have to do when you talk all the time."

A manager on the eve of producing a new play, with his reputation at
stake, may be excused for being a trifle irritable. Patty merely
shrugged her shoulders and descended through the stage-door to the
half-lighted hall, where she found Cathy Fair strolling up and down the
center aisle in an apparently aimless manner.

"Hello, Cathy," said Patty; "what are you doing over here?"

"I'm head usher, and I wanted to see if those foolish sophomores had
mixed up the numbers again."

"It strikes me they're a trifle close together," said Patty, sitting
down and squeezing in her knees.

"Yes, I know; but you can't get eight hundred people into this hall any
other way. When we once get them packed they'll have to sit still,
that's all. What are you doing over here yourself?" she continued. "I
didn't know you were on the committee. Or are you just helping
Georgie?"

"I'm in the cast," said Patty.

"Oh, are you? I saw the program to-day, but I'd forgotten it. I've often
wondered why you haven't been in any of the class plays."

"Fortune and the faculty are against it," sighed Patty. "You see, they
didn't discover my histrionic ability before examinations freshman year,
and after examinations, when I was asked to be in the play, the faculty
thought I could spend the time to better advantage studying Greek. At
the time of the sophomore play I was on something else and couldn't
serve, and this year I had just been deprived of my privileges for
coming back late after Christmas."

"But I thought you said you were in it?"

"Oh," said Patty, "it's a minor part, and my name doesn't appear."

"What sort of a part is it?"

"I'm a crash."

"A crash?"

"Yes, 'a crash without.' Lord Bromley says, 'Cynthia, I will brave all
for your sake. I will follow you to the ends of the earth.' At this
point a crash is heard without. I," said Patty, proudly, "am the crash.
I sit behind a moonlit balcony in a space about two feet square, and
drop a lamp-chimney into a box. It may not sound like a very important
part, but it is the pivot upon which the whole plot turns."

"I hope you won't be taken with stage-fright," laughed Cathy.

"I'll try not," said Patty. "There comes the butler and Lord Bromley and
Cynthia. I've got to go and make them up."

"Why are you making people up, if you are not on the committee?"

"Oh, once, during a period of mental weakness, I took china-painting
lessons, and I'm