It was two minutes to eight, just two minutes before the curtain was scheduled to go up, when Janet reached the stage. Miss Williams was pacing nervously when she hurried on, but she stopped instantly and eyed Janet approvingly.
“Splendid, dear, splendid. We’ll start on time. If you forget some of the lines, just make up a few sentences until you can recall them. The rest of the cast will help you carry along.”
Helen, dark and radiant, came out of the wings.
“You need a little more color on your cheeks. You look as pale as a ghost.”
“I feel pretty much like a ghost,” confessed Janet as they slipped into a dressing room where Helen adeptly applied a touch of rouge, used an eyebrow pencil sparingly, and then finished the makeup with just enough lipstick to accentuate the charm of Janet’s lips.
“Everybody ready?” It was Miss Williams, calling the cast together for a final checkup.
Fortunately Janet would not go on until the middle of the first act. It would give her an opportunity to regain her full composure, to get into the swing of the play, and to brush up on any lines she was afraid she might forget.
The music of the high school orchestra, which was playing in the pit out front, reached a crescendo and died away. Janet faintly heard a wave of applause for the efforts of the orchestra. Then the girl who had taken her place at the switchboard dimmed the house lights, shoved the switch that sent the electricity surging into the footlights, and the curtain started up.
There was that little breathless pause before the action of the play began. Then Helen, the first character on the stage, started her lines. Clearly, confidently, she spoke, and Janet’s fears for the play, fears for any mistakes of her own, melted away. Helen was going magnificently, perfectly at ease and seemingly living the very rôle of Gale Naughton.
Janet slipped into the mood of the play. It wasn’t hard for she had attended every rehearsal and knew the lines of almost every character.