ds
or get a programme. What's doin'--variety or a tumpy-tump show?"

"Why," says she, "this is Shakespeare's 'Romeo and Juliet.'"

"Z-z-z-zing!" says I. "Stung again! Who unloaded the tickets on you?"

What d'ye think, though? She'd picked this show out all by herself, put
up real money for it--and that with two Injun drammers runnin' right on
Broadway! Said she'd seen the same thing half a dozen times before, too.
Aw, say! I couldn't get next to any such batty move as that. And when I
thought how this was my first plunge into a two-dollar chair, it made me
sore.

"Wake me up when it's all over," says I, and settles back for a real
rest.

There's where I hung out the wrong number. That wa'n't any dope drammer
at all. Course, Shakespeare don't know how to ring in burnin' flat
houses, or mill explosions, or any real thrillers like that; but there's
somethin' doin' in his pieces. There was in this one, anyway. It was
quite some time before I got any glimmer of what it was all about; but
before the first act was over I was sittin' up, all right.

"What do you think of her?" says Marjorie.

"The one with the Maxine Elliott eyes and the gushy voice?" says I. "Oh,
I don't call her such a much; but if Romeo wants her as bad as he says
he does, I hope it won't be a case of 'My pa won't let me.' But, say,
what for did they kill off the only real live one they had, that Mr.
Cuteo? Say, he was all to the good, and it was a shame to have him
punctured so quick!"

The parts I liked, though, wa'n't the ones that Marjorie got herself
worked up over. It was the balcony scene she'd come for. When they got
to that she grips the seat in front and glues her eyes on them two that
was swappin' the long, lingerin' breakaway tackles, and every once in
awhile she heaves up a sigh like cuttin' out an airbrake.

After it was all over, and most everybody that counted had swallowed
knockout drops, Marjorie gives me a sidelight on what's been runnin'
through her head.

"I could do that," says she. "I just know I could!"

"Do what?" says I.

"Why, Juliet's part. I've been studying it for months, ever since our
class gave it at school. They wouldn't give me a part then; but just you
wait! I'll show them!"

"You're joshin'," says I.

Honest, I didn't think she meant it. She didn't say any more about it,
and all the way home she was as quiet as a bale of hay.

That was the last I see of Marjorie for near a week. Then, one afternoon
as