play would stop. She assured Hahn that its shabbiness did not show from
the front. She clung to it with that childish unreasonableness that is
so often found in people of the stage.

But Josie waited patiently. Dozens of costumes passed through her
hands. She saw plays come and go. Dresses came to her whose lining bore
the mark of world-famous modistes. She hung them away, or refurbished
them if necessary with disinterested conscientiousness. Sometimes her
caustic comment, as she did so, would have startled the complacency of
the erstwhile wearers of the garments. Her knowledge of the stage, its
artifices, its pretence, its narrowness, its shams, was widening and
deepening. No critic in bone-rimmed glasses and evening clothes was more
scathingly severe than she. She sewed on satin. She mended fine lace.
She polished stage jewels. And waited. She knew that one day her
patience would be rewarded. And then, at last came the familiar voice
over the phone: "Hello, Fifer! McCabe talking."

"Well?"

"'Splendour' closes Saturday. Haddon says she won't play in this heat.
They're taking it to London in the autumn. The stuff'll be up Monday,
early."

Josie Fifer turned away from the telephone with a face so radiant that
one of her sewing women, looking up, was moved to comment.

"Got some good news, Miss Fifer?"

"'Splendour' closes this week."