Fifty-Two Weeks For Florette

By ELIZABETH ALEXANDER HEERMANN
From Saturday Evening Post

It had been over two months since Freddy Le Fay's bill had been paid, and Miss Nellie Blair was worried. She had written to Freddy's mother repeatedly, but there had been no answer.

"It's all your own fault, sister. You should never have taken Freddy," Miss Eva said sharply. "I told you so at the time, when I saw his mother's hair. And of course Le Fay is not her real name. It looks to me like a clear case of desertion."

"I can't believe it. She seemed so devoted," faltered Miss Nellie.

"Oh, a girl like that!" Miss Eva sniffed. "You should never have consented."

"Well, the poor thing was so worried, and if it meant saving a child from a dreadful life----"

"There are other schools more suitable."

"But, sister, she seemed to have her heart set on ours. She begged me to make a little gentleman out of him."

"As if you could ever do that!"

"Why not?" asked Mary, their niece.

"That dreadful child!"

"Freddy isn't dreadful!" cried Mary hotly.

"With that atrocious slang! Won't eat his oatmeal! And he's such a queer child--queer! So pale, never laughs, doesn't like any one. Why should you take up for him? He doesn't even like you. Hates me, I suppose."

"It's because we are so different from the women he has known," said Mary.

"I should hope so! Well, sister, what are you going to do about it?"

"I don't know what to do," sighed Miss Nellie. "He hasn't any other relatives as far as I know. And the summer coming on, what shall we do?"

"Nothing for it but to send him to an orphanage if she doesn't write soon," said Miss Eva.

"Oh, auntie, you wouldn't!"

"Why not? How can we afford to give children free board and education?"

"It's only one child."

"It would be a dozen, if we once started it."

"I'll wait another month," said Miss Nellie, "and then, really, something will have to be done."

The girl looked out of the window.

"There he is now," she said, "sitting on the stone wall at the end of the garden. It's his favourite spot."

"What on earth he wants to sit there for--away from all the other children! He never plays. Look at him! Just sitting there--not moving. How stupid!" exclaimed Miss Eva impatiently.

"I do declare, I believe he's fallen asleep," said Miss Nellie.

Freddy was not asleep. He had only to close his eyes and it would all come back to him. Memories that he could not put into words, sensations without definite thought, crowded in upon him. The smell--the thick smell of grease paint, choking powder, dust, gas, old walls, bodies, and breath, and sharp perfume; the sickening, delicious, stale, enchanting, never-to-be-forgotten odour of the theatre; the nerves' sudden tension at the cry of "Ov-a-chure"; their tingling as the jaded music blares; the lift of the heart as the curtain rises; the catch in the throat as Florette runs on to do her turn.

Florette was a performer on the trapeze in vaudeville. Her figure was perfect from the strenuous daily exercise. She was small, young, and a shade too blonde. First she appeared in a sort of blue evening dress, except that it was shorter even than a d butante's. She ran out quickly from the wings, bowed excessively, smiled appealingly, and, skipping over to the trapeze, seized the two iron rings that hung from ropes. Lifting her own weight by the strength in her slender wrists, she flung her legs upward and hooked her knees into the rings. Then hanging head downward she swung back and forth; flung herself upright again, sat and swung; climbed to the topmost bar of the trapeze and hung down again. Her partner ran on and repeated her monkeylike manoeuvres. Then Florette held his hands while he swung upside down, he held Florette while she swung upside down. They turned head over heels, over and over each other, up and down, catching and slipping, and adjusting their balance, in time to gay tunes.

Sometimes the audience clapped. Sometimes they were too familiar with their kind of flirtation with death to clap. Then Florette and her partner would invent something a little more daring. They would learn to balance themselves on chairs tilted on two legs on the trapeze, or Florette would hang by only one hand, or she would support her partner by a strap held in her teeth. Sometimes Florette's risks were great enough to thrill the audience with the thought of death.

The thought of a slip, broken bones, delighted the safe people in comfortable chairs. They laughed. Florette laughed, too, for Freddy was waiting in the wings.

There were mothers in the audience who cooked and mended, swept and dusted, ran up and down innumerable stairs, washed greasy dishes, wore ugly house dresses, slaved and scolded and got chapped hands, all for their children. Florette, always dainty and pretty, had nothing to do but airily, gracefully swing, and smile. Other mothers spent their lives for their little boys. Florette only risked hers twice a day.

While the partner played an accordion Florette ran out for her quick change. Freddy was waiting, with her dress hung over a chair. He flew to meet her. His eager, nimble fingers unfastened the blue frock. He slipped the next costume over her head without mussing a single beloved blonde hair. The second costume was a tight-fitting silver bodice with a fluff of green skirt underneath. Freddy had it fastened up in a twinkling. Florette ran out again and pulled herself up into the trapeze.

While Florette went through the second part of her act Freddy folded up the blue costume and trudged upstairs with it. Florette's dressing room was usually up four flights. Freddy put the blue dress on a coat hanger and wrapped a muslin cover about it. Then he trudged down the four flights again, with the third costume over his arm. It was a Chinese jacket and a pair of tight, short blue satin trousers, and Freddy was very proud of this confection. He stood as a screen for Florette while she put on the trousers, and there are not many little boys who have a mamma who could look so pretty in them.

Florette skipped out lightly and finished her act by swinging far out over the audience, back and forth, faster and faster, farther and farther out, until it seemed as if she were going to fling herself into the lap of some middle-aged gentleman in the third row. His wife invariably murmured something about a hussy as Florette's pretty bare legs flashed overhead. The music played louder, ended with a boom from the drum. Florette flung herself upright, kissed her hands, the curtain fell, and the barelegged hussy ran up to the dressing room where her little son waited.

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