Out of a Labyrinth

by Lawrence L. Lynch

She favored me with a glance full of impotent hatred, sat quite silent for a long moment, during which I sat before her with a careless glance fixed on my watch.

Then she began:

"I worked at the Little Adelphi over a year ago. There was a hot rivalry between us, the Gayety, and the 'Frolique.' Fred Brookhouse was managing alone then; Storms—only came into partnership in the Spring.

"During the winter the Gayety brought out some new attractions,—I mean new to the profession; no old names that had been billed and billed, but young girls with fresh faces and pretty voices. They were new in the business, and the 'old stagers,' especially the faded and cracked-voiced ones, said that they would fail, they would hurt the business. But the managers knew better. They knew that pretty, youthful faces were the things most thought of in the varieties. And the 'freshness' of the new performers was only another attraction to green-room visitors. Nobody knew where these new girls came from, and nobody could find out; but they drew, and the Little Adelphi lost customers, who went over to the 'Gayety.'

"Fred Brookhouse was angry, and he began to study how he should outdo the 'Gayety,' and 'put out' the new attractions.

"At the carnival season, Arch and Louis Brookhouse came down; and we got to be very good friends. Do you mean to use anything that I say to make me trouble?" she broke off, abruptly.

"Not if you tell the entire truth and spare nobody."

"Then I will tell it just as it happened. Arch and Fred and I were together one day after rehearsal. I was a favorite at the theater, and Fred consulted me sometimes. Fred wanted some fresh attractions, and wondered how they got the new girls at the 'Gayety.' And I told him that I thought they might have been 'recruited.' He did not seem to understand, and I explained that there were managers who paid a commission to persons who would get them young, pretty, bright girls, who could sing a little, for the first part, and for green-room talent.

"I told him that I knew of an old variety actress who went into the country for a few weeks in the Summer, and picked up girls for the variety business. They were sometimes poor girls who 'worked out,' and were glad of a chance to earn an easier living, and sometimes daughters of well-to-do people; girls who were romantic or ambitious, stage-struck, and easily flattered.