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‘Then why do you spoil it all?’ asked the mollified manager.

‘It is my anxiety that Europe shall not be disappointed in you. Let us talk of the cast.’

‘It is so early yet.’

‘”The early bird catches the worm.”‘

‘But all our worms are caught,’ grinned Kloot. ‘We keep our talent pinned on the premises.’

‘I know, I know,’ said Pinchas, paling. He saw Mrs. Goldwater tripping on saucily as Ophelia.

‘But we don’t give all our talent to one play,’ the manager reminded him.

‘No, of course not,’ said Pinchas, with a breath of hope.

‘We have to use all our people by turns. We divide our forces. With myself as Hamlet you will have a cast that should satisfy any author.’

‘Do I not know it?’ cried Pinchas. ‘Were you but to say your lines, leaving all the others to be read by the prompter, the house would be spellbound, like Moses when he saw the burning bush.’

‘That being so,’ said Goldwater, ‘you couldn’t expect to have my wife in the same cast.’

‘No, indeed,’ said Pinchas enthusiastically. ‘Two such tragic geniuses would confuse and distract, like the sun and the moon shining together.’

Goldwater coughed. ‘But Ophelia is really a small part,’ he murmured.

‘It is,’ Pinchas acquiesced. ‘Your wife’s tragic powers could only be displayed in “Hamlet” if, like another equally celebrated actress, she appeared as the Prince of Palestine himself.’

‘Heaven forbid my wife should so lower herself!’ said Goldwater. ‘A decent Jewish housewife cannot appear in breeches.’

‘That is what makes it impossible,’ assented Pinchas. ‘And there is no other part worthy of Mrs. Goldwater.’

‘It may be she would sacrifice herself,’ said the manager musingly.

‘And who am I that I should ask her to sacrifice herself?’ replied the poet modestly.

‘Fanny won’t sacrifice Ophelia,’ Kloot observed drily to his chief.

‘You hear?’ said Goldwater, as quick as lightning. ‘My wife will not sacrifice Ophelia by leaving her to a minor player. She thinks only of the play. It is very noble of her.’

‘But she has worked so hard,’ pleaded the poet desperately, ‘she needs a rest.’

‘My wife never spares herself.’

Pinchas lost his head. ‘But she might spare Ophelia,’ he groaned.

‘What do you mean?’ cried Goldwater gruffly. ‘My wife will honour you by playing Ophelia. That is ended.’ He waved the make-up brush in his hand.

‘No, it is not ended,’ said Pinchas desperately. ‘Your wife is a comic actress—-‘

‘You just admitted she was tragic—-‘

‘It is heartbreaking to see her in tragedy,’ said Pinchas, burning his boats. ‘She skips and jumps. Rather would I give Ophelia to one of your kangaroos!’

‘You low-down monkey!’ Goldwater almost flung his brush into the poet’s face. ‘You compare my wife to a kangaroo! Take your filthy manuscript and begone where the pepper grows.’

‘Well, Fanny would be rather funny as Ophelia,’ put in Kloot pacifyingly.

‘And to make your wife ridiculous as Ophelia,’ added Pinchas eagerly, ‘you would rob the world of your Hamlet!’

‘I can get plenty of Hamlets. Any scribbler can translate Shakespeare.’

‘Perhaps, but who can surpass Shakespeare? Who can make him intelligible to the modern soul?’

‘Mr. Goldwater,’ cried the call-boy, with the patness of a reply.

The irate manager bustled out, not sorry to escape with his dignity and so cheap a masterpiece. Kloot was left, with swinging legs, dominating the situation. In idle curiosity and with the simplicity of perfectly bad manners, he took up the poet’s papers and letters and perused them. As there were scraps of verse amid the mass, Pinchas let him read on unrebuked.

‘You will talk to him, Kloot,’ he pleaded at last. ‘You will save Ophelia?’

The big-nosed youth looked up from his impertinent inquisition. ‘Rely on me, if I have to play her myself.’

‘But that will be still worse,’ said Pinchas seriously.

Kloot grinned. ‘How do you know? You’ve never seen me act?’

The poet laid his finger beseechingly on his nose. ‘You will not spoil my play, you will get me a maidenly Ophelia? I and you are the only two men in New York who understand how to cast a play.’