“Oh!” cried the chorus. “You are weird, Mr. Clayton. Isn’t he a cure? Isn’t he a scream, dear? Oh, Mr. Clayton, you do make me laugh. Isn’t he a comic?”
A dark, mournful girl touched Miss Moss on the arm.
“I just missed a lovely job yesterday,” she said. “Six weeks in the provinces and then the West End. The manager said I would have got it for certain if only I’d been robust enough. He said if my figure had been fuller, the part was made for me.” She stared at Miss Moss, and the dirty dark red rose under the brim of her hat looked, somehow, as though it shared the blow with her, and was crushed, too.
“Oh, dear, that was hard lines,” said Miss Moss trying to appear indifferent. “What was it—if I may ask?”
But the dark, mournful girl saw through her and a gleam of spite came into her heavy eyes.
“Oh, no good to you, my dear,” said she. “He wanted someone young, you know—a dark Spanish type—my style, but more figure, that was all.”
The inner door opened and Mr. Bithem appeared in his shirt sleeves. He kept one hand on the door ready to whisk back again, and held up the other.
“Look here, ladies——” and then he paused, grinned his famous grin before he said—“and bhoys.” The waiting-room laughed so loudly at this that he had to hold both hands up. “It’s no good waiting this morning. Come back Monday; I’m expecting several calls on Monday.”
Miss Moss made a desperate rush forward. “Mr. Bithem, I wonder if you’ve heard from . . .”
“Now let me see,” said Mr. Bithem slowly, staring; he had only seen Miss Moss four times a week for the past—how many weeks? “Now, who are you?”