temper, which is going some for a lady.

"What am I going to do New Year's? I know one thing. I ain't going to play an encore to the sozzle session number I pulled off last season. Didn't you hear about it? Evidently you were not on Broadway last New Year's Eve. A couple of young ladies and myself were playing a progressive hell party all up and down the main street. You see, you play it this way. A guy comes up and blows a horn in your ear. You swat the horn quickly on the end with your hand. If the guy swallows more than half the horn you win and are allowed to 'phone for the ambulance. But that was only a prelude to the main event. Ah, me! I blush to chronicle it. There were so many shows in town that the supply of college students didn't come up to the demand, and as me and the bunch had sorta turned them down after they went and lost all their money on the Thanksgiving game, so we had an intimation that developed into a hunch that our little 'welcome' mat on the doorstep would not be crowded with an eager throng. We engaged a couple of window tables at the Cafe des Beaux Minks realizing that though we were not in the money we were still on the track. This was last New Year's Eve. New Year's afternoon we held a reception up at Miss Verneaque's flat, took up a collection for the widows and orphans and cleared $4.43 apiece on it. The place got pinched and we all had to hide on the roof until the cops beat it. But not for me this year. Me for the peaceful kind of a celebration. I don't know what to do. The only people I have on my calling list now are the agents, and they will all be home splashing in the egg-nog.

"Gee, but I wish I was home. Was you ever in a country town on a New Year's Day? Say, list. Sixty laughs in sixty minutes looks like a busy day at the morgue compared to the laughs they hand out in one of those one-night stand dumps. The Sons of Temperance all go out and get a bun on ad lib. and everybody inhales good cheer. I sang in the choir. Honest I did, but it didn't take. I got a silver cigarette case yet the choirmaster gave me. But no home this year; me to the Cafe des Enfants. What? Will I? Don't make such a foolish noise. I'll be there with my hair in a braid. Two-thirty at Hector's. Say, you've got the Good Samaritan looking like a rent collector. So long."

In which Sabrina discloses a little of her past and those of the members of the company, tells how she was a bridesmaid and goes into detail in regard to the benefit to humanity of having carrier pigeons trained to rush the growler.

CHAPTER TWO

I was strolling down Broadway the other afternoon with Oscar when we happened to meet Miss Sabrina, the show girl. I introduced them, of course, and then retired to the background. This is what followed:

"I am very glad to meet you, Mr. Jenkins. I've heard the party here speak of you."

"Yes; and I have heard him say several nice things about you."

"Is that so?"

"Sure. But don't take it to heart; he means well."

"Well, I can only say he treats me like a true friend."

"Speaking of treats, I'll buy the beer."

"My goodness! Ain't you afraid of catching cold—taking so much money out of your clothes all at once?"

"What was that you handed out? Come again, please."

"I merely remarked that it was awful kind of you."

"Oh, that's all right; I always was careless with my money."

"I always like this place; it reminds me so much of the back of the drug store in Emporia."

"Then you are from the West, Miss De Vear."

"Oh, yes, indeed, I'm a Western girl pure and simple—"

"You said, 'pure and simple,' did you not?"

"I most certainly did, and I'd like to see the party that's got anything on me. I come from a dead swell family, I do. I may be only a poor chorus girl, but by gosh! I was brung up right. Did you know that I was featured for three seasons in the church choir in my home town and would have had it for life if the stage manag—I mean the choirmaster hadn't forgot he was a gentleman; so I just quit rather than cause talk. Why, would you believe it?—my father was mayor of Emporia for nearly two terms. You'd be surprised if I told you my real name and some of the people I am related to. Say, what are you going to do with that book? Trying to dope out whether you can buy another drink, I suppose."

"No. I'm just keeping track of the girls I met whose fathers are mayors of towns. I've got forty-seven for Providence, R.I., fifteen for Peoria, Ill., ten for Atlanta, Ga., and your two makes seven for Emporia. I've got fifty-three for chief of police, twenty-one fire captains, and eleven postmas—"

"Excuse me, but are you trying to infer that I am telling an untruth?"

"Oh, forget it! Can't you stand a little jolly without going up in the air?"

"Well, I'll accept your apology, but I don't like to have people casting slurs on my pa and ma, and beer wont appease my wrath when I feel like a highball.

"Go as far as you like. I was only ordering what I thought you were accustomed to."

"Say, Mr. Percival B. Fresh, you certainly are the village wag when it comes to the Oriental repartee, ain't you?"

"Sure I am, but I have to go to the mat when they commence to dish out this Emporia humor. Oh. Laza! Do you care for the one in red?"

"Of course I may go wrong, but in my mind no gentleman would make remarks about another girl when he is with a lady."

"Say, girlie, you're all right—lovely hair, beautiful eyes and all that—but cut it; drop in your penny and get wise to yourself. That's a great show you are with."

"When was you out front?"

"Night before last."

"Night before last! My Heavens! Wasn't I a sight? You know the girl I dress with had been out to a wine supper and she came splashing into the dressing room lit up like a show window and cried my makeup box full of tears over the death of her baby sister, and the way I had to put it on I thought was sure good for a fine, and to make matters worse some hussy got next to all my toothpicks and I had to use a hairpin for a liner; but did you notice the way that cat of a soubrette keeps me out of the spotlight? Professional jealousy, that's all; but it don't do me no good to kick, because the stage manager sends her silk stockings and that kind of junk, while the best I get is a chance to hold hands with the electrician; but, of course, he gets his orders."

"Say, that piece of work that stands on the end opposite you is all to the berries, ain't she?"

"Her!"

"Surest thing you know. She looks like a night-blooming pippin to me."

"My, gracious, Mr. Jenkins, I never knocked a living soul, but I don't mind telling you as a friend that I personally would not degrade myself by speaking to her, and of course you know that the hair she wears is not her own. I haven't a thing in the world against the poor creature, but it has been breathed around the company that she is not all she should be. Of course, I don't know positively, but it is what everybody says, and I only wish she would make good with that four bits of mine."

"Well, I'm glad there's no hard feeling between you two, as I would like to meet her."

"I'm very sorry, but you will have to pardon me if I refuse to give you a knockdown, for I would steer no friend of a friend of mine up against a flim flam where there's so many nice girls