“All right, children,” he said, “take the second act—from the beginning. Miss Cherry, Mrs. Morehead—come along. Stand by, everybody else, and, please, in Heaven’s name, remember your cues—for once.”
A young woman and a middle-aged woman detached themselves from one of the waiting groups and came downstage. The young woman moved eagerly to obey; she was an exceedingly pretty young woman. The other [207] woman, having passed her youth, strove now to re-create it in her costume. She wore a floppy hat and a rather skimpy frock, which buttoned down her back, school-girl fashion, and ended several inches above her ankles. Under the light her dyed hair shone with the brilliancy of a new copper saucepan. There were fine, puckery lines at her eyes. Her skin, though, had the smooth texture which comes, some say, from the grease paint, and others say from plenty of sleep.
She held in one hand a flimsy, blue-backed sheaf; it was her part in this play. Having that wisdom in her calling which comes of long experience, she would read from it until automatically she had acquired it without prolonged mental effort; would let her trained and docile memory sop up the speeches by processes of absorption. Miss Cherry carried no manuscript; she didn’t need it. She had been sitting up nights, studying her lines. For she, the poor thing, was newly escaped from a dramatic school. Mrs. Morehead wanted to make a living. Miss Cherry wanted to make a hit.
These two began the opening scene of the act and, between them, carried it forward. Miss Cherry as the daughter, was playing it in rehearsal, exactly as she expected to play it before an audience, putting in gestures, inflections, short catches of the breath, emotional gasps—all the illusions, all the business of the part. On the other hand, Mrs. Morehead [208] appeared to have but one ambition in her present employment and that was to get it over with as speedily as possible. After this contrasted fashion, then, they progressed to a certain dramatic juncture:
“But, mother,” said Miss Cherry, her arms extended in a carefully-thought-out attitude of girlish bewilderment, “what am I to do?”
Mrs. Morehead glanced down, refreshing her memory by a glance into the blue booklet.
“My child,” she said, “leave it to destiny.”
She said this in the tone of a person of rather indifferent appetite, ordering toast and tea for breakfast.
A pause ensued here.
“My child,” repeated Mrs. Morehead, glancing over her shoulder impatiently, but speaking still in the same voice, “leave it to destiny.”