extra backing? Twenty thousand honest-to-God dollars! I kissed ’em good-bye the very minute Nina first opened that dam’ pretty mouth, and her first note rasped across the footlights! Ain’t I the boob!”

Clifford smiled at the grotesquely disconsolate figure, but did not answer; he knew no answer was expected. But while he smiled, waiting, part of his brain was remarking that these seemingly reckless ventures of Loveman were in truth sound investments[28] on which, by the devious methods of his art, he later realized sumptuously. That twenty thousand, which would make the vain Nina regard him as her disinterested friend and adviser, wasn’t money thrown away—not in view of the whispered affair between the voiceless prima donna, and—

[28]

“Why should I be blowing my roll,” continued Loveman, “on these dam’ musical comedies—musical, say there’s some irony for you!—when what I’d have liked would have been to help back a show like ‘Justice.’ Or the Russian ballet. Nijinsky—there’s some artist for you!” His last words were vividly sincere; there was nothing more sincere about the little man than his admiration for the highest endeavors in art. “And yet my coin goes into ‘Orange Blossoms’! Is there an artistic Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde?—there is, and I’m the party—and that’s why my stomach, esophagus, palate, tongue, mouth, and all appertaining thereunto, are this A.M. composed of a faded and dusty Brussels carpet. But, my boy, you didn’t come here to listen to my woes. What can I do for you?”

A.M.

His humorously bewailing manner had suddenly dropped from him; he was brisk and alert, and his over-large eyes were fixed upon Clifford keenly. Clifford knew that there was little chance of deceiving this holder of the threads of destiny in a direct encounter.

“I came here, Loveman, to ask you for the address of Mary Regan.”

[29]Loveman looked puzzled. “Mary Regan—do I know her?”

[29]

Was there something behind this evasion? “You remember her if you remember getting Bradley off. She was in that case.”

“Oh, yes, I remember: slender—dark—handsome. But I haven’t seen her since the trial.”

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