er hands together on her breast, her eyes
wide with terror and remorse, starts running to her brother.

CURTAIN!

Can you _see_ it, Sally? Do you think it will "get across?" Will
I be able to "put it over"?

Now, convoyed by Rodney Harrison, I'm off to the Booking Office with
a 'script, enchantingly typed in black and scarlet, under my arm and
hope in my heart.

Jauntily,

JANE.

_Later._

P.S. They were quite wonderful to me, which is to say, they
pronounced "not bad" and will cast it at once. They talk vaguely of
changes and "gingering it up," and "adding a little pep," but say
that can be done at rehearsals.

I started to say I preferred not to have any alterations made, but I
thought it would be more tactful to wait and see.

Oh, but the forlorn wretches in the waiting room! Some of them had
been there for hours and when the proud and prosperous-looking Rodney
sent in his name and we were taken in at once without waiting for our
turn and they looked at me with their mournful made-up eyes I felt as
if my wicked French heels were on their necks. I noticed one girl,
particularly; there was something so gallant about her cracked and
polished shoes, her mended gloves, her collar, laundered to a cobweb
thinness, and about the improbable sea-shell pink in her hollow
cheeks. She had a sort of eager, sharpened sweetness in her face and
a regular Burne-Jones jaw.

I refused tea and said farewell to Rodney uptown and walked home, and
on the way I saw her again, standing outside of one of the white and
shining _Cafe des Enfants_, watching the man turn the muffins. She
opened a collapsed little purse and poked about in it for an instant
and then shut it again and turned away. Before I knew what I meant
to do, I heard myself saying, "Hello! I saw you just now at the
Booking Office, didn't I? I wish you'd come in and have some coffee
and butter cakes,--I detest eating alone!"

She hung back a bit but they are not formal in her world, and in we
went. Sally, I wish you could have seen that poor thing eat! She's
been sick and out of work and fearfully depressed. I've got her name
and address and if all goes as well with this vaudeville work as
Rodney thinks it will, I may be able to help her. At any rate, she's
stuffed like a Christmas turkey at this moment.