"What"s the odds," says I, "if a lot of them old-timers are willin" to pay to hear her try?"

Vee shakes her head and suggests that we go up and talk it over with Mr.

and Mrs. Robert. Which we does.

"But if she has been off the stage for twenty years," suggests Mrs.

Robert, "perhaps she wouldn"t attempt it."

"I"ll bet she would for Vee," says I. "Any way, she wouldn"t feel sore at being asked And if you could sting a bunch of twenty or thirty for a hundred apiece----"

"Just fancy!" says Mrs. Robert, drawin" in a long breath and doin"

rapid-fire mental arithmetic. "Verona, let"s drive right over and see her at once."

They"re some hustlers, that pair. All I have to do is map out the scheme, and they goes after it with a rush.

And say, I want to tell you that was a perfectly good charity concert, judged by the box-office receipts or any way you want to size it up.

Bein" the official press-agent, who"s got a better right to admit it?

True, Elman didn"t show up, but his alibi was sound. And not until the last minute was we sure whether the fair Geraldine would get there or not. But my contribution to the headliners was there from the first tap of the bell.

Vee says she actually wept on her shoulder when the proposition was sprung on her. Seems she"d been livin" in Harbor Hills for nearly three years without havin" been let in on a thing--with n.o.body callin" on her, or even noddin" as she drove by. Most of her neighbors was a lot younger, folks who barely remembered that there had been such a party as Clara Belle Kinney, and who couldn"t have told whether she"d been a singer or a bareback rider. They only knew her as a dumpy freakish dressed old girl whose drugged hair was turnin" gray.

"Of course," she says, sort of timid and trembly, "I have kept up my singing as well as I could. Mr. Tupper likes to have me. But I know my voice isn"t what it was once. It"s dear of you to ask me, though, and--and I"ll do my best."

I don"t take any credit for fillin" that double row of wicker chairs we put down front and had the nerve to ask that hold-up price for. When the word was pa.s.sed around that Clara Belle Kinney was to be among the performers, they almost mobbed me for tickets. Why, I collected from two-thirds of the Corrugated directors without turnin" a hand, and for two days there about all I did was answer "phone calls from Broad Street and the clubs--brokers, bank presidents, and so on, who wanted to know if there was any left.

A fine bunch of silver-tops they was, too, when we got "em all lined up.

You wouldn"t have suspected it of some of them dignified old scouts, either. Back of "em, fillin" every corner of the long room and spillin"

out into the big hall, was the top crust of our local smart set, come to hear Farrar at close range.

Yep, Geraldine made quite a hit. Nothing strange about that. And that piece from "Madame b.u.t.terfly" she gave just brought "em right up on their toes. But say, you should hear what breaks loose when it"s announced that the third number will be an old favorite revival by Clara Belle Kinney. That"s all the name we gave. What if most of the audience was simply starin" puzzled and stretchin" their necks to see who was comin"? Them old boys down front seemed to know what they was howlin"

about.

Yes, Clara Belle does show up a bit husky in evenin" dress. Talk about elbow dimples! And I was wishin" she"d forgot to do her hair that antique way, all piled up on her head, with a few coy ringlets over one ear. But she"d landscaped her facial scenery artistic, and she sure does know how to roll them big eyes of hers.

I didn"t much enjoy listenin" through them first few bars, though. There wasn"t merely a crack here and there. Her voice went to a complete smash at times, besides bein" weak and wabbly. It"s like listenin" to the ghost of a voice. I heard a few t.i.tters from the back rows.

But them old boys don"t seem to mind. It was a voice comin" to them from "way back in the "90"s. And when she struggles through the first verse of "O Promise Me," and pauses to get her second wind, maybe they don"t give her a hand. That seemed to pep her up a lot. She gets a better grip on the high notes, the tremolo effect wears off, and she goes to it like a winner. Begins to get the crowd with her, too. Why, say, even Farrar stands up and leads in the call for an encore. She ain"t alone.

"MacFadden! MacFadden!" K. W. Mason is shoutin".

So in a minute more Clara Belle, her eyes shinin", has swung into that raggy old tune, and when she gets to the chorus she beckons to the front rows and says: "Now, all together, boys!

"Wan--two--three!

Balance like me----"

Did they come in on it? Say, they roared it out like so many young college hicks riotin" around the campus after a session at a rathskeller. You should have seen Old Hickory standin" out front with his arms wavin" and his face red.

Then they demands some of the Katishaw stuff, and "Comrades," and "Little Annie Rooney." And with every encore Clara Belle seems to shake off five or ten years, until you could almost see what a footlight charmer she must have been.

In the midst of it all Vee gives me the nudge.

"Do look at Mr. Tupper, will you!"

Yes, he"s sittin" over in a corner, with his white shirt-front bulgin", his neck stretched forward eager, and his big hairy paws grippin" the chair-back in front. And hanged if a drop of brine ain"t tricklin" down one side of his nose.

"Gosh!" says I. "His emotions are leakin" into his whiskers. Maybe the old boy is human, after all."

A minute later, as I slides easy out of my end seat, Vee asks:

"Where are you going, Torchy?"

"I want a glimpse of Mrs. Pemmy Foote"s face, that"s all," says I.

CHAPTER VIII

WHEN TORCHY GOT THE CALL

No, I ain"t said much about it before. There are some things you"re apt to keep to yourself, specially the ones that root deep. And I"ll admit that at first there I don"t quite know where I was at. But as affairs got messier and messier, and the U-boats got busier, and I heard some first-hand details of what had happened to the Belgians--well, I got mighty restless. I expect I indulged in more serious thought stuff than I"d ever been guilty of.

You see, it was along back when we were gettin" our first close-ups of the big sc.r.a.p--some of our boats sunk, slinkers reported off Sandy Hook, bomb plots shown up, and Papa Joffre over here soundin" the S. O. S.

earnest.

Then there was Mr. Robert joinin" the Naval Reserves, and two young hicks from the bond room who"d volunteered. We"d had postals from "em at the trainin" camp. Even Vee was busy with a first-aid cla.s.s, learnin"

how to tie bandages and put on splints.

So private seccing seemed sort of tame and useless--like keepin" on sprinklin" the lawn after your chimney was bein" struck by lightnin". I felt like I ought to be gettin" in the game somehow. Anyway, it seemed as if it was my ante.

Not that I"d been rushed off my feet by all this buntin"-wavin" or khaki-wearin". I"m no panicky Old Glory trail-hitter. Nor I didn"t lug around the idea I was the missin" hero who was to romp through the barbed wire, stamp Hindenburg"s whiskers in the mud, and lead the Allies across the Rhine. I didn"t even kid myself I could swim out and kick a hole in a submarine, or do the darin" aviator act after a half-hour lesson at Mineola.

In fact, I suspected that sheddin" the enemy"s gore wasn"t much in my line. I knew I should dislike quittin" the hay at dawn to sneak out and get mixed up with half a bushel of impetuous sc.r.a.p-iron. Still, if it had to be done, why not me as well as the next party?

I"d been meanin" to talk it over with Vee--sort of hint around, anyway, and see how she"d take it. But as a matter of fact I never could seem to find just the right openin" until, there one night after dinner, as she finishes a new piece she"s tryin" over on the piano, I wanders up beside her and starts absent-minded tearin" little bits off a corner of the music.

"Torchy!" she protests. "What an absurd thing to do."

"Eh?" says I, twistin" it into a cornucopia. "But you know I can"t go on warmin" the bench like this."

She stares at me puzzled for a second.

"Meaning what, for instance?" she asks.

"I got to go help swat the Hun," says I.

The flickery look in them gray eyes of hers steadies down, and she reaches out for one of my hands. That"s all. No jumpy emotions--not even a lip quiver.