But how hard it was to face the thought of going before an audience again!  And especially in such circumstances.  There were to be gayety and life and light and sparkle all about me.  There were to be lassies, in their gay dresses, and the merriest music in London.  And my part was to be merry, too, and to make the great audience laugh that I would see beyond the footlights.  And I thought of the Merryman in The Yeomen of the Guard, and that I must be a little like him, though my cause for grief was different.

But I had given my word, and though I longed, again and again, as I rode toward London, and as the time drew near for my performance, to back out, there was no way that I could do so.  And Tom Valiance did his best to cheer me and hearten me, and relieve my nervousness.  I have never been so nervous before.  Not since I made my first appearance before an audience have I been so near to stage fright.

I would not see anyone that night, when I reached the theatre.  I stayed in my dressing-room, and Tom Valiance stayed with me, and kept everyone who tried to speak with me away.  There were good folk, and kindly folk, friends of mine in the company, who wanted to shake my hand and tell me how they felt for me, but he knew that it was better for them not to see me yet, and he was my bodyguard.

“It’s no use, Tom,” I said to him, again and again, after I was dressed and in my make up.  I was cold first, and then hot.  And I trembled in every limb.  “They’ll have to ring the curtain down on me.”

“You’ll be all right, Harry,” he said.  “So soon as you’re out there!  Remember, they’re all your friends!”

But he could not comfort me.  I felt sure that it was a foolish thing for me to try to do; that I could not go through with it.  And I was sorry, for the thousandth time, that I had let them persuade me to make the effort.

A call boy came at last to warn me that it was nearly time for my first entrance.  I went with Tom into the wings, and stood there, waiting.  I was pale under my make up, and I was shaking and trembling like a baby.  And even then I wanted to cry off.  But I remembered my boy, and those last words of his—­“Carry On!” I must not fail him without at least trying to do what he would have wanted me to do!

My entrance was with a lilting little song called “I Love My Jean.”  And I knew that in a moment my cue would be given, and I would hear the music of that song beginning.  I was as cold as if I had been in an icy street, although it was hot.  I thought of the two thousand people who were waiting for me beyond the footlights—­the house was a big one, and it was packed full that night.

“I can’t, Tom—­I can’t!” I cried.

But he only smiled, and gave me a little push as my cue came and the music began.  I could scarcely hear it; it was like music a great distance off, coming very faintly to my ears.  And I said a prayer, inside.  I asked God to be good to me once more, and to give me strength, and to bear me through this ordeal that I was facing, as he had borne me through before.  And then I had to step into the full glare of the great lights.