Mrs. Perkins. Thaddeus!
Perkins. I don't care, Bess, if Henry Cobb was the only friend you
ever had. I object to having my prints dumped into a Saratoga trunk
in order that he may confront Muddleton and regain the lost estates
of Puddingford by hiding in my chest. A gay earl Yardsley makes,
anyhow; and as for Barlow, he looks like an ass in that yellow-
chrysanthemum wig. No man with yellow hair like that could track
such a villain as Henderson makes Muddleton out to be. Fact is,
Henderson is the only decent part of the show.
Mrs. Perkins (rehearsing). What if he is weak? Then shall I still
more strongly show myself his friend. Poor? Does not--
Perkins. Oh, I suppose it does--(Bell rings.) There comes this
apology for a real earl, I fancy. I'll let him in myself. I suppose
Jennie has got as much as she can do sweeping my manuscripts out of
the laundry, and keeping my verses from scorching the wash. [Exit.
Mrs. Perkins. It's too bad of Thaddeus to go on like this. As if I
hadn't enough to worry me without a cross husband to manage. Heigho!
Enter Perkins with Yardsley. Yardsley holds bicycle cap in hand.
Yardsley. By Jove! I'm tired. Everything's been going wrong to-
day. Overslept myself, to begin with, and somebody stole my hat at
the club, and left me this bicycle cap in its place. How are you
getting along, Mrs. Perkins? You weren't letter perfect yesterday,
you know.
Mrs. Perkins. I'm getting it all right, I think. I've been
rehearsing all day.
Perkins. You bet your life on that, Henry Cobb, real Earl of
Puddingford. If you aren't restored to your estates and title this
night, it won't be for any lack of suffering on my part. Give me
your biking cap, unless you want to use it in the play. I'll hang it
up. [Exit.
Yardsley. Thanks. (Looks about the room.) Everything here seems to
be right.
Perkins returns.
Mrs. Perkins (rehearsing). And henceforth, my lord, let us
understand one another.
Perkins. Certainly, my dear. I'll go and have myself translated.
Would you prefer me in French, German, or English?
Yardsley. I hope it goes all right to-night. But, I must say, I
don't like the prospect. This beastly behavior of Henderson's has
knocked me out.
Perkins. What's the matter with Henderson?
Mrs. Perkins. He hasn't withdrawn, has he?
Yardsley. That's just what he has done. He sent me word this
morning.
Mrs. Perkins. But what excuse does he offer? At the last moment,
too!
Yardsley. None at all--absolutely. There was some airy persiflage
in his note about having to go to Boston at six o'clock.
Grandmother's sick or something. He writes so badly I couldn't make
out whether she was rich or sick. I fancy it's a little of both.
Possibly if she wasn't rich he wouldn't care so much when she fell
ill. That's the trouble with these New-Englanders, anyhow--they've
always got grandmothers to fall down at crucial moments. Next time I
go into this sort of thing it'll be with a crowd without known
ancestors.
Perkins. 'Tisn't Chet's fault, though. You don't suspect him of
having poisoned his grandmother just to get out of playing, do you?
Mrs. Perkins. Oh, Thaddeus, do be serious!
Perkins. I was never more so, my dear. Poisoning one's grandmother
is no light crime.
Yardsley. Well, I've a notion that the whole thing is faked up.
Henderson has an idea that he's a little tin Booth, and just because
I called him down the other night at our first rehearsal he's mad.
That's the milk in the cocoanut, I think. He's one of those fellows
you can't tell anything to, and when I kicked because he wore a white
tie with a dinner coat, he got mad and said he was going to dress the
part his own way or not at all.
Perkins. I think he was right.
Yardsley. Oh yes, of course I'm never right. What am I stage-
manager for?
Perkins. Oh, as for that, of course, you are the one in authority,
but you were wrong about the white tie and the dinner coat. He was a
bogus earl, an adventurer, wasn't he?