"I think you will, dear. It's laid in an old mill--there is one on Oak Farm, I believe. You're to be imprisoned in it, and your lover rides up--probably on one of those silly milk-white steeds I object to--and rescues you--breaks down the door in fact--and gets you just as you are about to be bound on the mill wheel."

"Really, Alice?" cried Ruth, clasping her hands in delight, for she dearly loved a romantic role.

"Really and truly--truly rural, I call it."

"How did you hear of it?"

"Oh, I overheard daddy and Mr. Pertell talking about it. Mr. Pertell asked daddy if he'd object to your taking a part like that."

"And what did dad say?"

"Oh, he agreed to it, as long as you weren't in danger. But I want something funny. I believe I'm to be a sort of 'cut-up' country maid, in some of the plays. I'm to upset the milk pails, tie a tin can to the calf's tail, hide under the sofa, when your country 'beaus' come to see you, and all that."

"Oh, Alice!"

"That's all right--I just love parts like that. None of the love business for me!"

"I should say not--you're entirely too young!" exclaimed Ruth, with sudden dignity.

"Pooh! You're not so old! Oh, there goes the supper bell. Come on!

I'm starved!"

The entire theatrical troupe gathered about the table, and a merry party it was. That Mrs. Apgar was a good cook was one of the first matters voted on, and there was not a dissenting voice. It was well that there was plenty of chicken, for nearly everyone had more than the first helping.

"Ach! But I'm glad that I came here!" announced Mr. Switzer, as he pa.s.sed his plate for more. "Ven I get so old dot I can vork no more, I am coming here!" and he leaned back with a contented sigh.

Even Pepper Sneed smiled graciously, and for once seemed to have no fault to find, and no dire prediction to make.

"The meal is very good," he said to Pop Snooks, the property man.

"Glad you think so--even if we did come out on track thirteen," was the reply. "I think that accident was the best thing that could happen. It delayed us so we all had fine appet.i.tes."

After supper the members of the company went on the broad veranda, to sit in the dusk of the evening and listen to the call of the night insects.

"We'll all have a day or so of rest," Mr. Pertell said. "That is, you folks will, while I lay out my plans and decide what we are to make first. Russ, I'll want you, the first thing in the morning, to take a walk around the farm with me, and we'll decide on which are the best backgrounds."

"Oh, may I come!" cried Alice, before Ruth could restrain her.

"Why, yes, I guess so," answered the manager, slowly. "Only we'll probably do a deal of walking."

"I don't tire easily," Alice replied.

"Oh, by the way, Mr. Apgar," said Mr. Pertell after a pause, turning to the farmer, "I am planning one play that has a barn-burning incident in it. Have you some old barn on the premises I could set fire to."

"Good land!" exclaimed the farmer, starting from his chair. "Set fire to a barn! Why th' idea! Th' sheriff will git after you, sure pop.

That's arson, man!"

"Oh, no, not the way I'd do it," laughed the manager. "I'd be willing to pay you for the barn, so no one would lose anything. Haven't you some such building on the place--one that isn't of much use?"

"Wa'al, I reckon there might be," was the slow answer, as if the farmer could not understand the strange proposition. "But as fer settin' fire to it; wa'al, I reckon you'll have to git permission of th' mortgagee. You see we're in trouble about this place. Sandy, maybe you'd better tell him," and he turned to his son.

CHAPTER V

SANDY'S STORY

For a moment or two Mr. Pertell seemed rather embarra.s.sed. He feared he had forced some unpleasant secret from the farmer, and he did not want to hurt his feelings. Then, too, he remembered that Sandy had hinted at some trouble at the farm. This was probably it, and it had to do with money.

"Perhaps you would rather not talk about it," suggested the manager, after a pause. He and Sandy were at one end of the porch now, the others having gone in. Felix Apgar, preferring to let his son do the talking, had risen from his chair, and was going slowly down the gravel walk to close the gate lest some stray cow wander in from the highway and eat his wife's favorite flowers.

"Oh, I reckon I might jest as well tell you," spoke Sandy, slowly.

"It's bound to come out sooner or later, and then everybody in Beatonville will hear of our trouble."

"Then it is trouble?" asked Mr. Pertell.

"That's what it is."

"If I could do anything to help," suggested the manager, "I would be glad to."

"No, I don't reckon you could, unless you wanted to invest quite a sum of money in this farm," returned the young man.

"Well, I'm afraid I'm hardly ready to do that," declared Mr. Pertell.

"Farming isn't in my line, and I've got about all my spare funds invested in the moving picture business. But if a loan would help you----"

"That's th' trouble!" interrupted Sandy. "We've got too much of a loan now, and we can't pay it off. Th' place is 'mortgaged up to th'

handle,' as they say out this way. That's why pa couldn't give you permission to burn a barn.

"We have an old shack, that's almost toppling over, and it would be better burned and out of th' way. But I guess Squire Blasdell would object if you sot fire to it. The squire pretty near owns our place with this mortgage; or, rather with th' mortgages of folks he represents. He's a lawyer," he added simply. "But maybe if you paid him what he thought the barn was wuth he'd let you fire it."

"Then I'll have to talk to him," went on Mr. Pertell. "I need a barn-burning in one scene. It will be very effective, I think."

"Gosh! But you movin' picture fellers certainly do things," commented Sandy. "You hire yachts to make believe take a trip to Europe, and now you're wantin' to burn a barn! I never heard tell th' like of such doin's."

"Oh, that's nothing to what some of them do," remarked the manager.

"Why, some of my compet.i.tors have bought old steamboats, taken them out in mid-ocean, and set fire to them, just to get a rescue picture."

"Get out!" cried Sandy, clearly incredulous.

"That's a fact," declared Mr. Pertell. "And, more than once, some of them have bought old locomotives and coaches, and set them going toward each other on the same track, to make a railroad collision."

"Do you mean it?" cried Sandy.

"I certainly do. Why, one manager actually burned up a whole mining town just to get a good picture. He destroyed more than twenty shacks. Of course they weren't very elaborate ones, but he got a fine effect."

"Wa'al, then I reckon burnin' one barn isn't so wonderful," observed Sandy.