he next afternoon Morry arrived to see the act. He was dressed in a natty pin stripe suit and he wore a big yellow carnation in the buttonhole, but his sallow face was impassive.
I escorted him down the dark empty theatre to the front row.
"Just hold your breath now," I told him. "I'll have the act on stage in a jiffy."
He yawned and glanced at his watch.
"I haven't got long," he said.
I went backstage and found Alice.
"Hurry up," I said. "Morry is waiting."
She looked at me as if I'd just crawled out from the wainscoating. "I've just talked to the kid," she said. "He thinks I'm poison. What kind of a yarn have you been feeding him?"
"Me? Why, honey, that hurts. Do you think your Uncle Patrick would breathe an unkind word about you?"
"Well, it's mighty strange," she said. "He won't even tell me what's biting him."