Part 24 (1/2)

”Da da da, da da da.

Da da dum de da da da,

The caissons go rolling along-”

”No, listen,” she said. ”I know all the words. Listen.

”Over hill, over dale,

All along the dusty trail,

The caissons go rolling along.

In and out, round about,

Hear them something, hear them shout,

And the caissons go rolling along.”

”Oh, yes, sure,” he said. ”That's the right way. Ah, Marjie, you've got a good voice.” And he added his music to hers.

”Then it's hi, hi, hee, the field ar-till-er-ee,

Lift up your voices loud and strong,

Where'er you go, you will always know

That the caissons are rolling along-

Keep 'em rolling-

The caissons are-”

There was harmony in the taxicab.

The New Yorker, September 16, 1933.

Glory in the Daytime.

Mr. Murdock was one who carried no enthusiasm whatever for plays and their players, and that was too bad, for they meant so much to little Mrs. Murdock. Always she had been in a state of devout excitement over the luminous, free, pa.s.sionate elect who serve the theater. And always she had done her wistful wors.h.i.+ping, along with the mul t.i.tudes, at the great public altars. It is true that once, when she was a particularly little girl, love had impelled her to write Miss Maude Adams a letter beginning ”Dearest Peter,” and she had received from Miss Adams a miniature thimble inscribed ”A kiss from Peter Pan.” (That was a day!) And once, when her mother had taken her holiday shopping, a limousine door was held open and there had pa.s.sed her, as close as that, a wonder of sable and violets and round red curls that seemed to tinkle on the air; so, forever after, she was as good as certain that she had been not a foot away from Miss Billie Burke. But until some three years after her marriage, these had remained her only personal experiences with the people of the lights and the glory.

Then it turned out that Miss Noyes, new come to little Mrs. Murdock's own bridge club, knew an actress. She actually knew an actress; the way you and I know collectors of recipes and members of garden clubs and amateurs of needlepoint.

The name of the actress was Lily Wynton, and it was famous. She was tall and slow and silvery; often she appeared in the role of a d.u.c.h.ess, or of a Lady Pam or an Honorable Moira. Critics recurrently referred to her as ”that great lady of our stage.” Mrs. Murdock had attended, over years, matinee performances of the Wynton successes. And she had no more thought that she would one day have opportunity to meet Lily Wynton face to face than she had thought-well, than she had thought of flying!

Yet it was not astounding that Miss Noyes should walk at ease among the glamorous. Miss Noyes was full of depths and mystery, and she could talk with a cigarette still between her lips. She was always doing something difficult, like designing her own pajamas, or reading Proust, or modeling torsos in plasticine. She played excellent bridge. She liked little Mrs. Murdock. ”Tiny one,” she called her.

”How's for coming to tea tomorrow, tiny one? Lily Wynton's going to drop up,” she said, at a therefore memorable meeting of the bridge club. ”You might like to meet her.”

The words fell so easily that she could not have realized their weight. Lily Wynton was coming to tea. Mrs. Murdock might like to meet her. Little Mrs. Murdock walked home through the early dark, and stars sang in the sky above her.

Mr. Murdock was already at home when she arrived. It required but a glance to tell that for him there had been no singing stars that evening in the heavens. He sat with his newspaper opened at the financial page, and bitterness had its way with his soul. It was not the time to cry happily to him of the impending hospitalities of Miss Noyes; not the time, that is, if one antic.i.p.ated exclamatory sympathy. Mr. Murdock did not like Miss Noyes. When pressed for a reason, he replied that he just plain didn't like her. Occasionally he added, with a sweep that might have commanded a certain admiration, that all those women made him sick. Usually, when she told him of the temperate activities of the bridge club meetings, Mrs. Murdock kept any mention of Miss Noyes's name from the accounts. She had found that this omission made for a more agreeable evening. But now she was caught in such a sparkling swirl of excitement that she had scarcely kissed him before she was off on her story.

”Oh, Jim,” she cried. ”Oh, what do you think! Hallie Noyes asked me to tea tomorrow to meet Lily Wynton!”

”Who's Lily Wynton?” he said.

”Ah, Jim,” she said. ”Ah, really, Jim. Who's Lily Wynton! Who's Greta Garbo, I suppose!”

”She some actress or something?” he said.

Mrs. Murdock's shoulders sagged. ”Yes, Jim,” she said. ”Yes. Lily Wynton's an actress.”

She picked up her purse and started slowly toward the door. But before she had taken three steps, she was again caught up in her sparkling swirl. She turned to him, and her eyes were s.h.i.+ning.

”Honestly,” she said, ”it was the funniest thing you ever heard in your life. We'd just finished the last rubber-oh, I forgot to tell you, I won three dollars, isn't that pretty good for me?-and Hallie Noyes said to me, 'Come on in to tea tomorrow. Lily Wynton's going to drop up,' she said. Just like that, she said it. Just as if it was anybody.”

”Drop up?” he said. ”How can you drop up?”

”Honestly, I don't know what I said when she asked me,” Mrs. Murdock said. ”I suppose I said I'd love to-I guess I must have. But I was so simply-Well, you know how I've always felt about Lily Wynton. Why, when I was a little girl, I used to collect her pictures. And I've seen her in, oh, everything she's ever been in, I should think, and I've read every word about her, and interviews and all. Really and truly, when I think of meeting her-Oh, I'll simply die. What on earth shall I say to her?”