Part 1 (2/2)

”There's one in this Ibsen book might do,” Jennie suggested. ”It's called 'A Dolls' House,' that's a real sweet name.”

”I am afraid it wouldn't do,” said Miss Masters hastily.

”What's the matter with it?” demanded Susie Meyer.

”Well, in the first place, there are children in it--”

”Cut it! 'Nough said,” p.r.o.nounced the President. ”Them plays wid kids in 'em is all out of style. We giv' 'East Lynne' the turn down an' there was only one kid in that. What else have you got in that Gibson book?

Have you got the play with the Gibson goils in it? We could do that all right, all right. Ain't most of us got Gibson pleats in our s.h.i.+rt waists?”

”I don't see nothin' about goils,” the Secretary made answer, ”but there's one here about ghosts. How would that do?”

”Not at all,” said Miss Masters firmly.

”What's the matter with it?” asked one of the girls abandoning her sewing-machine and coming over to the table. ”I seen posters of it last year. They are givin' it in Broadway. The costoomes would be real easy, just a sheet you know and your hair hanging down.”

”It's not about that kind of ghost,” Miss Masters explained, ”and I don't think it would do for us as there are very few people in the cast and one of them is a minister.”

”Cut it,” said the President briefly, ”we ain't goin' to have no hymn singin' in ours. We couldn't, you know,” she explained to Miss Masters, ”the most of us is Jewesses.”

”Katie McGuire ain't no Jewess,” a.s.serted the Secretary. ”She could be the minister if that's all you've got against this Gibson play. I wish we _could_ give it. It's about the only up-to-date Broadway success we can find. The librarian says you can't never buy copies of Julia Marlowe's an' Ethel Barrymore's an' Maude Adams' plays. I guess they're just scared somebody like us will come along an' do 'em better than they do an' bust their market. Actresses,” she went on, ”is all jest et up with jealousy of one another. Is there anythin' except the minister the matter with 'Ghosts?'”

”Everything else is the matter with it,” said Miss Masters. ”To begin with, I might as well tell you, it never was a Broadway success. It's a play that is read oftener than it's acted and last year, Jennie, when you saw the posters, it only ran for a week.”

”Cut it,” said the President. ”We ain't huntin' frosts.”

The brows of the Hyacinths grew furrowed and their eyes haggard in the search. Everyone could tell them of plays but no one knew where they could be found in printed form and whenever the librarian found something which might be suitable Miss Masters was sure to know of something to its disadvantage.

And then the real stage, the legitimate Broadway stage intervened.

Albert Marsden produced Hamlet and the Lady Hyacinths determined to follow suit.

”It's kind of old,” the President admitted, ”but there must be some style left to it. They're playin' it on Broadway right now. An' we'll give it on East Broadway just as soon as we can git ready. Me and Mamie went round to the library last night an' got it out. It's got a dandy lot of parts in it: more than this club will ever need. An' it's got lots of murders an' sc.r.a.ps, an' court ladies an' soldiers an' kings.

It's our play all right!”

The sea of troubles into which the Lady Hyacinths plunged with so much enthusiasm swallowed them so completely that Miss Masters could only stand on its sh.o.r.e, looking across to Denmark and wringing her hands over the awful things that were happening in that unhappy land.

Fortunately she had a friend to whom she could appeal for succour for the lost but still valiant Hyacinths. He was the sort of person to whom appeals came as naturally as honors come to some men and, since he had nothing to do and ample time and money with which to do it, he was generally helpful and resourceful. That he had once loved Miss Masters has nothing to do with this story. She was now engaged to be married to a poorer and busier man, but it was to Jack Burgess that she appealed.

”Of course I know,” said he when he had responded to her message and she had anch.o.r.ed him with a tea-cup and disarmed him with a smile, ”of course I know what you want to say to me. Every girl who has refused me has said it sooner or later. You are saying it later--much later--than they generally do, but it always comes. 'You have found a wife for me.'”

”I have done much better than that,” she answered, ”I have found work for you.” And she sketched the distress of the Hyacinths in Denmark and urged him to go to their a.s.sistance.

”But, my dear Margaret,” he remonstrated, ”What can I do? You have always known that 'something is rotten in the state of Denmark,' and yet you have let these poor innocents stir it up. I have often thought that poor Shakespeare added that line after the first performance. I intend to write that hint to Furniss one of these days.”

”You will write it,” said Margaret Masters, ”with more conviction after you have seen _my_ Denmark.”

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