But through it all, the shadows deepened, and a fixed conviction that he was moving towards catastrophe.  In spite of Watson’s touching words to him, he did not often let himself think of Phoebe.  Towards her, as towards so much else, his mind and heart were stiffened and voiceless.  But for hours in the night—­since sleeplessness was now added to his other torments—­he would brood on the loss of his child, would try to imagine her dancing, singing, sewing—­or helping her mother in the house.  Seventeen!  Why, soon no doubt they would be marrying her, and he, her father, would know nothing, hear nothing.  And in the darkness he would feel the warm tears rise in his eyes, and hold them there, proudly arrested.

The rehearsals in which he spent many hours of the week, generally added to his distress and irritation.  The play itself was, in his opinion, a poor vulgar thing, utterly unworthy of the ‘spectacle’ he had contrived for it.  He could not hide his contempt for the piece, and indeed for most of its players; and was naturally unpopular with the management and the company.  Moreover, he wanted his money desperately, seeing that the play had been postponed, first from November to February, and then from February to April; but the actor-manager concerned was in somewhat dire straits himself, and nothing could be got before production.

One afternoon, late in March, a rehearsal was nearing its completion, everybody was tired out, and everything had been going badly.  One of Fenwick’s most beautiful scenes—­carefully studied from the Trianon gardens on the spot—­had been, in his opinion, hopelessly spoilt in order to bring in some ridiculous ‘business’ wholly incongruous with the setting and date of the play.  He had had a fierce altercation on the stage with the actor-manager.  The cast, meanwhile, dispersed at the back of the stage or in the wings, looked on maliciously or chatted among themselves; while every now and then one or other of the antagonists would call up the leading lady, or the conceited gentleman who was to act Count Fersen, and hotly put a case.  Fenwick was madly conscious all the time of his lessened consideration and dignity in the eyes of a band of people whom he despised.  Two years before, his cooperation would have been an honour and his opinion law.  Now, nothing of the kind; indeed, through the heated remarks of the actor-manager there ran the insolent implication that Mr. Fenwick’s wrath was of no particular account to anybody, and that he was presuming on a commission he had been very lucky to get.

At last a crowd of stage-hands, setting scenery for another piece in the evening, invaded the stage, and the rehearsal was just breaking up when Fenwick, still talking in flushed exasperation, happened to notice two ladies standing in the wings, on the other side of the vast stage, close to the stage-entrance.