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He said he had had no hesitation in offering Paula a contract to sing the leading dramatic soprano rôles at Ravinia this summer and that he had told her if it worked anywhere near as well as he expected it to there was no doubt of her getting a good Metropolitan engagement next season.
Oh, and I didn't mean you by that either." "It's nice to be nobody in that sense," he said. His next suggestion was that he get his car, start north up the shore with her, have dinner at one of the taverns along the road and deliver her in good season for a night's sleep in the cottage at Ravinia. But this suggestion was declined rather more curtly.
She extracted quite a bit of amusement from observing some of the results of individual failures to understand this fundamental difference, all the more after she had Jimmy Wallace to share observations with. He was a dramatic critic, but he consented to take a fatherly, or better avuncular, interest in the Ravinia season during the month of his musical colleague's vacation.
She must have read the troubled look in his face for she said at once and on a warmer note: "Oh, my dear, don't! Don't let my vagaries trouble you. Let me tell you the message I came with. It's about the other opera. They want to put it on at once up at Ravinia.
Once the work was interrupted, when he asked, rather tensely, "Do you want me to come to Ravinia?" She found herself at a loss for a categorical reply. She'd have thought that a whole-hearted yes would have been the only thing she could say. "I don't want you tortured any more with unheard melodies," she answered after a moment's reflection. His nod, decisive as it was, struck her as equivocal.
It had been agreed among them that with certain important changes, it would make an admirable vehicle for Paula's return to the operatic stage, and being a small affair from the producer's point of view, involving only one interior set, would be practicable for production during the summer at Ravinia in case the project for Paula's singing there went through.
She didn't want to be called to the telephone, ever, except on matters of professional business by her Ravinia colleagues. All of this, John pointed out, could be accomplished at home. He, himself, could deal with the telephoners and the tourists. This was about all apparently that he was going to be good for this summer; but a watchdog's duties he could perform in a highly efficient manner.
She told Rush when they left the table, that she had some shopping to do in town for Paula and meant to go on the afternoon train. She was expected back at Ravinia to-morrow anyhow.
This day that was closing down over the hill behind the apple house couldn't be, it seemed, the same that had dawned over the lake at Ravinia. The whole Ravinia episode, even as she told Lucile and March about it, seemed remote, like something out of a book; but became for that very reason, rather pleasant to dwell upon.
Novelli, as it happened, was not very productive of information. Half an hour before the dinner, his wife had telephoned Lucile to ask if he might bring a guest of his own, a certain Monsieur LaChaise, who was one of the conductors at the Metropolitan and was to have the direction of the summer opera out here at Ravinia this year.
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