things behind the stage, crowded the passages, dressing rooms, and wings, and
forced everybody into everybody else's way. This was particularly distasteful

to the professionals, who carried themselves as befitted those of a higher
caste, and whose behavior toward the pariah amateurs was marked by hauteur and

even brutality. And Edna, bullied and elbowed and shoved about, clinging
desperately to her basket and seeking a dressing room, took note of it all.

A dressing room she finally found, jammed with three other amateur "ladies,"
who were "making up" with much noise, high-pitched voices, and squabbling over

a lone mirror. Her own make-up was so simple that it was quickly accomplished,
and she left the trio of ladies holding an armed truce while they passed

judgment upon her. Letty was close at her shoulder, and with patience and
persistence they managed to get a nook in one of the wings which commanded a

view of the stage.
A small, dark man, dapper and debonair, swallow-tailed and top-hatted, was

waltzing about the stage with dainty, mincing steps, and in a thin little
voice singing something or other about somebody or something evidently

pathetic. As his waning voice neared the end of the lines, a large woman,
crowned with an amazingwealth of blond hair, thrustrudely past Edna, trod

heavily on her toes, and shoved her contemptuously to the side. "Bloomin'
hamateur!" she hissed as she went past, and the next instant she was on the

stage, graciously bowing to the audience, while the small, dark man twirled
extravagantly about on his tiptoes.

"Hello, girls!"
This greeting, drawled with an inimitable vocal caress in every syllable,

close in her ear, caused Edna to give a startled little jump. A smooth-faced,
moon-faced young man was smiling at her good-naturedly. His "make-up" was

plainly that of the stock tramp of the stage, though the inevitable whiskers
were lacking.

"Oh, it don't take a minute to slap'm on," he explained, divining the search
in her eyes and waving in his hand the adornment in question. "They make a

feller sweat," he explained further. And then, "What's yer turn?"
"Soprano--sentimental," she answered, trying to be offhand and at ease.

"Whata you doin' it for?" he demanded directly.
"For fun; what else?" she countered.

"I just sized you up for that as soon as I put eyes on you. You ain't graftin'
for a paper, are you?"

"I never met but one editor in my life," she replied evasively, "and I,
he--well, we didn't get on very well together."

"Hittin' 'm for a job?"
Edna nodded carelessly, though inwardlyanxious and cudgelling her brains for

something to turn the conversation.
"What'd he say?"

"That eighteen other girls had already been there that week."
"Gave you the icy mit, eh?" The moon-faced young man laughed and slapped his

thighs. "You see, we're kind of suspicious. The Sunday papers 'd like to get
Amateur Night done up brown in a nice little package, and the manager don't

see it that way. Gets wild-eyed at the thought of it."
"And what's your turn?" she asked.

"Who? me? Oh, I'm doin' the tramp act tonight. I'm Charley Welsh, you know."
She felt that by the mention of his name he intended to convey to her complete

enlightenment, but the best she could do was to say politely, "Oh, is that
so?"

She wanted to laugh at the hurt disappointment which came into his face, but
concealed her amusement.

"Come, now," he said brusquely, "you can't stand there and tell me you've
never heard of Charley Welsh? Well, you must be young. Why, I'm an Only, the

Only amateur at that. Sure, you must have seen me. I'm everywhere. I could be
a professional, but I get more dough out of it by doin' the amateur."

"But what's an 'Only'?" she queried. "I want to learn."
"Sure," Charley Welsh said gallantly. "I'll put you wise. An 'Only' is a

nonpareil, the feller that does one kind of a turn better'n any other feller.
He's the Only, see?"

And Edna saw.
"To get a line on the biz," he continued, "throw yer lamps on me. I'm the Only

all-round amateur. To-night I make a bluff at the tramp act. It's harder to
bluff it than to really do it, but then it's acting, it's amateur, it's art.

See? I do everything, from Sheeny monologue to team song and dance and Dutch
comedian. Sure, I'm Charley Welsh, the Only Charley Welsh."

And in this fashion, while the thin, dark man and the large, blond woman
warbled dulcetly out on the stage and the other professionals followed in

their turns, did Charley Welsh put Edna wise, giving her much miscellaneous
and superfluous information and much that she stored away for the SUNDAY

INTELLIGENCER.
"Well, tra la loo," he said suddenly. "There's his highness chasin' you up.

Yer first on the bill. Never mind the row when you go on. Just finish yer turn
like a lady."

It was at that moment that Edna felt her journalistic ambition departing from
her, and was aware of an overmastering desire to be somewhere else. But the

stage manager, like an ogre, barred her retreat. She could hear the opening
bars of her song going up from the orchestra and the noises of the house dying

away to the silence of anticipation.
"Go ahead," Letty whispered, pressing her hand; and from the other side came

the peremptory "Don't flunk!" of Charley Welsh.
But her feet seemed rooted to the floor, and she leaned weakly against a shift

scene. The orchestra was beginning over again, and a lone voice from the house
piped with startling distinctness:

"Puzzle picture! Find Nannie!"
A roar of laughter greeted the sally, and Edna shrank back. But the strong

hand of the manager descended on her shoulder, and with a quick, powerful
shove propelled her out on to the stage. His hand and arm had flashed into

full view, and the audience, grasping the situation, thundered its
appreciation. The orchestra was drowned out by the terrible din, and Edna

could see the bows scraping away across the violins, apparently without sound.
It was impossible for her to begin in time, and as she patiently waited, arms

akimbo and ears straining for the music, the house let loose again (a favorite
trick, she afterward learned, of confusing the amateur by preventing him or

her from hearing the orchestra).
But Edna was recovering her presence of mind. She became aware, pit to dome,

of a vast sea of smiling and fun-distorted faces, of vast roars of laughter,
rising wave on wave, and then her Scotch blood went cold and angry. The

hard-working but silent orchestra gave her the cue, and, without making a
sound, she began to move her lips, stretch forth her arms, and sway her body,

as though she were really singing. The noise in the house redoubled in the
attempt to drown her voice, but she serenely went on with her pantomime. This

seemed to continue an interminable time, when the audience, tiring of its
prank and in order to hear, suddenly stilled its clamor, and discovered the

dumb show she had been making. For a moment all was silent, save for the
orchestra, her lips moving on without a sound, and then the audience realized

that it had been sold, and broke out afresh, this time with genuine applause
in acknowledgment of her victory. She chose this as the happy moment for her

exit, and with a bow and a backwardretreat, she was off the stage in Letty's
arms.

The worst was past, and for the rest of the evening she moved about among the
amateurs and professionals, talking, listening, observing, finding out what it

meant and takingmental notes of it all. Charley Welsh constituted himself her
preceptor and guardian angel, and so well did he perform the self-allotted

task that when it was all over she felt fully prepared to write her article.
But the proposition had been to do two turns, and her native pluck forced her

to live up to it. Also, in the course of the intervening days, she discovered
fleeting impressions that required verification; so, on Saturday, she was back

again, with her telescope basket and Letty.
The manager seemed looking for her, and she caught an expression of relief in

his eyes when he first saw her. He hurried up, greeted her, and bowed with a
respect ludicrously at variance with his previous ogre-like behavior. And as

he bowed, across his shoulders she saw Charley Welsh deliberately wink.
But the surprise had just begun. The manager begged to be introduced to her

sister, chatted entertainingly with the pair of them, and strove greatly and
anxiously to be agreeable. He even went so far as to give Edna a dressing room

to herself, to the unspeakable envy of the three other amateur ladies of