By the time I'd got well warmed up, and was throwin' in all the flourishes that's been invented—double ducks, side-step and swing, shoulder work, and so on—I felt real chipper. I makes a grandstand finish, and then has the nerve to face the audience and do a matinée bend. As I did that I gets my lamps fixed on some one in the front row.
Say, if you've ever done much on the platform, you know how sometimes you'll get a squint at a pair of eyes down front and can't get yourself away from 'em after that. Well, that was the way with me then. There was rows and rows of faces that all looked alike, but this one phiz seemed to stand right out; and to save me, all I could do was to stare back.
It belonged to Miriam. She had her chin tucked down, and her head canted to one side, and her mouth puckered into the mushiest kind of a grin you ever saw. Her eyes were rolled up real kittenish, too. Oh, it was a combination to make a man strike his grandmother, that look she was sendin' up to me. I wanted to dodge it and pick up another, but there was no more gettin' away from it than as if I was bein' followed by a search-light. Worst of it was, I could feel myself grinnin' back at her just as mushy. I was gettin' sillier every breath, and I might have got as far as blowin' kisses at her if I hadn't pulled myself together and begun to juggle the Indian clubs, for the second half of my act.
All the ginger had faded out of me, though, and I cut the rest of it mighty short. As I comes off, Sadie grabs me and begins to tell me what a hit I'd made, and how tickled she was, but I shakes her off.
"What's your great rush, Shorty?" says she.
"I've got a date to fill down the road," says I, and I makes a quick break for the dressin'-room. Honest, I was gettin' rattled for fear if Miriam should get another look at me she'd mesmerize me so I'd never wake up. I skins into my sack-suit, leaves word to have my bag expressed to town, and was just about to make a sudden exit when I bumps into some one at the front door.
"Oh, Mr. McCabe! How did you know where to find me?" says she.
Say, I'll give you one guess. Sure, it was Miriam again. She was got up expensive, all real lace and first-water sparks, and just as handsome as a towel rack. But the minute she turns on that gushy look I'm nailed to the spot, same as the rabbits they feed to the boa-constrictors up at the Zoo.
"You didn't think you could lose me so easy, did you?" says I.
"What a persistent fellow you are!" says she. "But, after you behaved so heroically last night, I suppose I must forgive you. Wasn't it silly of me to be so frightened?"