would have his imitators,--boys who pulled faces like his, and prided
themselves on having the Laflin wrinkles; just as it was once the
fashion for girls to look like Burne-Jones pictures, or young poets to
imitate Mr. Swinburne.

"Yes, I've got my first part. I've got it in my pocket," said Mike.

"Oh, really! That's splendid!" exclaimed Esther, with delight.

"Wait till you see it," said Mike, bringing out a French's acting
edition of some forgotten comedy. "Yes; guess how many words I've got to
say! Just exactly eleven. And such words!"

"Well, never mind, dear. It's a beginning."

"Certainly, it's a beginning,--the very beginning of a beginning."

"Come, let me see it, Mike. What are you supposed to be?"

At last Mike was persuaded to confess the humble little _rôle_ for which
the eminent actors who had consented to be his colleagues had cast him.
He was to be the comic boy of a pastry-cook's man, and his distinguished
part in the action of the piece was to come in at a certain moment with
the pie that had been ordered, and, as he delivered it, he was to
remark, "That's a pie as is a pie, is that there pie!"

"Oh, Mike, what a shame!" exclaimed Esther. "How absurd! Why, you're a
better actor with your little finger than any one of them with their
whole body."