He was a pleasant, weary-looking man, who wheeled about from his desk as they came in, and signed the page to place chairs.

"Mr. Wyatt," said Mrs. Coppered, with her pleasantest smile, "can you give us five minutes?"

"I can give you as many as you like, madam," said the manager, patiently, but with a most unpromising air.

"Only five!" she rea.s.sured him, as they sat down. Then, with an absolutely businesslike air, she continued: "Mr. Wyatt, you have Mr.

and Mrs. Penrose in your company, I think, both very old friends of mine. She's playing Mabel Vane,--Mary Archer is the name she uses,--and he's Triplet. Isn't that so?"

The manager nodded, eying her curiously.

"Mr. Wyatt, you've heard of their trouble, of course? The accident this morning to their little boy?"

"Ah, yes--yes," said Wyatt. "Of course. Hurt by a fall, poor little fellow. Very serious. Yes, poor things! Did you want to see--"

"You know that one of your big surgeons here--I've forgotten the name!--is to operate on little Phil tomorrow?" asked Mrs. Coppered.

"So Penrose said," a.s.sented the manager, slowly, watching her as if a little surprised at her insistence.

"Mr. Wyatt." said Mrs. Coppered,--and Duncan noticed that she had turned a little pale,--"Mrs. Penrose wired me news of all this only a few hours ago. She is half frantic at the idea that she must go on tomorrow afternoon and evening; yet the understudy is ill, and she felt it was too short notice to ask you to make a change now. But it occurred to me to come to see you about it. I want to ask you a favor.

I want you to let me play Mrs. Penrose's part tomorrow afternoon and tomorrow night. I've played Mabel Vane a hundred times; it's a part I know very well," she went on quickly. "I--I am not in the least afraid that I can't take it. And then she can be with the little boy through the operation and afterward--he's only five, you know, at the unreasonable age when all children want their mothers! Can't that be arranged, Mr. Wyatt?"

Duncan, holding a horrified breath, fixed his eyes, as he did, on the manager's face. He was relieved at the inflexible smile he saw there.

"My dear lady," said Wyatt, kindly, "that is--absolutely--OUT of the question! Anything in reason I will be delighted to do for Penrose and Miss Archer--but you must surely realize that I can't do that!"

"But wait!" said Mrs. Coppered, eagerly, not at all discouraged. "Don't say no yet! I AM an actress, Mr. Wyatt, or was one. I know the part thoroughly. And the circ.u.mstances--the circ.u.mstances are unusual, aren't they?"

While she was speaking the manager was steadily shaking his head.

"I have no doubt you could play the part," said he, "but I can't upset my whole company by subst.i.tuting now. Tomorrow is going to be a big night. The house is completely sold out to the Masons--their convention week, you know. As it happens, there couldn't be a more inconvenient time. No, I can't consider it!"

Mrs. Coppered smiled at him. She had a very winning smile.

"It would mean a rehearsal; I suppose THAT would be inconvenient, to begin with," she said.

"Exactly," said Wyatt. "Friday night. I can't ask my people to rehea.r.s.e to-morrow."

"But suppose you put it to them and they were all willing?" pursued the lady.

"My dear lady, I tell you it's absolutely--" He made a goaded gesture.

Then, making fierce little dashes and dots on his blotter with his pencil, and eying each one ferociously as he made it, he added irritably, but in a quieter tone: "You're an actress, eh? Where'd you get your experience?"

"With various stock companies on the Pacific Coast," she answered readily. "My name was Margaret Charteris. I don't suppose you ever heard it?"

"As it happens, I HAVE," he returned, surprised into interest. "You knew Joe Pitcher, of course. He spoke of you. I remember the name very well."

"Professor Pitcher!" she exclaimed radiantly. "Of course I knew him--dear old man! Where is he--still there?"

"Still there," he a.s.sented absently. "You married, I think?"

"I am Mrs. Coppered now--Mrs. Carey Coppered," she said. The man gave her a suddenly awakened glance.

"Surely," he said thoughtfully. They looked steadily at each other, and Duncan saw the color come into Margaret's face. There was a little silence.

Then the manager flung down his pencil, wheeled about in his chair, and rubbed his hands briskly together.

"Well!" he said. "And you think you can take Miss Archer's place, Mrs.

Coppered?"

"If you will let me."

"Why," he said,--and Duncan would not have believed that the somewhat heavy face could wear a look so pleasant,--"you are doing so much, Mrs.

Coppered, in stepping into the gap this way, that I'll do my share if I can! Perhaps I can't arrange it, but we can try. I'll call a rehearsal and speak to Miss Forsythe to-night. If you know the part, it's just possible that by going over it now we can get out of a rehearsal tomorrow. She wants to be with the little boy, eh?" he added musingly.

"Yes, I suppose it might make a big difference, his not being terrified by strangers." And then, turning toward Margaret, he said warmly and a little awkwardly: "This is a remarkably kind thing for you to do, Mrs.

Coppered."

"Oh, I would do more than that for Mary Penrose," said she, with a little difficulty. "She knows it. She wired me as a mad last hope today, and we came as fast as we could, Mr. Coppered and I." And she introduced Duncan very simply: "My stepson, Mr. Wyatt."

Duncan, fuming, could be silent no longer.

"I hope my--Mrs. Coppered is not serious in offering to do this," said he, very white, and in a slightly shaking voice. "I a.s.sure you that my father--that every one!--would think it a most extraordinary thing to do!"

Mrs. Coppered laid her hand lightly on his arm.

"Yes, I know, Duncan!" said she, quickly, soothingly. "I know how you feel! But--"

Duncan slightly repudiated the touch.

"I can't think how you can consider it!" he said pa.s.sionately, but in a low voice. "A thing like this always gets out! You know--you know how your having been on the stage is regarded by our friends! It is simply insane--"

He had said a little more than he meant, in his high feeling, and Margaret's face had grown white.

"I asked you only for your escort, Duncan," she said gently, but with blazing eyes. There was open hostility in the look they exchanged.

"I can't see what good my escort does," said the boy, childishly, "when you won't listen to what you know is true!"

"Nevertheless, I still want it," she answered evenly. And after a moment Duncan, true to his training, and already a little ashamed of his ineffectual outburst,--for to waste a display of emotion was, in his code, a lamentable breach of etiquette,--shrugged his shoulders.

"Still want to stay with it?" said Mr. Wyatt, giving her a shrewd, friendly look.

"Certainly," she said promptly; but she was breathing fast.

"Then we might go and talk things over," he said; and a moment later they were crossing the theatre to the stage door. The final curtain had fallen only a moment before, but the lights were up, the orchestra halfway through a swift waltz, and the audience, b.u.t.toning coats and struggling with gloves, was pouring up the aisles. Duncan, through all his anger and apprehension, felt a little thrill of superiority over these departing playgoers as he and his stepmother were admitted behind the scenes. He was young, and the imagined romance of green-rooms and footlights appealed to him.

The company, suddenly summoned, appeared in various stages of street and stage attire. Peg, a handsome young woman with brilliant color and golden hair, still wore her brocaded gown and patches, and wore, in addition, a slightly affronted look at this unprecedented proceeding.

The other members of the cast, yawning, slightly curious, were grouped about in the great draughty s.p.a.ce between the wings that it cost Duncan some little effort to realize was the stage.

From this group, as Margaret followed the stage manager into the circle of light, a little woman suddenly detached herself, and, running across the stage and breaking into sobs as she ran, she was in Margaret's arms in a second.