Free The Joys of Love by Madeleine L'Engle Page A

college with her roommate at eleven o’clock in the morning, so afraid was she that they might not be on time for the rise of the afternoon curtain. The roommate sighed but did not attempt to reason with her. They were so early that they saw Valborg Andersen standing on the cold stage wearing an old raccoon coat and watching while the stage manager set the lights. Somehow that made the day even more wonderful than it had promised to be, this unofficial glimpse of the professional theatre in action.
    Elizabeth sat through the matinee in a state of ecstasy and insisted that they stay for the evening performance, too. Quite a group of other students came over to Springfield for it and afterwards went backstage.

    â€œComing, Liz?” they asked her.
    She shook her head.
    â€œBut why on earth not? You’re so crazy about her! And she said we could go back.”
    She shook her head again. “I just can’t.” She could not explain her reasons even to herself.
    â€œLiz, you should have come back,” her roommate told her afterwards. “She was wonderful to us. And even when I made a couple of criticisms about the production, she took it perfectly seriously as though my opinion meant something, and discussed it with me. She’s—oh, Liz, you should have come back. Why didn’t you?”
    â€œI don’t know,” Elizabeth repeated. “I—I admire her too much. I couldn’t have said anything if I’d gone back there.”
    â€œBut there were lots of things about the production you said you’d give anything to ask her about.”
    â€œYes—but I couldn’t have done it, just going back with a bunch of kids, when she’s so busy and tired.”
    Â 
    Elizabeth still couldn’t explain why she hadn’t gone backstage that night any more than she could explain why, during the past week that Miss Andersen had been rehearsing, she had not, like most of the apprentices, made some sort of excuse to speak to her. Bibi had brought her coffee; Ditta had found an opportunity to talk to her about using Shakespeare Prefaces for her students; Ben reported wonderful talks with her; and Jane had gone down the boardwalk to buy her cigarettes.
    Now she watched Ben and the actress for a moment longer; then, afraid that she might be noticed, she turned away
from the theatre and walked back to the Cottage. Four of the apprentices were out on the stone porch, wearing wet bathing suits and rehearsing a scene from Mourning Becomes Electra , which they had been practicing in their class with Huntley Haskell. Elizabeth watched them critically for a moment before heading inside. The living room was dark in the daytime and smelled cool and damp and musty. The furniture was covered with very old and very faded chintz and was always being pushed around for one rehearsal or another. The ceiling light, which reminded Elizabeth of some horrible overfed spider with its seven weak bulbs at the end of rusty iron legs, was on, and Jane and John Peter, setting the dining room tables for lunch, waved at her as she started upstairs.
    I can’t go back to Jordan, Elizabeth thought. Oh, please, I can’t.
    Â 
    The bedroom was deserted. Elizabeth stood looking at the pictures on the chest of drawers which she and Jane shared. Jane had a picture of her parents in a silver frame. She looked, oddly, amazingly, like both of them. There was also, on Jane’s portion of the bureau, a picture of John Peter, dark and moody, his nose an aristocratic beak, his eyes brooding and troubled. Elizabeth liked and respected John Peter, but she was never completely comfortable with him.
    On Elizabeth’s side of the bureau was a small double frame with a snapshot of her father seated at his desk in his office at the boys’ school, and a newspaper picture of her mother. Her father, as he appeared in the snapshot, was a serious-looking man, with a humorous quirk to his mouth, and eyes