Page:Waifs and Strays (1917).djvu/110

“Ever been tried on the stage?” asked Hollis.

“Not exactly,” I answered. “I read half of it the other day to a fellow whose brother knows Robert Edeson; but he had to catch a train before I finished.”

“Go on,” said Hollis, sliding back in his chair like a good fellow. “I’m no stage carpenter, but I’ll tell you what I think of it from a first row balcony standpoint. I’m a theatre bug during the season, and I can size up a fake play almost as quick as the gallery can. Flag the waiter once more, and then go ahead as hard as you like with it. I’ll be the dog.”

I read my little play lovingly, and, I fear, not without some elocution. There was one scene in it that I believed in greatly. The comedy swiftly rises into thrillmg and unexpectedly developed drama. Capt. Marchmont suddenly becomes cognizant that his wife is an unscrupulous adventuress, who has deceived him from the day of their first meeting. The rapid and mortal duel between them from that moment—she with her magnificent lies and siren charm, winding about him like a serpent, trying to recover her lost ground; he with his man’s agony and scorn and lost faith, trying to tear her from his heart. That scene I always thought was a crackerjack. When Capt. Marchmont discovers her duplicity by reading on a blotter in a mirror the impression of a note that she has written to the Count, he raises his hand to heaven and exclaims: “O God, who created woman while Adam slept,