dy the rest out for yourself."

They both rose to their feet, Edna quite carried away by his enthusiasm
and his quick, jerky sentences, bristling with the things she wanted to
know.

"And remember, Miss Wyman, if you're ambitious, that the aim and end of
journalism is not the feature article. Avoid the rut. The feature is a
trick. Master it, but don't let it master you. But master it you must;
for if you can't learn to do a feature well, you can never expect to do
anything better. In short, put your whole self into it, and yet, outside
of it, above it, remain yourself, if you follow me. And now good luck to
you."

They had reached the door and were shaking hands.

"And one thing more," he interrupted her thanks, "let me see your
copy before you turn it in. I may be able to put you straight here and
there."

Edna found the manager of the Loops a full-fleshed, heavy-jowled
man, bushy of eyebrow and generally belligerent of aspect, with an
absent-minded scowl on his face and a black cigar stuck in the midst
thereof. Symes was his name, she had learned, Ernst Symes.

"Whatcher turn?" he demanded, ere half her brief application had left
her lips.

"Sentimental soloist, soprano," she answered promptly, remembering
Irwin's advice to talk up.

"Whatcher name?" Mr. Symes asked, scarcely deigning to glance at her.

She hesitated. So rapidly had she been rushed into the adventure that
she had not considered the question of a name at all.

"Any name? Stage name?" he bellowed impatiently.

"Nan Bellayne," she invented on the spur of the moment.
"B-e-l-l-a-y-n-e. Yes, that's it."

He scribbled it into a notebook. "All right. Take your turn Wednesday
and Saturday."

"How much do I get?" Edna demanded.

"Two-an'-a-half a turn. Two turns, five. Getcher pay first Monday after
second turn."

And without the simple courtesy of "Good day," he turned his back on her
and plunged into the newspaper he had been reading when she entered.

Edna came early on Wednesday evening, Letty with her, and in a telescope
basket her costume--a simple affair. A plaid shawl borrowed from the
washerwoman, a ragged scrubbing skirt borrowed from the charwoman, and a
gray wig rented from a costumer for twenty-five cents a night, completed
the outfit; for Edna had elected to be an old Irishwoman singing
broken-heartedly after her wandering boy.

Though they had come early, she found everything in uproar. The main
performance was under way, t