"When you play Rosalind you shall give us a new reading of the part," Mr. Wycherly remarked carelessly.
Jane-Anne cuddled closely against him. "When I'm grown up," she said, "I shall ask that Mr. Curly to take me about acting, too. How did he begin?"
"That," Mr. Wycherly answered dreamily, "is a long story, and rather sad. No one wanted him to be anything of the kind——"
"But he had to!" exclaimed Jane-Anne. "He just had to, something drove him——"
"I suppose so; even yet I think it a pity."
"I don't," Jane-Anne said decidedly. "I'd rather go about being people than anything—one could never be dull."
"I'm not so sure of that," said Mr. Wycherly.
For several nights now, both Bruey and "She walks in beauty like the night" were forgotten. Jane-Anne arose, after her aunt had taken away the candle, to impersonate Rosalind. She rolled her thick plait round her head and pinned it up with hairpins stolen from her aunt's store. She achieved doublet and hose by means of two towels, several safety pins, and her long stockings. And the moon looked in at the window and was doubtless well amused.
The moon waxed and waned and the end of July was at hand.
Mr. Wycherly was plainly stirred out of his usual scholarly calm. His boys were coming home. Jane-Anne shared his excitement, and even Mrs. Dew felt it necessary to make a large cake and "to get in" quantities of stores of every description.