"Why, Juliet's part. I've been studying it for months, ever since our class gave it at school. They wouldn't give me a part then; but just you wait! I'll show them!"

"You're joshin'," says I.

Honest, I didn't think she meant it. She58 didn't say any more about it, and all the way home she was as quiet as a bale of hay.

58

That was the last I see of Marjorie for near a week. Then, one afternoon as I was goin' through Tinpan Alley on an errand, I sees the Ellins carriage pull up, and out she comes.

Now, say, I knew in a minute that wa'n't any place for Marjorie. The buildin' she goes into is one of them old five-story brownstones, where they sell wigs in the basement, costumes on the first floor, have a theatrical agency on the second, and give voice culture and such stuff above. Among the other signs was one that read, "School of Dramatic Art, Room 9, Fifth Floor."

"Chee!" says I. "You don't suppose Marjorie's got it that bad, do you?"

First off I thinks I'll chase along and forget I'd seen anything at all. Then I thinks of what Mr. Robert would say if he knew, and I stops. Sure, I hadn't been called to play any Buttinsky part; but somehow I didn't feel right about stayin' out, so the first thing I knows I'm trailin' up the stairs. There wa'n't any need to do the sleuth act after Marjorie got started. Anyone on the floor could have heard it; for she was spoutin' the Juliet lines like a carriage caller, and whenever she made a rush to the footlights the floor beams creaked. It was59 enough to drag a laugh out of a hearse driver. And guess what the guy was tellin' her!

59

"Great!" says he. "You're almost as good as Mary Anderson was at her best, and as for Marlowe, she can't touch you. Excellent, that last speech! What fire, what expression, what talent! Why, young woman, all you need is a Broadway production to sweep 'em off their feet! I'll arrange it for you. It means money, of course; but after the first cost—fame, nothing but fame!"

Now, how was that for a hot-air blast? Wouldn't that make a short ice crop if you let it loose up the Hudson?

But it wa'n't what he said, so much as how he was sayin' it, that got me int'rested. There's some voices you don't have to hear but once to remember a lifetime, an this was one of that kind. It was one of these husky baritones, like 

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