I am just returned to N.Y. & I am glad to find you here, at least I shall be glad if you let me read you my new play--"Nathan Hale"--& dont escape me as you did so successfully in London. If you liked the scheme & story at all, I feel pretty sure you will like the play itself twice as well, & if you had been at the new Columbia College the other day when they unveiled a bas relief of _Knowlton_--one of my characters--& heard the _tremendous_ enthusiasm at the slightest mention of Hale, I think your interest in the play & subject would have immensely increased. I can read it in two hours--or less, you can send me away as soon after I _start_ as you like, if you dont care about it. I've no desire to choke the play down yr throat. All I want you to do is take _one_ chance in it! & right away, as I am back here to _sell this_ play to somebody & dont want to waste time. Wont you give me an appointment tomorrow? or the next day? or the next? (Any hour you like.) Go on! _Do!_ Yours, CLYDE FITCH I must tell you the girl's part comes out rather important, but I hope you won't mind that. [Illustration: MAXINE ELLIOTT _Fate's partner_] And this is the gentleman who, a few years later, insisted on the transportation of an entire company from Philadelphia to New York because he was too weary to make the trip himself. (The company was rehearsing one of his plays and he insisted on personally supervising it.) Even after his supplicating letter I dodged Fitch. I didn't like him in the first place and his shabby behavior with "Nathan Hale" made me disgusted with him. I broke a dozen appointments with him, but finally he cornered me and I had to hear the play. While I knew I could neither look nor suggest the character I did see possibilities for acting and I was sure the rôle of Alice Adams would fit Maxine down to the ground. For these reasons I agreed to produce the play. From that day forward Clyde Fitch and my wife conspired against me. They exchanged endearing expressions through the mail--aided and abetted by the wife of a Chicago dentist who had committed suicide after one of his "best friends" had stolen his wife (who deserted her child to come to New York and aid other women with affinities!). Fancy, killing one's self! Why not kill her and her paramour? They made a worthy trio! And they finally succeeded in hatching a scheme which developed in Maxine's starring alone in a play written for her by Fitch called "Her Own Way"--an appropriate title cunningly selected. They launched her as a star (on my money!) and broke up my home! They had to come to me to obtain bookings for a road tour. For putting up the cash I was to get one third of the profits. Abe Erlanger refused to go in with me for one dollar, insisting that Maxine would be an awful flivver on her own. But the play made an instant hit and her success was just as big.