Argosy All-Story Weekly, February 18, 1928 — page 23: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

BLUE STEEL. ing him standing there rather helplessly alone. Burke took off his old hat and ran his fingers through his hair. He felt a hand laid on one of his shoul- ders, and a cheerful voice whispered in his ear: “ Never mind, Terry; they’re out to razz us to-night, but I’m going to razz them back.” Burke turned around and saw Cherry standing there with a smile on her face. He had no time to reply, for Cherry had al- ready been given her cue and had bounded out onto the stage, where she found that, despite her determination to give as much as was sent, this audience at Lariat was a hard audience to razz back at. And it proved harder and harder as time went on. Guided by the boisterous and half intoxi- cated Bowlegs Bowers, who was aided and abetted by his guests, the evening was noth- ing short of a Roman holiday. Cherry fared better than the other mem- bers of the cast, as there was a certain in- difference and even nonchalance about her. She had been endowed with a sense of humor, and the hard years that she had experienced had made her capable of coping with hard people. Lily Burke, however, became more and more outraged as the show continued, and seemed near the breaking point. There was one other member of the cast near to the breaking point, but in an en- tirely different way. It was the ingénue, Betty, who was new to the life she was leading. Her very undertone of timidity and her evident responsiveness to the rail- lery of the audience Jed the careless gibers to intensify their cruel fun. There were tears in her eyes when she made her exit after her first song, but she smiled through them at Burke and Cherry, who were standing in the wings together. “Ton’t let ’em bother you, kid,” said Cherry. “Take what they hand you and laugh at ’em. It’s the only way—laugh at ‘em— it’s all you can do.” “ The brutes!” exclaimed Betty. “ They ought to be ashamed of themselves.” The next time Betty had gone on the stage she had tried to follow the advice $21 of Cherry, but she lacked the harder sur- face of the latter. Her vision was filled with grimacing, mocking faces, and she turned in desperation from the body of the theater and looked up to one of the boxes. She saw, in one of them, an unsmiling face that seemed to have some sympathy in it, sympathy for her. It was a dark face that was crowned with waving black hair, and Betty’s eyes kept wandering back to it as she sang. She felt almost sure that, as she was singing, he at last smiled encouragingly down at her, and this made her feel a little more certain of herself. Her eyes clung to him, and she thought she saw him turn and speak to the little grizzled man at his side, the squat fellow who appeared to be so drunk and who seemed to be the most troublesome one in the theater. Then the handsome, black-eyed young man looked back at her again; she thought she detected a certain compassionate look in his eyes. The first part of the performance was concluded, and the second part well under way. when Cherry, the soubrette, sang her garter song. The feature of the number, of course, was her removal of the garters which she wore especially for the occasion, and the tossing of them into the audience. Most of the disturbance that had oc- curred throughout the evening had had its inception in the box where the six turbulent characters were sitting, and Cherry, believ- ing that it would be good policy to placate the ribald crew that occupied it, tossed one of her red garters up to them. Bowlegs Bowers nearly fell out of the box in his successful attempt to catch it, and the house applauded wildly. Cherry’s number was followed by a scene in which the entire company took part, but which was featured by the rendi- tion of a sentimental ballad by Lily Burke. The song was entitled “ With Every Rose There Is a Thorn,” and Lily was rendering it with a voice that fairly quavered with emotion. It was, in its way, a song that Lily liked. It rang true to her, she believed in the sentiment it expressed, and the number was the big moment of the show | for her. GComicboo cS (E(0)