"Yes, you ought. Come, out with it!"
"Well, I suppose I may as well. The fact is, the citizens of this place have decided to——"
"Not another speech-making affair at the theater?" interrupted the boy, in horrified accents.
"Well," blurted out Mr. Wattles, "that's just it."
"I shan't be here. You know I've got to go ahead to the next town this afternoon."
"Oh, no, you haven't," smiled the old gentleman. "The fact is, the sale is so big that I have felt justified in canceling the next two towns, and we are to stay here the remainder of the week. There's no getting out of it, my boy; the thing has got to come off, and this time you will have to make a speech."
At first Al would not hear of this, and declared that he would start for home. But he at last allowed his companion's eloquence to overcome his objections, and agreed to remain.
How he dreaded the ordeal no one but he ever knew, but he made up his mind that, as he put it to himself, he would "see the thing through." He prepared a brief speech, which he memorized, and which he hoped to be able to deliver without breaking down.
Evening came only too soon, and Al, arrayed in a new dress suit, awaited the inevitable call for his appearance. Everything had been "cut and dried," and he knew that there was no escape.
At the end of the first act of the play there arose a shout, "Allston! Allston!"