“Your mother’s a sensible woman, then,” said Miss Raymond. “Now, Miss Emmet, what are we to do? It spoils the play so, to have me read Isabel’s part. I can’t drill them properly, and they don’t do justice to their own parts.”
“If you like, Miss Emmet, I will take Isabel’s part,” said Cricket, in her bright, unconscious way, after a telegraphic despatch to Eunice, with her eyebrows.
“But you don’t know it, child, and it’s the reading it at all that I object to. Not acting it, puts the others out,” said Miss Raymond, pulling off her gloves.
“I mean, I can say it,” explained Cricket. “I can’t act it very well, of course, but perhaps it would do. I know all the part.”
“Do you? Well, then, you can try it. It won’t be worse, at any rate, than my reading it, and keeping my eye on the girls at the same time. Stand here, and be ready for your cue.”
The speech was ungracious, for Miss Raymond was always sharp-tongued, but she patted Cricket’s cheek, approvingly.
The rehearsal began. Cricket was excited, but she had her wits about her, for this work was what she loved.
“You are doing very well, child,” said Miss Raymond, when she went off the stage. Cricket was so eager to fill in just right, that she never thought of herself. The little play was rehearsed twice through, and the second time Cricket did still better. Of course not as well as the girls who had been drilling for two weeks already, for she did not always get the right position on the stage, sometimes turned her back to the imaginary audience, did not leave at the right moment, every time, and never spoke loud enough.
Nevertheless, on the whole, the rehearsal was very satisfactory.
Miss Raymond said a few words to Miss Emmet while the children were resting. Miss Emmet nodded assent. When the girls were leaving, Miss Emmet detained Eunice and Cricket a moment.