The worst was past, and for the rest of the evening she moved about among the amateurs and professionals, talking, listening, observing, finding out what it meant and taking mental notes of it all. Charley Welsh constituted himself her preceptor and guardian angel, and so well did he perform the self-allotted task that when it was all over she felt fully prepared to write her article.
But the proposition had been to do two turns, and her native pluck forced her to live up to it. Also, in the course of the intervening days, she discovered fleeting impressions that required verification; so, on Saturday, she was back again, with her telescope basket and Letty.
The manager seemed looking for her, and she caught an expression of relief in his eyes when he first saw her. He hurried up, greeted her, and bowed with a respect ludicrously at variance with his previous ogre-like behavior. And as he bowed, across his shoulders she saw Charley Welsh deliberately wink.
But the surprise had just begun. The manager begged to be introduced to her sister, chatted entertainingly with the pair of them, and strove greatly and anxiously to be agreeable. He even went so far as to give Edna a dressing room to herself, to the unspeakable envy of the three other amateur ladies of previous acquaintance. Edna was nonplussed, and it was not till she met Charley Welsh in the passage that light was thrown on the mystery.
"Hello!" he greeted her. "On Easy Street, eh? Everything slidin' your way."She smiled brightly.
"Thinks yer a female reporter, sure. I almost split when I saw'm layin'
himself out sweet an' pleasin'. Honest, now, that ain't yer graft, is it?""I told you my experience with editors," she parried. "And honest now, it was honest, too."But the Only Charley Welsh shook his head dubiously. "Not that I care a rap,"he declared. "And if you are, just gimme a couple of lines of notice, the right kind, good ad, you know. And if yer not, why yer all right anyway. Yer not our class, that's straight."After her turn, which she did this time with the nerve of an old campaigner, the manager returned to the charge; and after saying nice things and being generally nice himself, he came to the point.
"You'll treat us well, I hope," he said insinuatingly. "Do the right thing by us, and all that?""Oh," she answered innocently, "you couldn't persuade me to do another turn; Iknow I seemed to take and that you'd like to have me, but I really, really can't.""You know what I mean," he said, with a touch of his old bulldozing manner.
"No, I really won't," she persisted. "Vaudeville's too--too wearing on the nerves, my nerves, at any rate."Whereat he looked puzzled and doubtful, and forbore to press the point further.
But on Monday morning, when she came to his office to get her pay for the two turns, it was he who puzzled her.
"You surely must have mistaken me," he lied glibly. "I remember saying something about paying your car fare. We always do this, you know, but we never, never pay amateurs. That would take the life and sparkle out of the whole thing. No, Charley Welsh was stringing you. He gets paid nothing for his turns. No amateur gets paid. The idea is ridiculous. However, here's fifty cents. It will pay your sister's car fare also. And,"--very suavely,--"speaking for the Loops, permit me to thank you for the kind and successful contribution of your services."That afternoon, true to her promise to Max Irwin, she placed her typewritten copy into his hands. And while he ran over it, he nodded his head from time to time, and maintained a running fire of commendatory remarks: "Good!--that's it!--that's the stuff!--psychology's all right!--the very idea!--you've caught it!--excellent!--missed it a bit here, but it'll go--that's vigorous!
--strong!--vivid!--pictures! pictures!--excellent!--most excellent!"And when he had run down to the bottom of the last page, holding out his hand:
"My dear Miss Wyman, I congratulate you. I must say you have exceeded my expectations, which, to say the least, were large. You are a journalist, a natural journalist. You've got the grip, and you're sure to get on. The INTELLIGENCER will take it, without doubt, and take you too. They'll have to take you. If they don't, some of the other papers will get you.""But what's this?" he queried, the next instant, his face going serious.
"You've said nothing about receiving the pay for your turns, and that's one of the points of the feature. I expressly mentioned it, if you'll remember.""It will never do," he said, shaking his head ominously, when she had explained. "You simply must collect that money somehow. Let me see. Let me think a moment.""Never mind, Mr. Irwin," she said. "I've bothered you enough. Let me use your 'phone, please, and I'll try Mr. Ernst Symes again."He vacated his chair by the desk, and Edna took down the receiver.
"Charley Welsh is sick," she began, when the connection had been made. "What?
No I'm not Charley Welsh. Charley Welsh is sick, and his sister wants to know if she can come out this afternoon and draw his pay for him?""Tell Charley Welsh's sister that Charley Welsh was out this morning, and drew his own pay," came back the manager's familiar tones, crisp with asperity.
"All right," Edna went on. "And now Nan Bellayne wants to know if she and her sister can come out this afternoon and draw Nan Bellayne's pay?""What'd he say? What'd he say?" Max Irwin cried excitedly, as she hung up.
"That Nan Bellayne was too much for him, and that she and her sister could come out and get her pay and the freedom of the Loops, to boot.""One thing, more," he interrupted her thanks at the door, as on her previous visit. "Now that you've shown the stuff you're made of, I should esteem it, ahem, a privilege to give you a line myself to the INTELLIGENCER people."
