The Corner House Girls in a Play

They saw the boys across the stage, ready, too, to enter – some of them grinning and foolish looking; others very serious. Neale smiled at Agnes and waved his hand encouragingly. Her confident pose delighted him.

Now they were on! It was easy, after all, to keep step with the music. She knew the words of the opening song perfectly. Agnes had a clear, if light contralto voice; the alto part was easy for her to sing.

With a vim that seemed not to have been in the chorus before, the number came to a finish. The girls and boys fell back. Innocent Delight was in the centre of the stage, ready to welcome the Carnation Countess.

Agnes was slow in speaking; her words seemed to drag a bit. Madam Shaw was waiting impatiently to come on. But the stage manager whispered shrilly:

"Quite right, my dear! quite right! The Countess is supposed to come on in a sedan chair, and you must give her time."

The professionals noted the girl's familiarity with the stage instructions; always, wherever the manager had explained in the earlier rehearsals the reason for some stage change, Innocent Delight had the matter pat. The action of the play was not retarded in any particular for the new girl. And her ability in handling the character of the blithe, joyous, light-hearted girl was most natural.

Somehow, this chief amateur part going so well, pulled the others up to the mark. But there was still much to be wished for in the case of Cheerful Grigg, the twins, Sunbeam and Moonbeam, and Lily White.

"I'd like to get hold of some of those other girls that Mr. Marks considers it his duty to punish," growled the professor. "What's all this foolishness about, anyway? Doesn't he want the play to be a success?"

He said this to Miss Lederer, the principal's assistant. She shook her head, sadly.

"I am sorry that you can't have them, Professor," she said. "But of course, this is only temporary for Agnes."

"What's that?" he demanded angrily.

"Why, she cannot play Innocent Delight for you," the teacher said firmly. "I am not sure that Mr. Marks will like it as it is."

"He's got to like it!" interrupted the professor. "I've just got to have the girl – there are no two ways about it. I tell you, without her the schools might as well give up trying to put on the play. That other girl, who was wished on me, is not fitted for the part at all."

"But you have given it to her."

"And I can take it away; you watch me!" snapped the director. "And I am going to have this Agnes, as you call her, Marks or no Marks!"

"Is that a pun?" the teacher asked archly. "For that is why Agnes Kenway cannot act in the play. Bad marks."

"What's her heinous crime?" demanded the professor.

"Stealing," said the assistant principal, with twinkling eyes.

"Stealing! What did she steal?"

"Strawberries."

"My goodness! I'll pay for them," rejoined the director, quickly.

"I am afraid that will not satisfy Mr. Marks."

"What will satisfy him, then?" demanded the professor. "For I am determined to have that girl play Innocent Delight for me, or else I will not put on the play. I would rather shoulder the expense thus far incurred – all of it – than to go on with a lot of numskulls such as seem to have been selected for many of these important rôles. For pity's sake let me have at least one girl who shows talent."

Meanwhile Madam Shaw, the prima donna, came to Agnes after it was all over and put her arms tight around the young girl's shoulders.

"Who are you, my dear?" she asked, looking kindly down upon Agnes' blushing face.

"Agnes Kenway, ma'am."

"Oh! one of the Corner House girls!" cried the lady. "I have heard of you sisters. Three of you were in the play from the first. And why not you, before?"

"Oh!" fluttered Agnes, now waking up from the beautiful dream in which she had lived from two o'clock till five. "I am not in it – really. I cannot play the part in the opera house."

"Why not, pray?" demanded Madam Shaw in some surprise.

"Because I have broken some rules and am being punished," admitted Agnes.

Madam Shaw hid a smile quickly. "Punished at home?" she asked gravely.

"Oh, no! There is nobody to punish us at home."

"No?"

"No. We have no mother or father. There is only Ruth, and we none of us want to displease Ruth. It wouldn't be fair."

"Who is Ruth?"

"The oldest," said Agnes. "She is in the play. But she hasn't a very important part. I think she might have been given a better one!"

"But you? Who is punishing you? Your teacher?"

"Mr. Marks."

"No? Not really?"

"Yes. The basket ball team and some other girls can only look on – we can't act. He said so. And – and we deserve it," stammered Agnes.

"Oh, indeed! But does the poor Carnation Countess deserve it?" demanded Madam Shaw, with asperity. "I wonder what Mr. Marks can be thinking of?"

However, everybody seemed to feel happier and less discouraged about the play when this rehearsal was over; and Agnes went home in a seventh heaven of delight.

"I don't care so much now if I never have a chance again," she said, over and over again. "I've shown them that I can act."

But Ruth began to be anxious. She said to Mrs. MacCall that evening: "Suppose, when Agnes gets older, she should determine to be a player? Wouldn't it be awful?"

The old Scotch woman bit off her thread reflectively. "Tut, tut!" she said, at last. "That's borrowing trouble, my dear. And you're a bit old-fashioned, Ruthie Kenway. Perhaps being an actress isn't so awful a thing as we used to think. 'Tis at least a way of earning one's living; and it seems now that all girls must work."

"Didn't they work in your day, Mrs. MacCall?" asked Ruth, slyly.

"Not to be called so," was the prompt reply. "Those that had to go into mills and factories were looked down upon a wee bit, I am afraid. Others of us only learned to scrub and cook and sew and stand a man's tantrums for our living. It was considered more respectable to marry a bad man than to work for an honest wage."

Saturday Agnes was not called upon at all. She heard that Trix was at home again; but there were no rehearsals of the speaking parts of The Carnation Countess. Only the dances and ensembles of the choruses were tried out in the afternoon.

The girls heard nothing further regarding the re-distribution of the parts – if there were to be such changes made. They only understood that the play would be given, in spite of the director's recent despairing words.

And it was known, too, that the following rehearsals would be given on the stage of the opera house itself. The scenery was ready, and on Saturday morning of the next week the first costume rehearsal would be undertaken.