Hue and Cry Read Free

curtain fell on the first act there was some very stimulating applause, which was renewed when Miss Mally Lee appeared behind the footlights, dropped a neat curtsey, and began to sing to the accompaniment of a ukulele—off.
    She sang:
    â€œAs Mally Lee cam doun the street her capuchin did flee—
    She cuist a look ahint her back to see her negligee—
    She had two lappets at her heid, that flaunted gallantly,
    And ribbon knots at back an’ breist o’bonny Mally Lee.”
    She had a pretty, clear voice, and she acted the song, as well as sang it. With a swish of her rose-colored skirts, she walked a few steps, looked over her shoulder, and gave the refrain:
    â€œAnd we’re a’ gane east and west, we’re a’ gane agee,
    We’re a’ gane east, we’re a’ gane west, coortin’ Mally Lee.”
    She took the second verse with considerable spirit:
    â€œA’ doun alang the Cannongate were beaux o’ ilk degree,
    An’ mony a yin turned roond aboot the comely sicht tae see.
    At ilka bob her ping-pong gied, ilk lad thocht ‘That’s tae me’;
    But fient a yin was in the thocht o’ bonny Mally Lee.”
    She gave the refrain in a laughing, lilting fashion:
    â€œOh, we’re a’ gane east and west, we’re a’ gane agee;
    We’re a’ gane east, we’re a’ gane west, coortin’ Mally Lee.”
    She ran off, waving her hand, and bumped into Jimmy in the wings.
    â€œI say, that was tophole! But what in the world’s a ping-pong?”
    Mally gurgled.
    â€œI haven’t an idea. Jimmy, I must fly and put on a cloak to be abducted in. Tell them it’s no use their clapping like that—I can’t give an encore.”
    The curtain rose on an act full of duels, hairbreadth escapes, and villainous machinations. Mally was very realistically abducted, and much less realistically rescued. When the play ended with Jimmy lying up-stage, decently shrouded in a cloak, and Mally, close to the footlights, locked in Roger’s stiffly reluctant arms, the applause was all that could be desired. Lady Mooring was surrounded by people with pretty things to say about Mally’s acting and Roger’s looks: “What a becoming dress!”; “Oh, Lady Mooring, you ought to make him have his portrait painted in it”; “He’s really awfully like the Cavalier picture you’ve got upstairs—isn’t he?”
    Lady Mooring thought he was. She beamed placidly upon the speaker, and then turned to beam again at Mrs. Armitage from Upper Linden.
    â€œLady Mooring, you said I might bring my niece, Dorothy Leonard. And she’s so excited because she says she is sure she was at school with Miss Lee—Dorothy, my dear——”
    The tall, fair, eager girl beside her bent towards Lady Mooring.
    â€œI recognized her the minute she came on and sang that song. We always used to make her sing it at school. Not at concerts, you know—Miss Martin wouldn’t have thought it proper—but at school singsongs. We both left two years ago—and I’d quite lost sight of her. I went straight out to India to my people. And—oh, do you think I might go behind the scenes and find her?”
    She was gone almost before the smiling permission had been given. Lady Mooring composed herself to listen once more to praise of Mally.
    Miss Leonard found the space behind the scenes crowded with laughing, chattering people, all telling one another how well the play had gone. Mally appeared to be the centre of the group, and the only person who was not laughing and talking was Roger Mooring, who was wrapped in gloom. Not only had Mally defied him, but she had made herself ridiculous by singing a ridiculous song. In making herself ridiculous she had made him ridiculous; he felt convinced that people would laugh. He therefore gloomed furiously and stood apart.
    Mally felt herself touched on the arm, and