“Haven’t any.”
“Well, then, write it here.” He proffered a blank page of a much-thumbed note book.
Angelo wrote. The stranger departed without another word. He had said nothing of real importance; had not so much as told them who he was, nor how he made his living; yet his pause there among them had inspired them with fresh hope. Such is the buoyancy of youth. And the old trouper was in spirit the youngest of them all.
CHAPTER XXV
A DARK DAWN
Before retiring that night Florence and Petite Jeanne sat for a long time in their own small room, discussing the past and future.
They had spent the earlier hours of the evening in Angelo’s studio. There, in frankness and utter sincerity, the little company had discussed its prospects.
No one blamed Petite Jeanne for the part she had played. Being endowed with tender and kindly souls, they one and all felt that under the same conditions they would have acted in an identical manner.
“It is of little consequence,” Angelo had declared magnanimously. “We should never have succeeded under that management. The opera was doomed. And once a failure always a failure in the realm of playland.”
“What does it matter?” Dan Baker’s kindly old eyes had lighted with a smile. “You have youth and love and beauty, all of you. How can you ask for more?”
This speech had seemed quite wonderful at the time. But to these girls sitting on their bed, facing facts, the future did not seem rosy. With only two weeks’ room rent paid, with less than ten dollars between them, with no income save Florence’s meager pay, and with bleak old winter close at hand, they could not but dread what lay ahead.