“But they wouldn't be my plays, Mrs. Peedles,” I suggested.
“They will if I give them to you,” answered Mrs. Peedles. “You put 'em in your box. And never mind the bit of rent,” added Mrs. Peedles; “you can pay me that later on.”
I kissed the kind old soul good-bye and took her gift with me to my new lodgings in Camden Town. Many a time have I been hard put to it for plot or scene, and more than once in weak mood have I turned with guilty intent the torn and crumpled pages of Mrs. Peedles's donation to my literary equipment. It is pleasant to be able to put my hand upon my heart and reflect that never yet have I yielded to the temptation. Always have I laid them back within their drawer, saying to myself, with stern reproof:
“No, no, Paul. Stand or fall by your own merits. Never plagiarise—in any case, not from this 'little lot.'”
CHAPTER IV.
LEADS TO A MEETING.
“Don't be nervous,” said the O'Kelly, “and don't try to do too much. You have a very fair voice, but it's not powerful. Keep cool and open your mouth.”
It was eleven o'clock in the morning. We were standing at the entrance of the narrow court leading to the stage door. For a fortnight past the O'Kelly had been coaching me. It had been nervous work for both of us, but especially for the O'Kelly. Mrs. O'Kelly, a thin, acid-looking lady, of whom I once or twice had caught a glimpse while promenading Belsize Square awaiting the O'Kelly's signal, was a serious-minded lady, with a conscientious objection to all music not of a sacred character. With the hope of winning the O'Kelly from one at least of his sinful tendencies, the piano had been got rid of, and its place in the drawing-room filled by an American organ of exceptionally lugubrious tone. With this we had had to make shift, and though the O'Kelly—a veritable musical genius—had succeeded in evolving from it an accompaniment to “Sally in Our Alley” less misleading and confusing than might otherwise have been the case, the result had not been to lighten our labours. My rendering of the famous ballad had, in consequence, acquired a dolefulness not intended by the composer. Sung as I sang it, the theme became, to employ a definition since grown hackneyed as applied to Art, a problem ballad. Involuntarily one wondered whether the marriage would turn out as satisfactorily as the young man appeared to anticipate. Was there not, when one came to think of it, a melancholy, a pessimism ingrained within the temperament of the complainful hero that would ill assort with those instincts toward frivolity the careful observer could not avoid discerning in the charming yet nevertheless somewhat shallow character of Sally.
“Lighter, lighter. Not so soulful,” would demand the O'Kelly, as the solemn notes rolled jerkily from the groaning instrument beneath his hands.