rocker. Maybe later, but right at the moment--"

His broad-shouldered, lean athletic form drifted through my door and was
gone.

Two weeks later _Parodisiac_ arrived, typed on fools-cap, uncorrected,
with pencil notations and coffee-spots on it, but it was by-lined,
"Hillary Hardy," and after a single, quick scanning I was overjoyed to
pay the expense of transcribing it to more durable paper. The play was
powerful, witty and emotion-stirring. It was a work of art.

And on the last page was scribbled in the border: "I looked into my tax
bill, and found you were right. I'm almost broke after Uncle Sam takes
his cut, so here is the play you asked for. Hope you like it. (signed)
H. H."

There was a P.S. "Expect to hit _birth_ this week."

When I phoned him at the sanitarium, asking for Sam Buckle, the name he
had left originally with Ellie, he refused to come to the phone. So I
wired him. "Quit worrying about taxes. I accept your earlier offer to be
your agent as well as producer. Good luck on your experiments."

_Parodisiac_ was much too good to hold for the closing of _Updraft_.
Indeed, the first play was showing no signs of weakening, so I began
rounding up talent outside the original cast. This was a cinch. Meredith
Crawley finished Act I, Scene I, and accepted the male lead without
turning another page. So did Alicia Pennington, even though it meant
giving up a personal appearance tour to publicize her latest Hollywood
release that was supposed to win her an Oscar.

Not that I had to go after talent like this to put _Parodisiac_ across.
It was so potent I believe I could have made it a hit with a cast out of
a burleycue revue.

The season was getting late, so I did the unthinkable. I cut normal
rehearsal time in half and slammed it at the big town without even a
trial run in the back-country. Nobody connected with the show
objected--not even Hec Blankenship, my publicity manager. In fact it was
he who suggested the sleeper treatment.

With nothing more than last-minute newspaper notices we opened the
box-office to a completely uninformed public, and did it knock the
critics for a loop! Only a couple showed up for the first performance,
along with less than a third-full house of casual first-nighters.

* * * * *

People wandered out stunned. A substitute drama-critic from the _Times_
looked me up after the show, and there were tears of gratitude in his
eyes. "My review of this