etermined upon. You may as well face
it, Wally. I am on the stage, and I intend to stay on it."

"Look here, Bryce, take a word of advice from me. I meet this every day.
Girls get this germ, and my experience is that it's better to let the
disease run its course. If you force her to go back to school, she has a
grievance for life. If she goes back of her own accord, she's cured."

"It's ridiculous! We'd be the laughing stock of the town!"

"Oh, no; it happens in the best families. Believe me, it is not such bad
training for young women who have never been disciplined--like your
daughter. She'll get it, in this business. She'll learn to obey orders
and to respect authority."

"But she's struck on herself now, and if she goes on the stage----"

"Don't bother; we'll take that out of her," remarked Cartel.

Wally looked from Isabelle's set face to the manager's smiling one.

"What is your idea?" he asked.

"Let her try it. Let her live at home. Send her back and forth in your
car; protect her, of course. But let her have her fling; it won't take
long," said Cartel, with a wise nod at Wally.

"Try it, Wally, just give me a chance," cried the near actress.

"Your mother will raise the roof!" he began.

"She'll come round, if you back me up."

"I don't know," he said, miserably.

Isabelle flew at him and hugged him wildly.

"Oh, Wally, you're a dear," she cried, thus committing him to partnership.

"We needn't treat Cartel to our family reconciliations," he said.

"Come take me to lunch, then. I have to be back at two. That isn't much
of a part," she added to Cartel.

"No? Well, we all must begin, you know. That is the first blow to young
ladies of your proclivities."

He rose, and bowed them out, as sign of dismissal. Wally and Isabelle
went to lunch, and it took them so long to work out their plans--where
Isabelle was to stay at present, how the matter was to be presented to
Max, and such weighty subjects--that Isabelle was late to rehearsal, and
was sharply reprimanded.

She felt this to be very unjust as her line did not come for a long
time. At the end of a long, tedious day, she went home to dine in lonely
state with the caretaker as cook, and to crawl into bed immediately
thereafter.

Wally managed the situation very well. He made Max see the futility of
fighting their child; he assured her that Cartel promised that the
seizure would be brief. He looked up old Miss Watts, and engaged her to
act a