CHAPTER XXIX A SHADOW FALLS

Her glorious Golden Circle; this is what the fellow members of her cast were coming to be. How different was the atmosphere of this new setting from that of the old Blackmoore.

“Of course,” she whispered charitably, “the Blackmoore was a horrible shell of a place. And it is easier to be happy and kind in beautiful surroundings. And yet I am sure that some of the most wonderful circles of friendship are found in the west side tenement region.” She was thinking of the blue-eyed Merry’s Golden Circle.

“Surely their lot is hard enough,” she told herself. “And yet they are happy in their own little circles.
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“What a sad place this grim old city would be,” she philosophized, “if it were not for the thousands upon thousands of these little golden circles of friendship we find everywhere! Sometimes it is a group that meets periodically in a pool room or a drug store. There are tiny club rooms everywhere. The people who work long days in downtown stores call one another Mary, Bob and Tom. They, too, are happy as they feel their tiny golden circle bind them round and round.

“But not one of them all,” she exclaimed loyally, “can boast of a more wonderful circle than ours!”

She thought of the Junior Ballet, those beautiful, talented young women who were being trained as her chorus. Their caresses and words of encouragement on that first night were not flattery. Every day, by little acts of kindness and courtesy, they proved this. They also bestowed their affections upon the old trouper, Dan Baker.

“And how I love them for that!” the little French girl said fervently.
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“And yet, who would not love him? His gray hair, his brooding blue eyes, his gentle, kindly manner toward all; how could anyone resist them?”

Soon enough she was to learn that there were those who could resist the old trouper’s kindly good nature. She was to learn, too, that this gentle old man held within his heart the courage of a soldier, the will and the power, if need be, to become a martyr for the right.

It was on that very evening that, as they loafed and talked over tea and toast in the studio, Dan Baker was called to the telephone, and Petite Jeanne heard him use language that she had believed quite foreign to his tongue.

“What’s that?” she heard him say. “A fund for actors? I have subscribed to the Fund for Aged Actors, yes. Yes. What’s that? Another fund? Five hundred dollars? Impossible!

“You will!” She saw his face turn red. His hands twisted themselves into livid knots. “Say, you! I know who you are now. It’s a racket! You’re trying to shake me down. You’ll never do it! Good-bye!”
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He slammed the receiver down on the hook and stood there until the hot blood drained from his face and left him white as marble. Watching him, Jeanne saw him totter. Thinking he was about to fall she hurried up to encircle him with her slender arms.

“What is it, old trouper?” she asked gently.

“It—why, it’s nothing.”

“Please don’t lie to me,” she pleaded. “One has no need to lie to a friend.”

“Well, then, if you must have it.” On his face a curious smile formed itself. “There’s a racket been going on in this town for a long time. My old friend Barney Bobson told me about it.

“You see,” he explained, leading her back to the fire, “most actors are nervous, temperamental people. They can’t stand suspense, lurking danger and all that. These crooks, knowing that, have taken to demanding sums of money for what they term a good cause: The Actors’ Benefit. They are the only actors benefited, and they are not actors at all, but deep-dyed villains. They have reaped a harvest.
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“But here—” He threw back his shock of gray hair. “Here is one golden harvest that will never be reaped. I’d rather die. I’m an old man. What’s a year more or less? How wonderful to go out like a candle; providing you go for a good cause!”

As Jeanne looked at him it seemed to her that his face was lit with a strange glory.

“But what will they do?” she asked. “And why do they come to you before the opera has gone on the stage?”

“They know we have had some advances; can perhaps get others. The opera may be a failure; at least that’s what they think. Now is the time to strike.”

“And if you continue to refuse?”

“I may meet them on a dark night. Or—” His face turned gray. “Or they may kidnap you.”

“Kidnap me?”

“Sometimes villains work through our friends to undo their victims,” he replied wearily. “You must be very careful. Never go out on the street without your capable Florence. And never walk when you can use a cab. So, I think you will be safe.
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“There!” he exclaimed, noting the wrinkles in her brow. “I have got you worrying. Do not think of it again. Those men are cowards. All evil doers are. We will not hear from them again.”

“No, no! Dear old trouper,” Jeanne said in the gentlest of tones, “I was not thinking of myself, but of you.

“However,” she added a moment later, “I shall be careful.”

Florence, in her big-hearted way, had given up her work at the settlement house and, casting her lot with the others, had once more become the little French girl’s stage “mother” and protector. She also became the guardian of his Majesty the God of Fire. And it seemed to her that he was quite as much in need of mothering as his youthful possessor. For was there not a dark-faced gypsy lurking, as she sometimes imagined, in every dark corner, ready at any moment to spring upon her and snatch her strange treasure away?
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She had fitted up a Boston bag with a chain, ending in a lock, run through the leather and clamping the top tight. This she carried when the ancient God of Fire, in pursuance of his art as a silent actor, was obliged to make his way from their room to the theatre and back again. At all other times his Highness continued to remain in hiding in the hole beneath the floor of the room.

At times Florence thought of the red-faced man, their chance enemy of Maxwell Street, the one who on that stormy night had apparently ridden half way across the city in order to take down their street address.

“He’s planning some meanness,” she assured herself. “What it will be only time can tell.”

When Petite Jeanne told her of the threat made to the old trouper over the telephone, she redoubled her vigil. They traveled only in taxicabs, and kept a sharp watch on every occasion. One other change was made by the stout young guardian. Whenever the gypsy god went with them she carried beneath her arm a rather heavy, paper-bound package, whose contents were her secret.