“Please don’t abuse me! My chest, oh-h-h!”
“Zelda Dameron, you are no more sick than I am! No person could get as sick as you are pretending to be in a few hours. You were as well as anybody at midnight, and you went through the rehearsal splendidly. Don’t try any tricks on me—”
Zelda sat up again and folded her arms. A smile twitched the corners of her mouth; then she began to speak and fell into another fit of coughing, burying her face in the blankets and seeming unable to recover herself.
“Oh-h-h! it has got me again!” and she shook first with the vigor of her cough and then with laughter. Olive seized her and forced her back on the pillows.
“I’m going away! I’m going home! I don’t intend to have you make a guy of me in such a way as this.” Olive seemed about to cry, and Zelda laughed until the tears rolled down her cheeks.
“I must say that your hilarity is decidedly unbecoming,” said Olive, with dignity. “Mrs. Carr may forgive you, but I never shall,—never!”
Zelda’s mirth rose again at the mention of Mrs. Carr.
“Theodosia would certainly be consumed with rage. Oh, me!”
She sat up in bed and wiped the tears from her eyes. “Please get me a handkerchief from that bureau,—top drawer on your right. This thing smells vilely of camphor. And please don’t take your doll rags and go home. I’m going to be good. Honestly; I’ll be all right in a minute.”
Olive did as Zelda bade her, and returned to the bedside of the invalid with unrelenting condemnation.