She lifted the heavy brim with both hands and stood in the bar of sunlight.
"Gad!" he cried—"Gad!" and jerked open a drawer and threw the big bulk of a typewritten manuscript on the desk before him. "Read that; read that, sister!" His heavy spatulate finger underlined the caption.
"'The—Red—Widow,' 'The Red Widow,' by Al Wilson."
He rose and jerked her by her two wrists so that she flounced toward him, her hair awry and the breath jumping out of her bosom.
"That's you, sister—the Red Widow!"
"The Red—Widow?"
"You're goin' out in a road chorus next week and get broke in. At the end of a season I'm goin' to feature you in the biggest show that ever I had up my sleeve."
She regarded him with glazed eyes of one dazed, and backed away from him.
"Me!"
"You—the Red Widow, sister! You know what a Hy Myers production means, don't you? You know what an Al Wilson show is, don't you? Add them two. I'll make you make that show or bust. Stand off there and lemme look at you again—there—so!"