"No matter," he said briskly. "It comes to the same thing: you're under
twenty. The stage is no place for girls of your age. Don't you think
you'd better chuck it--go home?"
Not trusting herself to speak, she shook her head, her eyes misty with
disappointment.
"Besides, you're too good looking...."
Struck by her unresponsiveness, he paused to glance at her, and noted
with consternation the glimmer of tears in her lashes.
"Oh, I say! Don't cry--we'll find something for you, never fear!"
"I'm sorry," she gulped. "I--I didn't mean to.... Only, I can't go home,
and I must find something to do, and you'd been so kind to me, once, I
thought--"
"And I will!" he asserted heartily. "I'm only trying to advise you.... I
don't want to preach about the immorality of the theatre. A sensible
girl is as safe on the legitimate stage as she would be in a business
office--safer! But theatrical work has other effects on one's moral
fibre, just as disastrous, in a way. It's lazy work; barring rehearsals,
you won't find yourself driven very hard--unless ambition drives you,
and you've got uncommon ability and mean to get to the top. Otherwise,
you won't have much to do, even if constantly engaged. You'll get
average small parts; you may be on in one act out of three or four. But
even if you appear in every act, you'll only be in the theatre three
hours or so a day. The rest of it you'll waste, nine chances out of ten.
You'll lie abed late, and once up it won't seem worth while starting
anything before it's time to show up at the theatre. That's the real
evil of stage life: to every hard-working actor it turns out a
hundred--five hundred--too lazy even to act their best, of no real use
either to themselves or to the world."
He checked and laughed in a deprecatory manner. "I didn't mean to
speechify like this, but I do know what I'm talking about."
Joan had listened, admiring Matthias intensely, but thoroughly sceptical
of his counsel, to the tenor of which she paid just sufficient heed to
perceive that doubts admitted would condemn her cause.
"I mean to succeed," she said in an earnest voice: "I mean to work hard,
and I do believe I'll make good, if I ever get a chance."
"Then that's settled!" assented Matthias promptly. "The thing to do now
is to find out what you can do with a chance."
He pawed the litter of papers on the table, and presently brought to
light a typed manuscript in blue paper covers.
"This," he said, rustling the leaves, "is the first act of a play we're
going to put on early in September. It goes into rehearsal in a week or
ten days. There's a small part in the first act--a stenographer in a law
office--a slangy, self-sufficient girl--you might be able to play. As I
say, it's small; but it's quite important. It's the fashion nowadays,
you know, to write pieces with small casts and no parts that aren't
vital to the action. If you should bungle, it would ruin the first act
and might kill the play. But I'm willing to try you out at
rehearsals--with the distinct understanding that if you don't fit
precisely you'll be released and somebody else engaged who we're sure
can play it."
"That's all I ask," said the girl. "You--you're awful' kind--"
"Nonsense: I'd rather have you than anyone else I can think of just now,
because you're pretty, and pretty women help a play a lot; and the man
who's putting this piece on would rather have you because he'll get you
for less money than he'd have to pay an actress of experience. So, if
you make good, all hands will be pleased."
"Shall I begin to study now?" Joan asked, offering to take the
manuscript.
"Not necessary. Your part will be given you when the first rehearsal is
called. I merely want to refresh my memory, to see how much you'll have
to do."
He ran hastily through the pages.
"As I thought: you are on at the opening for about ten minutes, and near
the end of the act for a two-minute scene. Twelve minutes' work a day
for, say, twenty-five dollars a week: that isn't bad. You'll be out of
the theatre by half-past nine every night.... You see the point I've
been trying to make?"
"Yes," Joan assented. "It seems very easy. I hope I can do it."
"I'm sure you can," said Matthias. "But--how are you going to live
between now and the opening?"
Joan's eyes were blank.
"Have you any money?" he insisted.
"A very little," she faltered--"eighteen dollars--"
"You won't get pay for rehearsals; and they'll last three weeks; after
we open it will be another week before the ghost walks. That's--say--six
weeks you've got to scrape through somehow. Eighteen dollars won't cover
that. Perhaps you'd better go back to your old job until we start."
"I was fired from the last, and it would take more than two weeks for me
to find anything like it, I know."
"And there you are!"
Matthias tossed the manuscript back to the table, waved his hands
eloquently and threw himself into a chair, regarding her with his
whimsical, semi-apologetic smile.
"I'm afraid," he added after a minute, "I've reached the end of my
string. Further suggestions will have to come from you."
"I don't know," said the girl doubtfully. "Maybe I can think of
something--maybe something will turn up."
"I hope so. Perhaps even I may invent something. If I do, I'll let you
know, Miss Thursday."
He arose, his manner an invitation to go, to which she couldn't be
blind.
She got up, moved slowly toward the door.
"I hope I haven't bothered you much--put you out of your writing--"
"Oh, that's all right," he interrupted insincerely.
"And you have been awful' good to me."
"Please don't think of it that way."
He was holding the door for her, but on the threshold she hesitated.
"Unless," she ventured half-heartedly--"unless I could help you some way
with your work."
"Help me?" he exclaimed, at once amazed and amused.
"I mean, copying--if you ever have any."
"Type-writing?"
She nodded, with a flush of hope. "When I was a kid--I mean, before I
left school--I studied a while at a business college--nights, you know.
They taught me type-writing by the touch system, but I couldn't seem to
get the hang of shorthand, and so had to give it up and go to work in a
store."
"Now that _is_ a helpful thought!" he cried, turning back into the room.
"Wait a minute. There may be something in this. Let me think."
But his deliberation was very brief.
"It can be done!" he announced in another moment. "I have got a lot of
stuff to be copied. You see, about a month ago I...."
He checked, his eyes clouding without cause apparent to the girl.
"Well!" he went on with a nervous laugh--"I didn't feel much like work.
Guess I must've done too much of it, for a while. Anyway, I found I had
to quit, and went out of town for a while. Of course I couldn't stop
work really--a man can't, if he likes his job--and so I took some
manuscripts along and revised them in long-hand. Now they ought to be
copied--I'd been thinking of sending them out to some public
stenographer--but if you want the work, it's yours."