hand.

“Take care,” she murmured. “Here’s Joe.”

[Pg 29]

[Pg 29]

Joe came in, his Panama hat low on his brow. He gave no sign of greeting till he saw Bassett, then he emitted an abrupt “Hello” and snatched off the hat:

“Little Anne’s got a caller. Howdy, Bassett! How’s things?”

There was a jovial note in his voice, a wide grin of greeting on his face. It was evident the sight of Bassett pleased him, and he stood teetering back and forth on his toes and heels, looking ingratiatingly at the visitor. He was like Anne, the same delicate features, the same long eyebrows and the same trick of raising them till they curved high on his forehead. But his face had an elfish, almost malign quality lacking in hers, and the brown eyes, brilliant and hard, were set too close to his nose. He was two years younger than she—twenty-two—but looked older, immeasurably older, in the baser worldly knowledge which had already set its stamp upon him.

He launched forth with a suggestion of pouncing eagerness on the Twelfth Night performance. [Pg 30]He had heard this and that, and Anne had told him the other. His interest surprised Anne, he hadn’t shown much to her; only a few laconic questions. And she was wondering what was in his mind, as she so often wondered when Joe held the floor, when a question enlightened her:

[Pg 30]

“Have you got anybody to play Sebastian yet?”

“No. I wanted that boy who played with her on the southern tour last year, but he’s in England. He gave a first-rate performance and he did look like her.”

“That was a lucky chance. You’ll search the whole profession before you get any one that looks like Sybil’s twin brother.”

“He ought to bear some resemblance to her,” and Bassett quoted, “‘One face, one voice, one habit, and two persons.’ I wonder if Shakespeare had twins in his eye when he wrote the play.”

“Not he! They did the same in his day as they do now—dressed ’em up alike and let it go at that. 

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