that kind; nev' put up any hard-luck story y'
un'erstan'. But she'd bin outa work, sick. An' w'en she come back it
looked like her ac' was a frost. I run up on her in K.C., an'----"

"What is K.C.?"

"Why, Kansas City! We was on the bill there two weeks ago. Me an'
Florette was ole friends, see? No foolishness, if you know what I
mean. I'm a married man myse'f--Bowers there on the card's my
wife--but me an' Florette met about five years ago, an' kep' on
runnin' on to one another on the bill, first one place an' then
another. So she was glad to see me again, an' me her. 'W'y, w'ere's
Freddy?' I says, first thing. An' then I never seen any person's face
look so sad. But she begun tellin' me right off w'at a fine place the
kid was at, an' how the theayter wasn't no place for a chile. An' she
says, 'Bert, I wan' him to stay w'ere he's happy an' safe,' she says.
'Even if I nev' see him again,' she says. Well, it give me the shivers
then. Psychic, I guess."

Bert paused, staring into space.

"And then?" Miss Nellie asked gently.

"Well, like I was tellin' you, Florette had been playin' in hard luck.
Now I don' know whether you ladies know anything about the vodvil
game. Some ac's is booked out through the circuit from N' Yawk; others
is booked up by some li'l fly-by-night agent, gettin' a date here an'
a date there, terrible jumps between stands, see?--and nev' knowin'
one week where you're goin' the nex', or whether at all. Well,
Florette was gettin' her bookin' that way. An' on that you gotta make
good with each house you play, get me? An' somethin' had went wrong
with the ac' since I seen it las'. It useter be A Number I, y'
un'erstan', but looked like Florette had lost int'rust or somethin'.
She didn't put no pep into it, if you know what I mean. An' vodvil's
gotta be all pep. Then, too, her an' that partner of hers jawin' all
the time somethin' fierce. I could hear him raggin' her that af'noon,
an' me standin' in the wings, an' they slipped up on some of their
tricks terrible, an' the audience laughed. But not with 'em, at 'em,
y' un'erstan'! Well, so the ac' was a fros', an' they was cancelled."

"Cancelled?"

"Fired, I guess you'd call it. They was to play again that night an'
then move on, see?"

"Oh, yes."

"An' they didn't have no bookin' ahead. Florette come an' talked to me
again, an' she says again she wanted Freddy to be happy, an' git a
better start'n she'd had an' all. 'An,' Bert,' she says, 'if a