"Nothing."

"Then perhaps you will inform us why you do break into a speech
of mine with a horrible noise like that?"

"I only coughed, Mr. Potter," said Miss Lyston, shaking.

"Coughed!" he repeated slowly, and then with a sudden tragic
fury shouted at the top of his splendid voice, "COUGHED!" He
swung away from her, and strode up and down the stage,
struggling with emotion, while the stricken company fastened
their eyes to their strips of manuscript, as if in study, and
looked neither at him nor Miss Lyston.

"You only coughed!" He paused before her in his stride. "Is it
your purpose to cough during my speeches when this play is
produced before an audience?" He waited for no reply, but taking
his head woefully in his hands, began to pace up and down again,
turning at last toward the dark auditorium to address his
invisible manager:

"Really, really, Mr. Tinker," he cried, despairingly, "we shall
have to change some of these people. I can't act with--Mr.
Tinker! Where's Mr. Tinker? Mr. Tinker! My soul! He's gone! He
always is gone when I want him! I wonder how many men would bear
what I--" But here he interrupted himself unexpectedly. "Go on
with the rehearsal! Packer, where were we?"

"Here, sir, right here," brightly responded Packer, ready finger
upon the proper spot in the manuscript. "You had just begun,