The Play's the Thing[B]

The Play's the Thing[B]

BY GEORGE MADDEN MARTIN.

(Arranged by Maude Herndon and Grace Kellam.)

t was the day of the exhibition. Miss Carrie, teacher of the Third Reader Class, talked in deep tones—gestures meant sweeps and circles. Since the coming of Miss Carrie, the Third Reader Class lived, as it were, in the public eye, for on Fridays books were put away and the attention given to recitations and company. No other class had these recitations, and the Third Reader was envied. Its members were pointed out and gazed upon, until one realized one was standing in the garish light of fame. The other readers, it seemed, longed for fame and craved publicity, and so it came about that the school was to have an exhibition with Miss Carrie's genius to plan and engineer the whole. For general material Miss Carrie drew from the whole school, but the play was for her own class alone.

And this was the day of the exhibition.

Hattie and Sadie and Emmy Lou stood at the gate of the school. They had spent the morning in rehearsing. At noon they had been sent home with instructions to return at half-past two. The exhibition would begin at three.

"Of course," Miss Carrie had said, "you will not fail to be on time." And Miss Carrie had used her deepest tones.

It was not two o'clock, and the three stood at the gate, the first to return. They were in the same piece. It was "The Play." In a play one did more than suit the part.

In the play Hattie and Sadie and Emmy Lou found themselves the orphaned children of a soldier who had failed to return from the war. It was a very sad piece. Sadie had to weep, and more than once Emmy Lou had found tears in her eyes, watching her.

Miss Carrie said Sadie showed histrionic talent. Emmy Lou asked Hattie about it, who said it meant tears, and Emmy Lou remembered then how tears came naturally to Sadie.

When Aunt Cordelia heard they must dress to suit the part she came to see Miss Carrie, and so did the mamma of Sadie and the mamma of Hattie.

"Dress them in a kind of mild mourning," Miss Carrie explained, "not too deep, or it will seem too real, and, as three little sisters, suppose we dress them alike."

And now Hattie and Sadie and Emmy Lou stood at the gate ready for the play. Stiffly immaculate white dresses with beltings of black sashes, flared jauntily out above spotless white stockings and sober little slippers, while black-bound Leghorn hats shaded three anxious little countenances. By the exact center, each held a little handkerchief, black-bordered.

Hattie and Sadie and Emmy Lou wore each an anxious seriousness of countenance, but it was a variant seriousness; for as the hour approached, the solemn importance of the occasion was stealing brain-ward, and Emmy Lou even began to feel glad she was a part of The Exhibition, for to have been left out would have been worse even than the moment of mounting the platform.

"My grown-up brother's coming," said Hattie, "an' my mamma an' gran'ma an' the rest."

"My Aunt Cordelia has invited the visiting lady next door," said Emmy Lou.

But it was Sadie's hour. "Our minister's coming," said Sadie.

Emmy Lou's part was to weep when Sadie wept, and to point a chubby forefinger skyward when Hattie mentioned the departure from earth of the soldier parent, and to lower that forefinger footward at Sadie's tearful allusion to an untimely grave.

Emmy Lou had but one utterance, and it was brief. She was to advance one foot, stretch forth a hand and say, in the character of orphan for whom no asylum was offered, "We know not where we go." All day, Emmy Lou had been saying it at intervals of half minutes, for fear she might forget.

Meanwhile, it yet lacking a moment or so of two o'clock, the orphaned heroes continued to linger at the gate, awaiting the hour.

"Listen," said Hattie, "I hear music."

There was a church across the street. It was a large church with high steps and a pillared portico, and its doors were open.

"It's a band, and marching," said Hattie.

The orphaned children hurried to the curb. A procession was turning the corner and coming toward them. On either sidewalk crowds of men and boys accompanied it.

"It's a funeral," said Sadie.

Hattie turned with a face of conviction. "I know. It's that big general's funeral; they're bringing him home to bury him with the soldiers."

"We'll never see a thing for the crowd," despaired Sadie.

Emmy Lou was gazing. "They've got plumes in their hats," she said.

"Let's go over on the church steps and see it go by," said Hattie, "it's early."

The orphaned children hurried across the street. They climbed the steps. At the top they turned. There were plumes and more, there were flags and swords, and a band led. But at the church, with unexpected abruptness, the band halted, turned; it fell apart, and the procession came through; it came right on through and up the steps, a line of uniforms and swords on either side from curb to pillar, and halted.

Aghast, between two glittering files, the orphaned children shrank into the shadow behind a pillar, while upstreamed from the carriages below an unending line—bare-headed men and ladies bearing flowers. Behind, below, about, closing in on every side, crowded people, a sea of people.

The orphaned children found themselves swept from their hiding by the crowd and unwillingly jostled forward into prominence.

A frowning man, with a sword in his hand, seemed to be threatening everybody; his face was red and his voice was big, and he glittered with many buttons. All at once he caught sight of the orphaned children and threatened them vehemently.

"Here," said the frowning man, "right in here," and he placed them in line. The orphaned children were appalled, and even in the face of the man cried out in protest. But the man of the sword did not hear, for the reason that he did not listen. Instead he was addressing a large and stout lady immediately behind them.

"Separated from the family in the confusion, the grandchildren evidently—just see them in, please."

And suddenly the orphaned children found themselves a part of the procession as grandchildren. The nature of a procession is to proceed. And the grandchildren proceeded with it. They could not help themselves. There was no time for protest, for, pushed by the crowd, which closed and swayed above their heads, and piloted by the stout lady close behind, they were swept into the church and up the aisle, and when they came again to themselves were in the inner corner of a pew near the front.

The church was decked with flags. So was the Third Reader room. It was hung with flags for The Exhibition.

Hattie in the corner nudged Sadie. Sadie urged Emmy Lou, who, next to the stout lady, touched her timidly. "We have to get out; we've got to say our parts."

"Not now," said the lady, reassuringly; "the program is at the cemetery."

Emmy Lou did not understand, and she tried to tell the lady.

"S-h-," said the person, engaged with the spectacle and the crowd; "sh-h-" Abashed, Emmy Lou sat, sh-h-ed.

Hattie arose. It was terrible to rise in church, and at a funeral, and the church was filled, the aisles were crowded, but Hattie rose. Hattie was a St. George, and a Dragon stood between her and The Exhibition. She pushed by Sadie, and past Emmy Lou. Hattie was slim as she was strenuous, but not even so slim a little girl as Hattie could push by the stout lady, for she filled the space.

At Hattie's touch she turned. Although she looked good-natured, the size and ponderance of the lady were intimidating. She stared at Hattie; people were looking; it was in church; Hattie's face was red.

"You can't get to the family," said the lady; "you couldn't move in the crowd. Besides I promised to see to you. Now be quiet," she added crossly, when Hattie would have spoken. She turned away. Hattie crept back vanquished by this Dragon.

"So suitably dressed," the stout lady was saying to a lady beyond; "grandchildren, you know. Even their little handkerchiefs have black borders." The service began, and there fell on the unwilling grandchildren the submission of awe. The stout lady cried, she also punched Emmy Lou with her elbow whenever that little person moved, but finally she found courage to turn her head so she could see Sadie. Sadie was weeping into her black-bordered handkerchief, nor were they tears of histrionic talent. They were real tears. People all about were looking at her sympathetically. Such grief in a grandchild was very moving. It may have been minutes; it seemed to Emmy Lou hours, before there came a general uprising. Hattie stood up. So did Sadie and Emmy Lou. Their skirts no longer stood out jauntily; they were quite crushed and subdued. There was a wild, hunted look in Hattie's eyes. "Watch the chance!" she whispered, "and run."

But it did not come. As the pews emptied, the stout lady passed Emmy Lou on, addressing some one beyond. "Hold to this one," she said, "and I'll take the other two, or they'll get tramped in the crowd."

Slowly the crowd moved, and being a part of it, however unwillingly, Emmy Lou moved, too, out of the church and down the steps. Then came the crashing of the band and the roll of the carriages, and she found herself in the front row on the curb.

The man with the brandishing sword was threatening violently. "One more carriage is here for the family," called the man with the sword. His glance in search for the family suddenly fell on Emmy Lou. She felt it fall.

The problem solved itself for the man with the sword, and his brow cleared.

"Grandchildren next," roared the threatening man. "Keep an eye on them—separated from the family," he was explaining, and in spite of their protests, a moment later the three little girls were lifted into the carriage, and as the door banged, their carriage moved with the rest up the street.

"Now," said Hattie, and Hattie sprang to the farther door. It would not open. Through the carriage windows the school, with its arched doorways and windows, gazed frowningly, reproachfully. A gentleman entered the gate and went in the doorway.

"It's our minister," said Sadie, weeping afresh. Then Hattie wept and so did Emmy Lou. What would The Exhibition do without them?

Late that afternoon a carriage stopped at a corner upon which a school building stood. Since his charges were infantile affairs, the colored gentleman on the box thought to expedite matters and drop them at the corner nearest their homes. Descending, he flung open the door, and three little girls crept forth, three crushed little girls, three limp little girls, three little girls in a mild kind of mourning. They came forth timidly. They looked around. They hoped they might reach their homes unobserved.

There was a crowd up the street. A gathering of people—many people. It seemed to be at Emmy Lou's gate. Hattie and Sadie lived farther on.

"It must be a fire," said Hattie.

But it wasn't. It was The Exhibition, the Principal, and Miss Carrie, and teachers and pupils, and mammas and aunties and Uncle Charlie.

"An' grand'ma," said Hattie. "And the visiting lady," said Emmy Lou. "And our minister," said Sadie.

The gathering of many people caught sight of them presently, and came to meet them, three little girls in mild mourning.

The parents and guardians led them home.

Emmy Lou was tired. At supper she nodded and mild mourning and all, suddenly she collapsed and fell asleep, her head against her chair.

Uncle Charlie woke her. He stood her up on the chair, and held out his arms. "Come," he said, "Come, suit the action to the word."

Emmy Lou woke suddenly, the words smiting her ears with ominous import. She thought the hour had come; it was The Exhibition. She stood stiffly, she advanced a cautious foot, her chubby hand described a careful half circle. Emmy Lou spoke her part.

"We know not where we go."