“What’s it all about, anyway?”
“Gawd forgive me for sayin’ anythin’ against my wife, but I don’t know what it’s all about. Miss Wimple read it. Judgin’ from the expression of her face, as she read it, it’s a comedy. Even if Susie don’t think so. I’m goin’ to be Howard Chesterfield, a jockey. I’m the jigger,” says Hank sad-like, jambin’ his derby down over one eye, “what wins the race, saves the mortgage and wins the girl.”
“That’d be worth goin’ a long ways to see,” says I.
“That’s what Miss Wimple said. But we’re short of actors. Susie suggests that we git you two fellers to play with us. But I said neither of yuh knowed the first thing about actin’, and Miss Wimple said that mebbe I was right, ’cause, as she read the play, it needed somebody with more brains than an ordinary cowpuncher has to play them parts.”
“Lemme tell you somethin’!” says Peewee. “I’ve done more actin’ than you ever seen. I was a actor before you ever knowed there was anythin’ but a four-wheel stage on earth; and I never seen any part I can’t play.”
“I ditto all that and sign my name,” says I. “When it comes to play actin’, a Sykes jist falls naturally into the part.”
“This is a hard play to act,” says Hank.
“That’s my meat,” declares Peewee. “I’ve shore bit off some hard ones.”
“Didja ever see a horse on the stage?” asks Hank.
“Well,” says Peewee, “I kinda have, but I never favored ’em.”