P G Wodehouse - Man Upstairs

by Man Upstairs

  Almost from the first Rutherford had a feeling that he had met the man before, that he knew him. As their acquaintance progressed-the actor was in an expansive mood, and talked much before coming to business-the feeling grew. Then he understood. This was Willie, and no other. The likeness was extraordinary. Little turns of thought, little expressions-they were all in the play.

  The actor paused in a description of how he had almost beaten a champion at golf, and looked at the parcel.

  "Is that the play?" he said.

  "Yes," said Rutherford. "Shall I read it?"

  "Guess I'll just look through it myself. Where's Act I.? Here we are! Have a cigar while you're waiting?"

  Rutherford settled himself in his chair, and watched the other's face. For the first few pages, which contained some tame dialogue between minor characters, it was blank.

  " 'Enter Willie,' " he said. "Am I Willie?"

  "I hope so," said Rutherford, with a smile. "It's the star part."

  "H'm."

  He went on reading. Rutherford watched him with furtive keenness. There was a line coming at the bottom of the page which he was then reading which ought to hit him, an epigram on golf, a whimsical thought put almost exactly as he had put it himself five minutes back when telling his golf story.

  The shot did not miss fire. The chuckle from the actor and the sigh of relief from Rutherford were almost simultaneous.

  Winfield Knight turned to him.

  "That's a dandy line about golf," said he.

  Rutherford puffed complacently at his cigar.

  "There's lots more of them in the piece," he said.

  "Bully for you," said the actor. And went on reading.

  Three-quarters of an hour passed before he spoke again. Then he looked up.

  "It's me," he said; "it's me all the time. I wish I'd seen this before I put on the punk I'm doing now. This is me from the drive off the tee. It's great! Say, what'll you have?"

  Rutherford leaned back in his chair, his mind in a whirl. He had arrived at last. His struggles were over. He would not admit of the possibility of the play being a failure. He was a made man. He could go where he pleased, and do as he pleased.

  It gave him something of a shock to find how persistently his thoughts refused to remain in England. Try as he might to keep them there, they kept flitting back to Alcala.

  VI

  Willie in the Wilderness was not a failure. It was a triumph. Principally, it is true, a personal triumph for Winfield Knight. Everyone was agreed that he had never had a part that suited him so well. Critics forgave the blunders of the piece for the sake of its principal character. The play was a curiously amateurish thing. It was only later that Rutherford learned craft and caution. When he wrote Willie he was a colt, rambling unchecked through the field of play-writing, ignorant of its pitfalls. But, with all its faults, Willie in the Wilderness was a success. It might, as one critic pointed out, be more of a monologue act for Winfield Knight than a play, but that did not affect Rutherford.

  It was late on the opening night when he returned to Alcala. He had tried to get away earlier. He wanted to see Peggy. But Winfield Knight, flushed with success, was in his most expansive mood. He seized upon Rutherford and would not let him go. There was supper, a gay, uproarious supper, at which everybody seemed to be congratulating everybody else. Men he had never met before shook him warmly by the hand. Somebody made a speech, despite the efforts of the rest of the company to prevent him. Rutherford sat there, dazed, out of touch with the mood of the party. He wanted Peggy. He was tired of all this excitement and noise. He had had enough of it. All he asked was to be allowed to slip away quietly and go home. He wanted to think, to try and realize what all this meant to him.

  At length the party broke up in one last explosion of handshaking and congratulations; and, eluding Winfield Knight, who proposed to take him off to his club, he started to walk up Broadway.

  It was late when he reached Alcala. There was a light in his room. Peggy had waited up to hear the news.

  She jumped off the table as he came in.

  "Well?" she cried.

  Rutherford sat down and stretched out his legs.

  "It's a success," he said. "A tremendous success!"

  Peggy clapped her hands.

  "Bully for you, George! I knew it would be. Tell me all about it. Was Winfield good?"

  "He was the whole piece. There was nothing in it but him." He rose and placed his hands on her shoulders. "Peggy, old girl, I don't know what to say. You know as well as I do that it's all owing to you that the piece has been a success. If I hadn't had your help-"

  Peggy laughed.

  "Oh, beat it, George!" she said. "Don't you come jollying me. I look like a high-brow playwright, don't I! No; I'm real glad you've made a hit, George, but don't start handing out any story about it's not being your own. I didn't do a thing."

  "You did. You did everything."

  "I didn't. But, say, don't let's start quarrelling. Tell me more about it. How many calls did you take?"

  He told her all that had happened. When he had finished, there was a silence.

  "I guess you'll be quitting soon, George?" said Peggy, at last. "Now that you've made a home-run. You'll be going back to that rube joint, with the cows and hens-isn't that it?"

  Rutherford did not reply. He was staring thoughtfully at the floor. He did not seem to have heard.

  "I guess that girl'll be glad to see you," she went on. "Shall you cable to-morrow, George? And then you'll get married and go and live in the rube house, and become a regular hayseed and-" She broke

  off suddenly, with a catch in her voice. "Gee," she whispered, half to herself, "I'll be sorry when you go, George."

  He sprang up.

  "Peggy!"

  He seized her by the arm. He heard the quick intake of her breath.

  "Peggy, listen!" He gripped her till she winced with pain. "I'm not going back. I'm never going back. I'm a cad, I'm a hound! I know I am. But I'm not going back. I'm going to stay here with you. I want you, Peggy. Do you hear? I want you!"

  She tried to draw herself away, but he held her.

  "I love you, Peggy! Peggy, will you be my wife?"

  There was utter astonishment in her grey eyes. Her face was very white.

  "Will you, Peggy?"

  "You're hurting me."

  He dropped her arm.

  "Will you, Peggy?"

  "No!" she cried.

  He drew back.

  "No!" she cried sharply, as if it hurt her to speak. "I wouldn't play you such a mean trick. I'm too fond of you, George. There's never been anybody just like you. You've been mighty good to me. I've never met a man who treated me like you. You're the only real white man that's ever happened to me, and I guess I'm not going to play you a low-down trick like spoiling your life. George, I thought you knew. Honest, I thought you knew. How did you think I lived in a swell place like this, if you didn't know? How did you suppose everyone knew me at Rector's? How did you think I'd managed to find out so much about Winfield Knight? Can't you guess?"

  She drew a long breath.

  "I-"

  He interrupted her hoarsely.

  "Is there anyone now, Peggy?"

  "Yes," she said, "there is."

  "You don't love him, Peggy, do you?"

  "Love him?" She laughed bitterly. "No; I don't love him."

  "Then come to me, dear," he said.

  She shook her head in silence. Rutherford sat down, his chin resting in his hands. She came across to him, and smoothed his hair.

  "It wouldn't do, George," she said. "Honest, it wouldn't do. Listen. When we first met, I-I rather liked you, George, and I was mad at you for being so fond of the other girl and taking no notice of me-not in the way I wanted, and I tried-Gee, I feel mean. It was all my fault. I didn't think it would matter. There didn't seem no chance then of your being able to go back and have the sort of good time you wanted; and I thought you'd just stay here and we'd be pals a
nd-but now you can go back, it's all different. I couldn't keep you. It would be too mean. You see, you don't really want to stop. You think you do, but you don't!"

  "I love you," he muttered.

  "You'll forget me. It's all just a Broadway dream, George. Think of it like that. Broadway's got you now, but you don't really belong. You're not like me. It's not in your blood, so's you can't get it out. It's the chickens and roses you want really. Just a Broadway dream. That's what it is. George, when I was a kid, I remember crying and crying for a lump of candy in the window of a store till one of my brothers up and bought it for me just to stop the racket. Gee! For about a minute I was the busiest thing that ever happened, eating away. And then it didn't seem to interest me no more. Broadway's like that for you, George. You go back to the girl and the cows and all of it. It'll hurt some, I guess, but I reckon you'll be glad you did."

  She stooped swiftly, and kissed him on the forehead.

  "I'll miss you, dear," she said, softly, and was gone.

  Rutherford sat on, motionless. Outside, the blackness changed to grey, and the grey to white. He got up. He felt very stiff and cold.

  "A Broadway dream!" he muttered.

  He went to the mantelpiece and took up the photograph. He carried it to the window where he could see it better.

  A shaft of sunlight pierced the curtains and fell upon it.

  The End

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