The Black Cat (magazine)/Volume 22/Number 2/Lost—A Star
LOST—A STAR
BY KENNETH VAUX REED
A fall from a second story window is generally more or less painful. Certainly there is rarely any romance in it. But then, the girl in this story wasn't looking for romance, she was trying to avoid it.
VY'S trousered legs swung gayly even while she frowned severely at a fold of her wide white smock which she creased and recreased. Ivy's feet were like that—eternally optimistic, dance feet. And, sitting there on the sill of Perreard's second-story window, she was merry in spite of the seriousness of the business in hand.
"Nothing to it, Harvey." She shook her head without turning to look at the moist, chubby tenor who pleaded at her shoulder. "I can't see you that way."
"Aw, be a good fellow, sweetie," the little fat man begged peevishly, coaxingly. "Just try and look once. You and I hitched up could go out over the big time together and show vaudeville what's what. You've been there and got a rep, I know. That's why Perry just the same as stars you here in his bum cabaret. It'd be kinda like hitching my wagon to a star I suppose, but I'm willing. Sing me the pretty tune this time. C'mon." His hot breath was on her neck, his cheek against hers, one arm behind her, the other circling in front to meet it. He was fat and warm and excited. The physical contact made Ivy frown and her foot stop swinging for an instant, but she had long since learned to endure this thing from men she could not ignore altogether. She sat still in his embrace.
Behind them, in Perry's, was the buzz of the cabaret diners and over that the boisterous delivery of a vaudeville monologuist. The faint glow of light that strained through the coarse canvas of the scenery on Perry's miniature stage to lighten the gloom all about them, came from the great hot room where Perry's patrons, rejoicing in the belief that they were happy as Parisians only are happy, consumed carelessly prepared food and carefully adulterated wine and all the while applauded the excellence of the entertainment provided. For Perry's is one of the oldest of the cabarets in this country and the best as a place of amusement. There the spirit of the cabaret is preserved.
So long was Ivy silent that the fat man finally concluded she was not going to answer him.
"Silence tokens assent," he murmured and tried to kiss her. Her hand went up to his face and turned it away easily, carelessly. And again she was silent, suffering his embrace, her face turned away from the light outward to the listless breeze from the darkness of the street below. Even this darkness was broken by bright light in two paths from the windows of Perreard's Restaurant—the downstairs one where stupid people, uninterested in French songs and music with their meals, took advantage of the economic opportunity offered in Perreard's sixty-cent dinner. Just the lobe of her ear and a straying strand of her bright hair peeping from under the floppy velvet tam-o'-shanter, the curving line of her jaw and a very small patch of her cheek were caught in a high light by the glow behind her. Instead of the professional smile on her lips was a wistful one her public had never seen. But the one foot hanging free under the sill swung almost as briskly as ever.
"I'm different from most girls in the profession, Harvey," she spoke at last.
"Sure you are," agreed the tenor tightening his embrace. "That's why I want you."
Ivy loosened his arms a little and went on as if he hadn't spoken. "I left a happy home over on the edge of Jersey to go on the stage. My folks weren't crazy about my going, but I didn't have to run away. Guess I was like all the stage-struck Janes though. Nothing would do but I must 'develop my talent' and be a Broadway planet.
"But, Harvey, I landed a job the first day in the big wicked city, went into a musical stock organization that summer and into vaudeville the next season with a good act. In the spring I went out on the U. B. circuit with my own tabloid company. It was too easy. And right now I'm as much of a star as I'll ever be—willingly. There isn't anything I hate just at this minute like the smell of the theatre, and the glare, and the lights on the bald heads, and the feel of the grease on my lips. Here Perry's got me down for a new song tonight—by Berlin—sure-fire hit. And here I am dolled up like a little Artie art student in velvet pants and a silk smock like no artist ever wore and tam-o'-shanter—all ready to go on and sing, "The Picture of My Dreams," before the admiring throng. Am I satisfied? No. What do I want? I don't know. But one thing sure: The stage has gone stale on me. I wish now I'd stayed home. As the cartoons say, 'Father was right'. It's my own fault, I guess. I thought I had a life work and now the bottom's fallen out of it. I'm going to drop out of the show business, Harvey. So if you want to marry a partner for vaudeville,—forget me, that's all."
The fat tenor looked around into her face. "I get you, sweetie. What you want is a home and kids and fireside stuff. I'm dippy about you. I'll go that far. Just say the word and there's a flat up in—"
"Maybe you're right," was Ivy's listless interruption. "Home and kids and fireside sound good. But there's got to be more. Something you ain't got. Something that isn't in you. So just run along, Harvey—and forget it."
Instead, the perspiring man drew her against his chest tightly and pushed his face over her shoulder against her own. "I'm damned if I do, Ivy. You're a little queen and I want you. The only one I ever felt like this about! I'm going to wake you up yet." He sought her lips.
"Cut it," cried Ivy, roused to anger at last. "I've said 'no' and that's all there is to it. It's your cue for a quick exit. Good night!" She drew her hands up between them and laid them on his shirt front, holding him away. "Let go! Let go, I say, Harvey. Don't be a fool. I can—" She pushed suddenly so that the starched shirt front wrinkled and crackled loudly. But the tenor was heavy. The push worked just contrary to her expectation. She slipped outward on the window sill, wildly reaching for a hold on something, anything. Her fingers caught his collar, pulled, broke it. And Ivy slipped suddenly downward."
The awning over the restaurant entrance broke her fall. She flapped down to the pavement on hands and knees enveloped in a swirl of canvas, but not even scratched.
The first thing she did was to laugh—a merry peal, muffled under the canvas. Almost immediately she was conscious of hands tearing excitedly at the chaos that covered her, and, in an instant, she was able to scramble up, the last fold falling away from her. There she stood, in the flare of light from one of Perreard's lower windows, a jaunty figure in tam-o'-shanter, smock and velveteen trousers, smiling happily and beating the dust from her clothes. Facing her, the full light on his lean face, was a tall, earnest-eyed young fellow, evidently the man who had extricated her from the wreckage. He was talking and holding her arm, demanding to know if she were hurt. Behind them, in the restaurant, people were rising to their feet, waiters were hurrying toward them. Ivy saw them and looked down at her costume. A vivid imagination showed her, in a flash, how they would crowd around, asking silly questions, and storing up information to spread all over the city. Off stage, she was seized with stage-fright.
"Quick!" whispered Ivy, and her happy-go-lucky feet turned of their own accord. "I've got to hide. Please,—just for a minute." As the door of the restaurant opened, Ivy slipped with her rescuer into the darkness, moving swiftly, running along the dark street until the young man drew her aside into a darkened store entrance.
"Far enough!" he breathed, and they both paused, a little breathless.
In the half light, Ivy could see her rescuer leaning against the plate glass window, tall and blonde, slender and boyish. He was very serious she could see vaguely.
"Why did we run?" he asked abruptly.
"We ran to—because—because they were coming,—the waiters,—the people. I didn't want to be seen—in these clothes." Though she had thought nothing of appearing before the cabaret crowd at Perreard's in the costume, Ivy blushed a little under his frank scrutiny.
"A hod carrier appears before all eyes in his overalls. Why should you not be seen in your working clothes?" The young man eyed her sententiously.
Ivy looked sharply at him, then down at the smock and trousers. "Working clothes?" Then, "Of course." Again she regarded him earnestly, puzzled. "But I've never worn these on the street before."
"You're not ashamed of them, though?" he interrogated. A moment he was silent, then sighed deeply. "It's the dream of my life—to be an artist. Please say you're not ashamed of your profession."
Only a second did Ivy puzzle over that before she answered. "No, not in the least." This was true whether he spoke of painters or actors. There was a suspicion in her mind, though, that he had made the mistake. Anyway, she never had been ashamed of her profession.
"I'm glad of that," he nodded. "For in God's world there are no nobler men than the artists."
Again she wondered whether he was speaking of artists in a large sense or particularly in reference to creators of pictures. And too, this time she was struck by the exclusive masculinity of his sentiment. She asked herself whether he could be making another mistake, a great big ludicrous mistake.
"There are women who paint, too," she said airily, in the tone of an impersonal observation. Then added in slight confusion, "I mean women artists, of course."
"Oh, certainly," he agreed, impatiently, she thought. "But I can't believe there is much sex rivalry in art. We give the women honor due. I mean we men do. Don't you think so?"
Ivy nodded sagely, exercising all her self-control. "Oh, we do. Indeed we do." She wanted to laugh immoderately. His mistake was so absurdly absurd. And yet she could not put him straight. She knew well that she could not face his serious regard and explain as kindly as he deserved to have it explained that she was an actress, a dancer instead of an inspired painter of pictures; that the trousers were a costume, not a habit.
Biting her lips to keep from smiling, she turned from him and stole on tiptoe to the corner of the show window to peep cautiously around. In front of the restaurant was Perreard himself, his hands flitting all ways at arm's length, his feet stamping the hard pavement. Several waiters jabbered with him excitedly, and bystanders joined in the fun. "Oh, I must go back," she told the young man, turning to him. "I'm needed. I've got to go—in only a minute." But after two minutes she still lingered. He joined her at the window corner and together they watched the crowd.
"Look here," he began suddenly. "You don't want to appear before that crowd do you? And unless you do, you can't get back to your studio until the excitement is over. Meanwhile—if you could stay—I—I'd like to talk to you,—if you'd let me,—please." There was eagerness and earnestness in his face, a sort of boyish enthusiasm that made Ivy want to stay. She wavered for an instant. She was thinking of Perreard. But again she turned the way her feet wanted to go, giving a mental snap of her fingers in his direction.
They drew back into the entrance.
"You see, I've never talked to a real artist before," the boy explained. "And I'm madly interested in painting. To nurse a canvas from absolute bleakness to something real, almost breathing, the counterpart of life itself, seems to me—But of course," he broke off shyly, "I am only an amateur. I haven't yet learned to know when I'm inspired and when I'm not. I've always felt that if I could just know an artist, talk to one, I could feel so much more confidence in myself and my work."
So serious was he that Ivy felt a little sorry for the deception. But she could not bring herself to confide. "Anything I can do for you,' she whispered, "I'll do gladly. 'Help one another' is almost an axiom among us. Besides,—you rescued me."
"Will you? Oh, will you?" the young man cried eagerly. "I knew you would. I prayed you would. You'll have the time. Wait while I get a taxi. Please don't think better of what you've promised. It means so much to me. Wait here." And he would have been off and away had not Ivy caught at his sleeve and clung in almost feminine fear.
"Wait a minute! Don't go! Please! Tell me first what you want."
"I'm afraid you won't do it. It's not much to ask. Please don't think of refusing."
"Yes, but what?"
The young man was quiet for a moment while the earnestness and pleading gathered in his eyes. "Only to look at my pictures. Tell me whether they're good or—or bad; whether I've got a chance. It means so much to me to know. Won't you come?"
Then, while Ivy was grasping the import of his request, the low-gear noises of a taxicab grated in the street, and from the direction of Perreard's came the vehicle gathering speed. The young man at her side darted forth, and in an instant too brief for reflection or consideration, too brief in fact for anything but a soft laugh over the mischief her feet were doing, she was in the machine.
There was no talk during the brief, swift ride. Ivy combed her memory for art phrases, professional-sounding words of vague meaning. Then she found herself waiting on the sidewalk in front of a dark, dingy building looming upward four stories or so. Her friend rejoined her.
"We could have walked," she suggested, nodding at the departing taxi. "Those things are expensive."
He smiled sadly. "Oh, I can afford it," he mourned. "It I were a real artist it might have occurred to me to walk. But I'm tied to a job and a salary, and my father gives me studio and room rent free here. That's why I have to paint afternoons and Sundays and do my drawing by artificial light. You draw in the evening sometimes, don't you?"
"Saturday night," replied Ivy gravely, and with little fear that he would catch her meaning. "I've got a reputation for drawing, too. That's the reason they pay me what I ask."
They had entered the gloomy building with its unlighted halls and climbed three flights of steps. Along a passage, they groped until the boy paused, and she heard the clink of keys. She wavered for a moment, then, with a smile, stood waiting.
"I've been after Father to put electric lights in this old barn," he explained as he bent to the keyhole. "There's only gas; but I think we can see all right. And please tell me the truth. I can stand it. I'd really rather not be flattered. This way." He threw open the door and walked in familiarly.
But before Ivy had taken a step she heard a sound,—a heavy rasping sound as of some one using a meat saw on a taut rope, She stood stockstill.
"What's that?" she whispered timorously. In spite of the role she was playing, her voice trembled. Her misgivings took shape and she reprimanded herself for being placed in such a position. "What's that?" she repeated.
"Come on," came her guide's voice from within the room. "It's only my room-mate. He sleeps like a log—in a sawmill. The lights won't wake him. Come on. And be careful of that chair—to the right of the door."
But Ivy was running away. On tiptoe she slipped down the corridor in the dark and, hearing him stumble over a chair and call out again softly, she stole down the stairway in mouselike silence. It was plain desertion. Yet the absurdity of it made her want to laugh aloud.
She ran a block after she had left the building, then stopped to look around. But before she could discover where she was, to her surprise, almost consternation, she caught sight of a tall shadow a block away,—a fleeting figure in headlong pursuit. She caught her breath. Pursuit! She hadn't dreamed he'd follow. For a moment she stood almost breathless, while he hammered on toward her.
Afterward she could recollect that a precious instant had been wasted while the thought flashed into her mind that she was glad in a wild, unaccountable way that the boy was following her. Then she had fled.
The rest of that mad chase she remembered as a breathless nightmare, a mere chaos of impressions. There was one vivid recollection of a narrow escape when, dodging about in a parked square, only his stumbling over a "Keep Off" sign had saved her. She had sped away, smock knotted about her waist, hair uncoiffed but safe in the bagging fold of the tam-o'shanter, free-limbed and swift, only a boy running in the shadows.
A street, darker than the rest, presented itself, its narrow opening partly concealed by a projecting porch. Dimly she realized that it led to a less admirable part of the city, but she could not halt. Into it she turned, running on tiptoe so that he might not hear her when he came to the corner behind. A short block and then a turn; another short block and a blank wall.
In consternation, Ivy paused. Back against the wall, her breast rising and falling in tumult, she listened. Only the city's sounding silence fell on her ears for long minutes that seemed like hours. She relaxed. The sigh she gave was genuine, not of relief, but akin to disappointment. Because now that she had escaped she felt sorry for the boy whom she had treated so badly—not intentionally, but badly, nevertheless. Then she remembered that he had been intent only on regaining his fleeing art critic; he had not known that this was a girl he pursued; he had given chase for none but selfish reasons. Indeed, she had fled to prevent his discovering that it was a girl who had run away from his roommate's snores. She was glad she had succeeded in eluding him. Only now that she was free she would like—she half wished that he could guess.
Then came footsteps pounding at the entrance of the blind alley.
Ivy thrilled, looked this way and that, laughing in the renewed joy of the chase. Overtake those flying feet, impertinent boy? Never. For beside the house at her left Ivy had discovered a narrow flight of stone steps mounting to some unknown level in the darkness.
Up she sprang, two steps at a time. But tired muscles refused to climb a thousand steps in five hundred bounds; and these steps were steep. So she was obliged to slacken her speed and plod step by step, up and up, until there seemed no end, and she was beginning to puff and pant. And in climbing those endless stairs she had to raise both hands several times to the faithful tarn in order to prevent its slipping off and spilling her hair about her shoulders.
Just as she saw the deep blue of the night sky above the top step, there came to her the sound of ascending steps, two at a time on the first few stairs, then one at a time, and slowing perceptibly. Ivy had come above the tops of the houses crowded close under the hill in the older part of the city, and when she saw the top step and beyond that the street along the edge of the hill and heard the hurrying footsteps behind her, she bounded up the remaining steps. Sharply to the left she turned, along the road overlooking the city, and came to an abrupt and jarring stop in the embrace of a giant, who resolved into a policeman at a glance. The insecure tam-o'-shanter slipped and dropped to the nape of her neck, revealing its burden of wavy curling locks to the copper's astonished eyes for a brief moment before she swept one arm swiftly upward to replace it and conceal her disordered hair.
"Holy St. Swithings! It's a girl!" whistled Officer Corrigan, and grasped Ivy's two arms just below the shoulders holding her off for inspection. "And a queen at that. What's up, my pretty lady? And where did you get the rig?"
"Let me go! Let me go,—p-please!" panted Ivy, weaving from side to side in a struggle to escape the arm of the law. "Come, officer. I've got to go on. You'll be sorry if—" Then changing her tone—"Please, sir," and smiled at him.
"Sure," chuckled Officer Corrigan, and still holding her in his great paws, he looked up and down the street "Just one, little queen, and I'll forget I met you." He released one of Ivy's arms so that he could press back his straggling mustache with two caressing sweeps of his great fingers. Ivy realized his intentions and fought madly, but succeeded only in keeping one arm free while he bent over her with a smug, grimacing face.
"Just put up your bail, little bird, and you're out o' jail," he smirked. "Put up your pretty face and you can say good-bye."
"You ugly mutt," sobbed Ivy, in rage and desperation, her free hand striving futilely to break the grip on her arm. "You're on the force to protect women. You—I'll see you smashed for this."
Officer Corrigan laughed nastily. And, as if bent on choking that ugly sound, out of the darkness of the stairway came a leaping figure. One machine-like blow and Ivy was free. She shrank back into the shadows, watching the blonde boy in action, fascinated. Unconsciously, keeping her eyes on the fray before her, she assured herself that the tam-o'-shanter was securely in position, hiding all her hair. And instinctively she drew farther back into the shadows, seeking a hiding place. She knew that whichever man was victorious she must not be found. But she crouched behind a fence to watch the struggle because she could not bring herself to run away.
The man from whom she had fled was proving himself a match for the burly policeman. After that one blow, delivered with all the force in him, he was in the grip of the bigger man.
"Blow your whistle," he panted as he locked his left arm in Officer Corrigan's right to prevent his reaching for the club behind him. "Make a row. Go on! I dare you!"
The officer struggled on in silence. Back they went against the railing that bordered the terraced street. Below them were the roofs of squalid houses and beyond that the great expanse of the city. The rail was stout iron yet it quivered under the weight thrown against it. Officer Corrigan was heavy. And for that reason—for his weight was fat, and malt liquor fat at that—Officer Corrigan began to puff and weaken. Swiftly the blonde boy's right arm went under the stout policeman's left armpit up to the shoulder. His chest pressed tight against the officer's; the moving arm came up behind Officer Corrigan's neck, then to the left side of it, and the hand slipped in front of his throat close under his chin. Officer Corrigan found his head going back, his chin up, his back bending backward. He attempted to relieve the strain and straighten up by stepping backward and away from the tense-faced, stern-jawed figure. His foot struck the other's foot placed behind him, and down he fell like a slaughtered bull, on his back.
The boyish man stood over him.
"Get up, scum! Get up and get out. Complain and howl for help if you dare. Come on! Up!" And he stirred the prostrate bully with his foot. Up clambered the fallen guardian of the law's majesty, pale of face and gasping.
"I—I'm—going—to die," Ivy heard him whimper, breathing jerkily.
"I hope so," said the stern figure over him. "But I'm afraid not. Haven't you ever had the wind knocked out of you before? Move on, officer. Move on!" Whining and cowed, Officer Corrigan moved.
The boy wiped the palm of his hand over his brow and laughed mirthlessly. He looked about him slowly, turned toward Ivy's hiding place and took a few doubtful steps. She knew he was looking for the man who could criticise his pictures.
"Girl!" he called. "Hello! Where are you, girl? Where are you?"
Crouched behind her fence, Ivy felt her heart leap as never in her happy life had it leaped before. With the tide of crimson that swept over her, swept also a tide of joy. He knew! He had known! The pursuit then had been the pursuit of life, the pursuit of man for woman! But within her was a strange constraint, perhaps a stupified happiness, or perhaps more; in any case, an influence she did not understand, but which restrained her.
"Girl!" he kept calling, up and down the shadow. For awhile she could not see him, but his voice came to her faintly. Again he passed near her hiding place. Soon his voice grew fainter and fainter—farther and farther away; then she heard it no more. Panic-stricken she sprang to her feet. She took two steps in the direction in which he had vanished, paused, then went on hastily.
"Boy!" she called. "Where are you? I'm here. I was hiding. Boy, where are you?"
Presently she saw him leaning on the iron rail.
"Boy," she called, "were you calling me? Were you looking for me?"
When he heard her, his body straightened and the blonde head raised swiftly. He came toward her, both hands extended.
"Why did you hide? Why did you run away from me?" he asked, the serious light burning in his eyes made her aware that on his questions depended the continuation of the earth's revolution or the rising of tomorrow's sun.
"I—I didn't think you knew," she whispered, her profile toward him, her gaze directed at the far horizon which suddenly flared a hot red in an arc over the gas houses where a door had been opened on roaring fires.
"Knew what?" His earnestness amounted to a compelling force.
Either from an instinctive resistance to force or from that strange constraint that had laid its hand on her once before, she was silent, still looking away from him.
"You were afraid," he accused.
Slowly she nodded. "Yes, I—I was afraid to have you know."
"Know what? Please, don't torment me."
"That I am a woman."
"Lord, yes! I knew that!" He laughed queerly, his flashing eyes betraying repressed emotion. The gas house flamed again on the edge of the sky. In a moment she was crushed against his breast, breathless, but tumultuously happy. She heard him whisper something unintelligible, but somehow she knew what he was saying and put her face up to his without a thought as to the wonder of it.
"Little sweetheart," he murmured, "did you think I didn't know the minute I saw you? Did you think your working clothes could fool me?"
She smiled up into his face greatly comforted. "Then you didn't mean me when you said 'we men,' back there? You never thought I was a man?"
He pressed her closer. "Glory, no! You couldn't even fool a policeman."
"But," and she forced herself to say it, "I'm not an artist. I don't know the difference between a palette and a—an easel."
Then he laughed aloud, his seriousness lost. "I knew that, too,—away back there when the taxi stopped under a street lamp and I saw your smock. It's entirely too clean."