"Yes," growled Harper.
"What ails you?"
"Disgusted."
"At what?"
"Somebody."
"Who?"
"Myself for one."
"Somebody else?"
"Yes."
"Who?"
"You"re it."
Fowler fell back and stared at Harper. He had taken a seat opposite his fellow actor. Harper returned his stare with something like still greater sourness.
"What"s the matter with me?" asked Fowler, wondering.
"You"re a confounded idiot!" answered Harper, bluntly.
"Well, I must say I like your plain language!" exclaimed Fowler, coloring and looking decidedly touched. "You were in a bad temper when we started for Denver, but you seem to be worse now. What"s the matter?"
"Oh, I see now that I"ve put a foot in the soup. I am broke, and I need money. All I am liable to get is the two weeks salary I shall receive from Merriwell. If I"d kept my mouth shut I might have a new engagement with him, like the others."
"Then some of the others have a new engagement?"
"All of them, I reckon, except you and I. We are the fools of the company."
"Well, what shall we do?"
"Can"t do anything but keep still and swallow our medicine."
"Perhaps you think that, but I"m going to hit Merriwell up."
"Well, you"ll be a bigger fool if you do, after the calling down you received from him to-day."
At that moment Frank entered the smoker, looking for Hodge, who had been unable to procure a good seat in one of the other cars. Bart was sitting near Harper and Fowler.
As Frank came down the aisle, Fowler arose.
"I want to speak to you, Mr. Merriwell," he said.
"All right," nodded Frank. "Go ahead."
"I have heard that you are making new engagements with the members of the company."
"Well?"
"You haven"t said anything to me."
"No."
"I suppose it is because I made some foolish talk to you this morning.
Well, I apologized, didn"t I?"
"Yes."
"Well, I presume you will give me a chance when you take the play out again?"
"No, sir."
Frank said it quietly, looking Fowler full in the face.
"So you are going to turn me down because I made that talk? Well, I have heard considerable about your generosity, but this does not seem very generous."
"Ever since joining the company and starting to rehea.r.s.e, Mr. Fowler, you have been a source of discord. Once or twice you came near flatly refusing to do some piece of business the way I suggested. Once you insolently informed me that I was not the stage manager. You completely forgot that I was the author of the piece. I have heard that you told others not to do things as I suggested, but to do them in their own way.
Several times before we started out I was on the verge of releasing you, which I should have done had there been time to fill your place properly. Last night you were intoxicated when the hour arrived for the curtain to go up. You went onto the stage in an intoxicated condition.
You did not do certain pieces of business as you had been instructed to do them, but as you thought they should be done, therefore ruining a number of scenes. You were insolent, and would have been fined a good round sum for it had we gone on. In a number of ways you have shown that you are a man I do not want in my company, so I shall let you go, after paying you two weeks salary. I believe I have given the best of reasons for pursuing such a course."
Then Frank stepped past Fowler and sat down with Hodge.
The actor took his seat beside Harper, who said:
"I hope you are satisfied now!"
"Satisfied!" muttered Fowler. "I"d like to punch his head off!"
"Very likely," nodded Harper; "but you can"t do it, you know. He is a holy terror, and you are not in his cla.s.s."
Behind them was a man who seemed to be reading a newspaper. He was holding the paper very high, so that his face could not be seen, and he was not reading at all. He was listening with the keenest interest to everything.
As Frank sat down beside Hodge he observed a look of great satisfaction on Bart"s face.
"Well, Merriwell," said the dark-faced youth, with something like the shadow of a smile, "you have done yourself proud."
"Let"s go forward," suggested Merry. "The smoke is pretty thick here, and some of it from those pipes is rank. I want to talk with you."
So they got up and left the car.
As they went out, Fowler glared at Merriwell"s back, hissing:
"Oh, I"d like to get even with you!"