ine. But now you are here,
don't go this minute, and I'll tell you why I think so much of Morton
Morrison. I don't know him, mind you--he doesn't know me from Adam--but
once long ago I had something to do with him. And God bless him, but
damn every other manager in London, for he was the only one of the lot
that gave me a civil hearing and a kind word!'

"I knew what he was talking about, and he knew that I knew, for we had
understood one another in the old days.

"'I took it to him last of all,' he went on, wiping his damp lips with
his hand. 'When I began hawking it about he was an unknown man; when his
turn came he was here. He let me read it to him. Then he asked me to
leave it with him for a week; and when I went back to him, he said what
they had all said--that it would never act! But Morton Morrison said it
nicely. And when he saw how it cut me up, into little bits, he got me to
tell him all about everything; and then he persuaded me to burn the
play, instead of ruining my life for it; and I burnt it in his
dressing-room fire, but the ruin was too far gone to mend. I wrote that
thing with my heart's blood--old man, you know I did! And none of them
would think of it! My God! But Morrison was good about it--he's a good
soul--and that's why you'll see me at every first night of his until the
drink finishes its work.'

"I had not followed him quite to the end. One thing had amazed me too
much.

"'You burnt your play,' I could only murmur, 'when it would have turned
into such a novel! Surely you have some draft of it still?'

"'I burnt the lot when I got home,' Pharazyn replied; 'and by-and-by I
shall join 'em and burn too!'

"I had nothing to answer to that, and was, besides, tenacious of my
point. 'I don't think much of the kindness that makes one man persuade
another to burn his work and throw up the sponge,' said I, with a good
deal of indignation, for I did feel wroth with that fellow Morrison--a
bread-and-butter drawing-room actor, whose very vogue used to irritate
me.

[Illustration: "WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THIS?"]

"'Then what do you think of this?' asked Pharazyn, as he dipped a hand
within his shabby coat, and cautiously unclenched it under my nose.

"'Why, it's a five-pound note!'

"'I know; but wasn't _that_ kind, then?'

"'So Morrison gave you this!' I exclaimed.

"Two or three persons had stopped to join us at the pit door, and
Pharazyn hastily put the note back in his pocket. As he did so,