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me few children skip ropes, or step carefully across the cracks of the sidewalk for fear they spoil their suppers. Ah!--a bat goes by--a glove--a ball! And now from a vacant lot there comes the clamor of choosing sides. Is no mention to be made of you--you, "molasses fingers"--the star left fielder--the timely batter? What would you not give now for a clean bill of health? You rub your offending nose upon the glass. What matters it with what deep rascality in black mustachios you once strutted upon your boards? What is Hecuba to you? My own first theatre was in the attic, a place of squeaks and shadows to all except the valiant. In it were low, dark corners where the night crawled in and slept. But in the open part where the roof was highest, there was the theatre. Its walls were made of a red cambric of a flowered pattern that still lingers with me, and was bought with a clatter of pennies on the counter, together with nickels that had escaped my extravagance at the soda fountain. A cousin and I were joint proprietors. In the making of it, the hammer and nails were mine by right of sex, while she stitched in womanish fashion on the fabrics. She was leading woman and I was either the hero or the villain as fitted to my mood. My younger cousin--although we scorned her for her youth--was admitted to the slighter parts. She might daub herself with cork, but it must be only when we were done. Nor did we allow her to carry the paper knife--shaped like a dagger--which figured hugely in our plots. If we gave her any word to speak, it was as taffy to keep her silent about some iniquity that we had worked against her. In general, we judged her to be too green and giddy for the heavy parts. At the most, she might take pins at the door--for at such a trifle we displayed our talents--or play upon the comb as orchestra before the rising of the curtain. The usual approach to this theatre was the kitchen door, and those who came to enjoy the drama sniffed at their very entrance the new-baked bread. A pan of cookies was set upon a shelf and a row of apples was ranged along the window sill. Of the ice-box around the corner, not a word, lest hunger lead you off! As for the cook, although her tongue was tart upon a just occasion and although she shooed the children with her apron, secretly she liked to have them crowding through her kitchen. Now if you, reader--for I assume you to be one of the gathering audience--were of the kind c
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