hard on her hand not to let that laugh burst out.
The echoing bang of the piano lid seemed to give Mayhew some relief. He took up a pose by the fireplace, stared into the middle distance for a moment, and said in a grave, reasonable tone, ‘I’ve cabled Winnipeg and Duluth. They will rescind this pup’s admonishments, but it’s too late for that. We’ll take the high road and head out of here on Monday—work out the week so as not to leave bad feeling behind us, that is never good policy. Arriving a few weeks earlier in Edmonton will suit my plans very well.’
Mayhew pulled East & Verrall off the Starland bill as well, insisting that The Casting Couch required them and could not be remounted with new actors, and producing their contract, which held them to his production company, rather than to the Starland. Standard practice, he assured Aurora, and only the petty incompetence and lack of true vaudeville experience caused the ire of the Starland types.
That ire extended on Mr. Cocklington’s part to talk of ‘papers being served’—whatever that might mean—and led to a buzz of scandal among the vaudeville people in all the theatres. When Mayhew took the girls to luncheon at the Palliser on Sunday, a steady stream of newsmen and producers visited their table, bewailing their impending departure or prodding Mayhew for more information.
Aurora held her breath when the first plump producer came to the table with a jolly laugh and a sting in his conversation’s tail. But Mayhew had had his flash of temper and was perfectly urbane, dismissing the curious and the comforting alike with a laugh. ‘My interests in Edmonton proceed apace,’ he told the pressmen, genially. ‘It’s the City of Tomorrow, and I aim to be top of the heap up there.’
Aurora could not help but applaud his resilience. She’d expected him to stay in a temper for days after this new setback.
‘Happens all the time,’ he told her. ‘All we need is a free hand, free rein—and that’s what we’re going to have at the Muse. Besides, we’re no worse off for a couple of weeks’ receipts from the Starland. Calgary is a terrible one-horse town, I’ve always hated it,’ he said, glaring out the window at the broad expanse of 9th Avenue, empty on a Sunday of anything but his car, left parked on the dusty street, and a single lonely wagon.
The Pierce-Arrow shone in the sunlight, hungry for the open road again, even if it was heading farther north.
INTERMISSION
7.
North Pole
SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 1914
The Muse, Edmonton
Always leave the audience wanting a little bit more, but by all means take your share without overdoing it, as you will find at times some audiences that seem frozen to their seats with a North Pole expression to their faces.
FREDERICK LADELLE, HOW TO ENTER VAUDEVILLE
September in Edmonton—sixteen months they’d been stuck in this North Pole city. The streetcar ran through backyards on its way to the High Level Bridge, as they rode home from the Muse after the matinee. Bella and Clover liked to stand along this stretch, ready for the dizzying view off the top of the bridge.
Aurora sat with hands clasped in her lap. Overgrown rhubarb reached up rusty fluted leaves to the car window; small leaves shifting on the city’s spindly trees were tinged with yellow. Everything was aging, turning back to winter. It made Aurora want to leap up and run south.
But you don’t run from the lap of luxury. Fitz had moved them out of the King Edward Hotel (last June, when things began to run tight at the Muse), but the Arlington Apartments were luxury too, the newest and best in the city. The very desirable top floor, riverside corner, for their own suite; a separate apartment for Mama and the girls, two floors down, so they were not living in each other’s pockets. Bella took great delight in the Murphy bed in their suite’s parlour, swivel-flipping out of its shining mahogany pocket like Long Chak Sam’s conjurer’s boxes; her pleasure made Aurora happy. Pretty kitchenettes let them do for themselves, at least breakfast and cups of tea. Aurora had caught herself resenting it when Fitz told her to have eggs and bacon on hand, and then laughed to think how quickly she could progress from fearing for their lives and dining on bread-and-milk—if at all—to being too fancy to cook an egg.
Fitz was not often in for breakfast these days. He was busy doing the rounds of