“Miss Raymond and I spoke of replacing Isabel Fleming two or three days ago,” she said. “I told her, the last time she was absent, that I should fill her place if she failed again. Now, Jean, I wish you would ask your mother if she has any objection to your taking the part of Nancy. You know the part already, and we can soon train you in the acting.”
Cricket’s eyes grew bigger and bigger. To act a part in that wonderful play!
“Will your mother permit her, do you think?” Miss Emmet asked Eunice. “Jean is rather younger than the girls are when they first take part, usually, but I think she will do.”
“Yes, indeed, I think mamma will be willing,” beamed Eunice.
“I come to all the rehearsals now,” said Cricket, eagerly, “and I know the part perfectly, and I am sure mamma will let me.”
The girls almost danced down the street.
“I’d rehearse every day in the week, and all night too,” said Cricket, fervently, to mamma, when the latter warned her again that she must not let anything interfere with rehearsing. “We will not ask to shirk it once, no matter what we want to do.”
“That’s the only condition you can undertake it on,” said mamma. “If you do it at all, you must do it thoroughly, you know.”
The condition seemed a very small one to the children, as only a week remained before the eventful Friday night. The rehearsals were never more than an hour long, and generally not more than three-quarters of an hour at a time, but they came every other day.
It was Monday afternoon,—the Monday before the play. A rehearsal was appointed for three o’clock. As the girls came out into the street from school, one of their friends joined them, begging them to come and see her in the afternoon. Her mother, she said, had just come home from New York, and brought her many pretty things, as well as a great box of Huyler’s candy. She wanted Eunice and Cricket to see the things and help eat the candy. Eunice, remembering the rehearsal, said no very firmly, though her resolution was somewhat shaken when she learned that most of the candy was chocolate.