Thomas
Batchgrew seemed to be quite at home in the theatre; he wore no hat
and there was a pen behind his ear. Never would she have set foot
inside the Imperial de Luxe had she guessed that Thomas Batchgrew was
concerned in it. She thought she had heard once, somewhere, that he
had to do with cinemas in other parts of the country, but it would
not have occurred to her to connect him with a picture-palace so near
home. She was not alone in her ignorance of the councillor's share in
the Imperial. Practically nobody had heard of it until that night, for
Batchgrew had come into the new enterprise by the back door of a loan
to its promoters, who were richer in ideas than in capital; and now,
the harvest being ripe, he was arranging, by methods not unfamiliar to
capitalists, to reap where he had not sown.
Shame and fear overcame Rachel. The crystal dream was shivered
to dust. Awful apprehension, the expectancy of frightful events,
succeeded to it. She perceived that since the very moment of quitting
the house the dread of some disaster had been pursuing her; only she
had refused to see it--she had found oblivion from it in the new and
agitatingly sweet sensations which Louis Fores had procured for her.
Pages:
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226