All the smooth, rich flow was gone. Pop, stumbling, sounded like a novice with stage fright. Tony Vaux’s red face had become a mottled red. “What’s the matter with you, Pop? Can’t you read your lines?” Pop drew himself up. “I can always read my lines. A slight indisposition. I assure you I shall be myself directly.” “Are you sick?” “Tony!” Joe’s voice was impulsive. “Give him more light.” Red-faced, Tony looked at the boy and then at the dark day grown darker. He crossed the room and brought back a standing lamp. “Try it again.” Somebody came into the room. Pop’s voice, enriched by forty years of acting, rolled out the lines once more, gave them a tang and a flavor. And yet there came to Joe, as the reading went on, a sense of something missed, of something that did not quite touch. He made his last speech. Vic Wylie, rumpled and tense, was in the room. Tony Vaux scratched his chin. “What do you think of it, Vic?” Wylie was abrupt. “I never poke a finger in another man’s show. You know that.” Tony took a fat cigar from his bulging vest and chewed off the end. “What’s wrong with it?” He raised plump hands toward Joe and Pop. “Now, now, folks. I don’t mean it’s a bad show. It’s like one of these salads that need a pinch more of this or a pinch less of that.” He puffed on the cigar. [Illustration: “Now, now, folks,” Tony Vaux said. “I don’t mean it’s a bad show.”] Joe began a hesitant: “Perhaps—” “Again, Joe?” Tony chuckled. “What is it this time?” “Perhaps Mr. Bartell comes in too fast. He’s supposed to be a retired old man with no worries except baseball. Sits around in the shade and enjoys life. Never in a hurry—that’s what I mean. Doesn’t Pop come in too crisply? You sort of lose the mellow, unhurried old man. If he came in leisurely, a little drawly....” Joe knew that Vic Wylie was watching him intently. Had he been too free with his opinion? Tony rolled the cigar across his lips. “Give it a go, Pop.” Joe was amazed at the changed shading, the difference in timing, that Pop gave his lines. He didn’t have to wonder if this were better. Vic Wylie would still have struggled for greater perfection; but Tony Vaux, rocking back and forth on his heels, exuded a bluff, red-faced pleasure. “Folks,” he said heartily, “that’s a show. If the He people don’t cool off, we’ll lay them in the aisles.” Joe thought: “That’s always the trouble with show business—the if.” You had to sell a sponsor while he was hot; next day or next week he began to wonder if the show was as good as he had thought. That was the sticker with _Sue Davis Against the World_. Too much time had passed since the audition. And these two shows were the only hopes he had. Pop Bartell departed. Joe had a shrewd idea the old actor would have nothing to do with eye-glasses. Glasses would take from his front of lingering, gallant youth. The door closed slowly as Joe followed Pop. Vic Wylie’s rasp of irritation was audible: