Roast Beef, Medium

aywrights have been putting that fiction into the mouths of wronged husbands and building their "big scene" around it. But don't you believe it. There are four kinds: good women, bad

-three-NINETY FOUR! by gosh! and the cinders are filtering into your berth, and even the porter is wandering restlessly up and down the aisle like a black soul in purgatory and a white duck coat, then th

pers and kimono, waited until the tortured porter's footsteps had squeaked their way to the far end of the car, then sped up the dim aisle toward the back platform. She wrenched open the door, felt the rush of

voice in the darkness. (Na

something inside of her suspended action for the f

forward from the corner in which she had been crouchin

h each other according to the rules of the Ancient Order of the Kimono. Seven seconds after Emma McChesney first beheld

at the end of a leash. The Japanese are wrongly accused of having perpetrated it. In pattern it showed bright g

without looking like a Swedish immigrant just dumped at Ellis Island. Traveling had become a science with her, as witness her service

it hot!" she

notized into making some lemonade-a pitcherful, with a lot of

still usin' it?" She leaned against the door, swaying with the motion of

a McChesney, and decid

it, without com

s, not pleasure. I'm on the road, represen

plump blonde widened with surprise.

. It's the way your hair's fixed, I suppose. Say, that must b

an out into the world-" began Emma McChe

ose makes up train schedules? They don't seem to think no respectable train ought to leave anywhere before eleve

t the door for another look at the

l, if you think mine is a h

and laughed not prettily. "I ain't

e-" Emma McChesney stopped, her

Bend at six to-morrow morning, and we play there to-morrow night, Sunday." She took a step forward so that her haggard face a

; w

g there by the steps and try what the newspaper accounts call 'jumping into

there swept a wave of pity. But she answer

that the Irish comedy guy slaps in the face with a bunch of lettuce. Say, there's somethin

behind the coarseness and vulgarity and ignorance, Emma McChesney's keen mental eye sa

the woman's shoulder. So they stood, on the swaying, jolting platform. Blanche LeHaye, of the Sam Levin Crac

elling the story of my life, with all the tremolo stops

med to snatch itself away

with your life's his

g that looked up at me, pitiful. You know, the way you reach down, and pat 'm on the head, and say, 'Nice doggie, nice doggie, old fellow,' even if it is a street cur,

lines; beings redolent of bitter almond, and violet toilette water; beings in doubtful corsets and green silk petticoats perfect as to accordion-plaited flounce, but showing slits and tatters farther up; beings jealously guarding their ten inches of mirror space and consenting to mo

t treat me with your life

se the rumpled, shapeless figure of Miss Blanche LeHaye. The queen of burlesque bore in her arms a conglomerate mass of

I never slep' a wink till just about half a hour ago. I bet I ain'

clothes a satire on the fashions for men, their chins unshaven, their loose lips curved contentedly over cigarettes; the women dreadfully unreal with the pitiless light of the early morning sun glaring down on their bedizened faces, their spotted, garish clothes, their run-down heels, their vivid veils, their matted hair. They were quarreling among themselves, and a flame of hate for the moment lighted up those dull, stupid, vicious faces. Blanche LeHaye appeared to be the center about which the strife waged, for suddenly she flung through the shrill group and walked swiftly over

ow'm a leadin' lady's a leadin' lady. Let 'em go to their hash hotels. I'm goin' to the real inn in this town just to let 'em know that I got my dignity to keep up, and that I don't have to mix in with sc

bunch, with the pink reins in my hands, drivin' that four-in-hand of johnnies.

er anger left her with the sudde

erce?" she fretted,

ht of the wounds of others. But now, as she studied the woman huddled there in the corner, she was conscious of a shuddering disgust of her-of the so

e look on Emma McChesney's face. Caught it, and compr

the rest of 'em. Every real actress has got a farm on Long Island, if it's only there in the mind of the press agent. It's a kind of a religion with 'em. I was goin' to build a house on mine that was goin'

at the curbing outside the hotel and jumped down to open the door. She foun

had two hours of restful sleep. She had bathed, and breakfasted, and donned clean clothes. She had brushed the cinders ou

y glanced in. What she saw made her stop. The next moment she

ped in a dejected heap in a chair before the window. There was

I left the door open to catch the breeze, but there ain't any. Y

McChesney hurriedl

, and rose. She slouched over to where Emma M

voluntarily put out her hand, "why-m

?" She put down the squat little glass she had in her hand and

is morning, h'm? Whatja mean? You got a nerve turnin' up your nose at me, you

oom and closed the door. Then she ca

hat a woman ever had. She's skirt and suit buyer at Barker & Fisk's here. I have a standing invitation to spend Sunday at her house. She knows I'm coming. I help get dinner if I feel like it, and wash my hair if I want to, and sit out in the back yard, and fool with the dog, and act like a human being for on

cking at the pin which fastened

r game?" sh

ney, pleasantly. "Do you ever have any luck with

nted it." And she was down on her knees, her f

d suit buying, could have stood the test of having a Blanche LeHaye thrust upon her, an unexp

s Miss Blanche LeHa

elles," put in Miss LeHa

t visit here, Miss LeHaye? Excuse me for not shaking hands. I'm all flour. Lay your things in there. Ma's spending the day with Aunt Gus at Forest City and I'm the whole works around here

ut it was in the manner of one who is fearful of wakening a sleeper. When

e picking hers up. Then she held it by both sleeves and looked at it long, and curiously. When she looked up aga

"that I guess I've almost forgotten how to be a wom

r the caramel icing. She shed her rings, and pinned her hair back from her forehead, a

rown crock, with a chip out of the side. There's certain things always goes hand-in-hand in your mind. You can't thin

l and cold cream is one; and new pot

ck. She skinned tomatoes. She scoured pans. She wiped up the white oilcloth table-top with a capable and soapy hand. The heat and bustle of the little kitchen seemed to work some miraculous change in her. Her eyes

halfway to their knees, things looked propitious for that first stroke in the plan which had

a bit in her chair. "Tell me, Miss LeHaye, haven't you ever thoug

used to. I've got over that. Now all I ask is to get a

en a time-" insinuated

dly at the two women who we

y sweetheart when I was young and trusting. If I was to draw a picture of my life it would look like one of those charts that the weat

depths of the leather-cushioned chair.

the big chair, "that's not the life for a woman like you. I can get you a place in

our store. I've been there long enough to have some say-so, and if I recommend you they'd s

ing her arm around at the back, be

that's my brother--in years and years. Then one night in Omaha, I glimmed him sitting down in the B. H. row. His face just seemed to rise up at me out of the audience. He recognized me, too. Say, men are all alike. What they see in a dingy, half-fed, ignorant bunch like us, I don't know. But the minute a man goes to Cleveland, or Pittsburgh, or somewhere on business he'll hunt up a burlesque show, and what's more, he'll enjoy it. Funny. Well, Len waited for me after the show, and we had a talk. He told me his troubles,

er feet, and stepped out of it. She walked ove

before slipping her skirt over her head. The silence

ls, I couldn't hold down

, don't you? Well, I ain't. I don't hurt anybod

ey. "I don't. That's why I made that proposition to you. That's

women with brains in a burlesque troupe. If they had 'em they wouldn't be there. Why, we're the dumbest, most ignorant bunch there is. Most of us are just hired girls, dressed up. That's why you find the Woman's Uplift Union ha

hand. "I'm sorry," she sa

a time. My fingers are all stained up with new potatoes, and my nails is full of strawberry juice, and I hope it won't come off for a week. And I want to thank you

a sort of admiration all played across the faces of the two women, whose kindness had met with rebu

ait until your caramel is off the stove, and then add your butter, when t