“Now you see, daughter,” he went on, “this act gives you a great chance for emotion, and I know, when you get the right angle on it, you’ll eat it up.  You’ve just got wise there, where I broke in, to the fact that your husband’s a criminal.  You ain’t never suspected he was a crook before.  Now that calls for emotion....  Put more color into it....  Pound it a little harder.  When George ends his long speech and pauses, that brings you across, see?  It cues your reception of the news.  It throws a bomb under you.  In times like them women get more hysterical.  They ain’t quiet in grief, like men, so just cut loose a little more.  Give us a nice little scream.”

For once Mary Burton almost smiled, as she hearkened to this wise dissertation on emotion, but she only bowed her head in assent, as the director added:  “Take the scene up again at George’s entrance.”

When he sat down beside Smitherton, Abey Lewis shook his head.  “I ain’t sure we didn’t make a mistake in giving her a straight dramatic sketch,” he said dubiously.  “She ain’t got no emotion.  She needs more pep.  Now if she had an act with lots of changes of costume—­something that would show her off better, it might go bigger.”

Smitherton growled.

“Yes, and then you wouldn’t have her at all,” he retorted.  “Get it through your head that this whole thing is distasteful to Miss Burton.  It’s bad enough as it is, without asking her to do a diving Venus.”

“She won’t ever be an actor,” commented Mr. Lewis, sagely, “but what the hell’s the difference?  It’s the name that’s going to carry this act—­and it’s going to be a knock-out.”

CHAPTER XXXIV

The day of the ordeal arrived.  Mary could not remember any occasion to which she had gone with such a sense of terror and misgiving, but this neither Mr. Lewis nor any of his subordinates suspected.  It had pleased the management to call a morning rehearsal, so Mary had not been able to go home before her matinee debut.  Tomorrow, if all went well, she could remove her parents to a greater comfort, so it was her affair to see that all went well.

Her mother had been less well than usual during these last few days and Mary had impressed upon old Tom Burton the necessity of remaining on watch during her own absence.  But, out of the advance she had received, Old Tom had drawn a small allowance, and it was remarkable how greatly the manner of bartenders had changed for the better in the brief space of a few days.  By forenoon Thomas Standish Burton was more than tipsy, and by two o’clock as he emerged from a side door his step was so unsteady that he found the slippery footing a matter requiring studious attention.  Once he would have fallen had a policeman not caught his arm.

“I thank you, sir,” acknowledged the old man, “I am deeply gra’fle, sir.”

“You’re deeply loaded,” replied the officer.  “I ought to run you in for your own protection.”