New Faces | Page 4

too solid Prince wore his hair low
on his neck and a golden fillet bound his brows. Silent, he was noble.
His walk as he came in at the end of a procession of court ladies and
gentlemen was magnificent--slow, dejected, imperious, aloof. But
Wittenberg had a great deal to answer for, if he had contracted his
accent there.
Gertrude, Queen of Denmark, was a Hyacinth who worked daily at
hooks and buttonholes for an East Broadway tailor. On this night she
wore none of her regalia save her crown and the King had done nothing
at all to differentiate himself from Susie Lacov who officiated as
waitress in a Jewish lunchroom.
The Hyacinths had wisely decided to edit Hamlet. In this they followed
an almost universal principle and their method was also time-honored.
All the scenes in which unimportant members of the club or cast "came
out strong," were eliminated. So far the Hyacinths were orthodox, but
Rosie Rosenbaum, Prince, President and Censor, went a step further.
"Git busy. Mix her up, why don't you!" she commanded later from the
wings. The other players were laboriously wading through persiflage
and conversation. "You folks ain't done nothin' the last ten minutes
only stand there and gas. Is that actin'? Maybe it's wrote in the book.
What I want to know is--is it actin'?" Burgess sat suddenly erect and his
eyes glowed. Miss Masters half rose to assume authority but he
restrained her.
"You shut up and leave me be," Polonius cried. "Ain't I got a right to
say good-bye to my son?"
"You can say good-bye all right," Rosie reminded her, "without puttin'
up that game of talk. Give him a 'I'll be a sister to you' on the cheek an'
git through sometime before to-morrow. Cut it, I tell you."
This "off with his head" attitude on the President's part delighted
Burgess. But the caste enjoyed it less and when the ghost was docked

of a whole scene it grew rebellious.
"If you give me any more of your lip," said the princely stage manager,
"I'll trow you out altogether. There's lots of people wouldn't believe in
ghosts anyway. Me grandfather seen this play in Chermany and he told
me they didn't use the ghost at all. Nothin' but a green light with a voice
comin' out of it."
"Well, I could be the voice, couldn't I?" the ghost argued; and it was at
this point that Miss Masters took charge of the meeting and introduced
Mr. Burgess.
"Who has offered," she went on in spite of his energetic pantomime of
disclaimer, "to help us with our play."
"That's real sweet of you, Mr. Burgess," said the President graciously.
"Not at all--not at all," he answered. "It will be a pleasure, I assure
you."
"You'll excuse me, I'm sure," the Secretary broke in, "if we go right on
with our woik while you're here. We're makin' our own costoomes, as
much as we can. That was one reason us young ladies chose Hamlet.
It's a play what everyone wears skoits in. It's easier for us and it ain't so
embarrassing, and I guess our folks will like it better. You have to think
of your folks sometimes. Even if they are old-fashioned. Miss Masters
got us pictures of Mr. Marsden's production an' every last one of the
characters has skoits on. Hamlet's ain't no longer than a bathin' suit, but
anyway it's there. I don't think it's real refined, myself, for young ladies
to wear gents' suits on the stage."
"And of course," a gentle-eyed little girl looked up from her sewing to
remark,--"of course this club ain't formed just for makin' shirt waists.
We've got a culture-an'-refinement clause in the club constitution, so
we wouldn't want to do nothin' that wasn't real refined."
[Illustration: BURGESS GAINED AN INTEREST AND AN
OCCUPATION MORE ABSORBING THAN HE HAD FOUND FOR

MANY YEARS.]
"I understand," said Burgess more at a loss than a conversation had
ever found him, "And what may I ask, is your part of the play?"
"Mamie Conners is too nervous," the lady President explained "to come
right out and act. She's 'A flourish of trumpets within an' a voice
without an' a lady of the court an' a soldier an' a choir boy at the
funeral.'"
"Ah, Miss Conners," Burgess assured this timid but versatile Hyacinth,
"that's only stage fright, all great actresses suffer from it at one time or
another."
* * * * *
During the weeks that followed, order gradually gained sway in
Denmark and Burgess gained an interest and an occupation more
absorbing than he had found for many years.
"My dear Margaret," he was wont to assure Miss Masters, when she
remonstrated with him upon his generosity, "Why shouldn't I order
supper to be