ng
chee-ild, gave a biting burlesque of the famous bedside visit that
brought the tears of laughter to his eyes, and the nurse flying from
down the hall. "This won't do," said that austere person.

"Won't, eh? Go on and stick your old thermometer in my mouth. What do I
care! A laugh like that is worth five degrees of temperature."

When Josie rose to leave he eyed her keenly, and pointed to the dragging
leg.

"How about that? Temporary or permanent?"

"Permanent."

"Oh, fudge! Who's telling you that? These days they can do--"

"Not with this, though. That one bone was mashed into about twenty-nine
splinters, and when it came to putting 'em together again a couple of
pieces were missing. I must've mislaid 'em somewhere. Anyway, I make a
limping exit--for life."

"Then no more stage for you--eh, my girl?"

"No more stage."

Hahn reached for a pad of paper on the table at his bedside, scrawled a
few words on it, signed it "S.H." in the fashion which became famous,
and held the paper out to her.

"When you get out of here," he said, "you come to New York, and up to my
office; see? Give 'em this at the door. I've got a job for you--if you
want it."

And that was how Josie Fifer came to take charge of the great Hahn &
Lohman storehouse. It was more than a storehouse. It was a museum. It
housed the archives of the American stage. If Hahn & Lohman prided
themselves on one thing more than on another, it was the lavish
generosity with which they invested a play, from costumes to carpets. A
period play was a period play when they presented it. You never saw a
French clock on a Dutch mantel in a Hahn & Lohman production. No hybrid
hangings marred their back drop. No matter what the play, the firm
provided its furnishings from the star's slippers to the chandeliers.
Did a play last a year or a week, at the end of its run furniture,
hangings, scenery, rugs, gowns, everything, went off in wagonloads to
the already crowded storehouse on East Forty-third Street.

Sometimes a play proved so popular that its original costumes, outworn,
had to be renewed. Sometimes the public cried "Thumbs down!" at the
opening performance, and would have none of it thereafter. That meant
that costumes sometimes reached Josie Fifer while the wounds of the
dressmaker's needle still bled in them. And whether for a week or a year
fur on a Hahn & Lohman costume was real fur; its satin was silk-backed,
its lace real lace. No paste, or tinsel, or