Tish Plays the Game by Mary Roberts Rinehart Read Free Book Online Page A

age!”
    He reflected on this, almost tearfully.
    “Well,” he said, “that’s over now. There are twenty-nine million women over forty in America to-day, and everyone will see this picture. That is, if we do it.”
    “If you do it?” Tish inquired, gazing at him through her spectacles.
    “When I told the casting director to find me a woman for the part he went out and got drunk. He’s hardly been sober since.”
    “You haven’t found anyone?”
    “Not yet.”
    Tish had picked up her knitting, and Mr. Stein sat back and surveyed her for a few moments in silence. Then he leaned forward.
    “Excuse me for asking, Miss Carberry,” he said, “but have you ever driven a car?”
    “I drove an ambulance in France.”
    “Really?” He seemed interested and slightly excited. “Then the sound of a gun wouldn’t scare you, I dare say?”
    “I would hardly say that. I shoot very well. I’m considered rather good with a machine gun, I believe.”
    He sat forward on the edge of his chair, and stared at her.
    “Ever ride a horse?” he inquired. “Not hard, you know, with a Western saddle. You just sit in it and the horse does the rest.”
    Tish looked at him through her spectacles.
    “There is no argument for the Western saddle as against the English,” she said firmly. “I have used them both, Mr. Stein. One rides properly by balance, not adherence.”
    Mr. Stein suddenly got out his handkerchief and wiped his forehead.
    “Would you believe it!” he muttered. “And me just happening to be in town on a little matter of alimony! Does everything! By heaven, I believe she could fill a tooth!”
    He then stared again at Tish and said, “You’re not by any chance related to the Miss Carberry who captured the town of X— from the Germans, I suppose?”
    “My friends here, and I, did that; yes.”
    He stared at us all without saying anything for a moment. Then he moistened his lips.
    “Well, well!” he said. “Well, well! Why, we ran a shot of you, Miss Carberry, in our news feature, when you were decorated and kissed by that French general, What’s-His-Name.”
    “I prefer not to recall that.”
    “Surely, surely,” he agreed. He then got up and bowed to Tish. “Miss Carberry,” he said, “I apologize, and I salute you. I came here to offer you a fixed price for your story. A moment ago I decided to offer you the part of the woman of—er—maturity in your picture, with two hundred dollars a week and a double for the stunts. I now remove the double, and offered you a thousand a week for your first picture. If that goes, we’ll talk business.”
    If Tish reads this I will ask her at this moment to pause and think. Did I or did I not enter a protest? Did Aggie warn her or did she not? And was it not Tish herself who silenced us with a gesture, and completed her arrangements while Aggie softly wept?
    She cannot deny it.
    One final word of Tish’s I must record, in fairness to her.
    “If I do this, Mr. Stein,” she said, “there must be a clear understanding. This is purely a picture of adventure and is to teach a real moral lesson.”
    “Absolutely,” Mr. Stein said heartily. “Virtue is always triumphant on the screen. It is our greatest commercial asset. Without it, ladies, we would be nowhere.”
    “And there must be no love element introduced.”
    “Certainly not,” said Mr. Stein. “Certainly not!”
    Those were almost his final words. We then had tea, and Tish gave him some of our homemade blackberry cordial. He seemed very pleased with it, and on departing remarked, “My admiration for you grows steadily, Miss Carberry. I did not fully estimate your powers when I said you could fill a tooth. You could, with that cordial, make a ouija board hiccup.”

III
    T HINGS WERE QUIET FOR a month or two after that, and we understood that the production was being got ready. But Tish was very busy, having thrown herself into her preparations with her usual thoroughness.
    She had found a teacher who