ed in the
afternoon frocks and until she herself had had a chance to give each of
them a final inspection and to make a few last touches and
readjustments. Then they all trooped out on the stage and stood in a
row, turned about, walked here and there, in obedience to Galbraith's
instructions shouted from the back of the theater.

It was dark out there and disconcertingly silent. The glow of two cigars
indicated the presence of Goldsmith and Block in the middle of a little
knot of other spectators.

The only response Rose got--the only index to the effect her labors had
produced--was the tone of Galbraith's voice. It rang on her ear a little
sharper, louder, and with more of a staccato bruskness than the
directions he was giving called for. And it was not his practise to put
more cutting edge into his blade, or more power behind his stroke, than
was necessary to accomplish what he wanted. He was excited, therefore.
But was it by the completeness of her success or the calamitousness of
her failure?

"All right," he shouted. "Go and put on the others."

There was another silence after they had fled out on the stage again,
clad tins time in the evening gowns--a hollow heart-constricting
silence, almost literally sickening. But it lasted only a moment. Then,
"Will you come down here, Miss Dane?" called Galbraith.

There was a slight, momentary, but perfectly palpable shock accompanying
these words--a shock felt by everybody within the sound of his voice.
Because the director had not said, "Dane, come down here." He had said,
"Will you come here, Miss Dane?" And the thing amounted, so rigid is the
etiquette of musical comedy, to an accolade. The people on the stage and
in the wings didn't know what she'd done, nor in what character she was
about to appear, but they did know she was, from now on, something
besides a chorus-girl.

Rose obediently crossed the runway and walked up the aisle to where
Galbraith stood with Goldsmith and Block, waiting for her. She was still
feeling a little numb and empty.

Galbraith, as she came up, held out a hand to her. "I congratulate you,
Miss Dane," he said. "They're admirable. With all the money in the
world, I wouldn't ask for anything handsomer."

Before she could say anything in reply, he directed her attention, with
a nod of the head, to the partners, and walked away. Rose gasped at
that. She'd never thought beyond him--beyond the necessity of pleasing
him; and that he'd carry