"About eight years ago," went on Bat, "I went broke on a wrestling
tournament in 'Frisco; and right away I had to look around for something
to run the wolf off the property. In Oakland there was a theatrical
manager who had nerve enough to do Shakespeare, and he was rehearsing
'As You Like It.' A friend of mine tipped me off that there was a week's
work for me if I went after it; and go after it I did. Acting was new to
me, and it had my nerve a little; but the director told me not to
bother, for I could leave that all to the regular company; my work was
to rehearse the leading man in a little wrestling bout, and then go
through it with him in the show."

Ashton-Kirk laughed.

"And so," said he, "you are another of the many who have sweated their
way through the role of 'Charles, the Wrestler.'"

"That was me," replied Bat. "But I didn't sweat much. The leading man
was a kind of a drawing-room actor, and I had to keep at low pressure
all the time so as not to wear him out. But what I did as an actor ain't
got much to do with what I want to tell you. The big thing is that the
Rosalind of that production was Nora Cavanaugh; and it was the first
time I ever saw her."

"Ah!" said Ashton-Kirk. "You knew her as far back as that, did you?
That's interesting."

"She was the finest thing I ever looked at," said Bat Scanlon. "And not
only that, but she rang with the right sound. I was never what you would
call a woman's man, and so I never got to knowing much about them. But
in the week I was in that Oakland theatre I took a new course, and,
though she never knew it, Nora was the teacher."

"You didn't fall in love with her!" said the investigator, through a
haze of pipe smoke.

"I did," replied the big athlete. "I fell for her as a man falls off a
steeple--there was never a chance for me--even if I'd looked for
one--which I never did."

"That's a novelty," said Ashton-Kirk. "I'd never have thought of you in
that way, Bat."

"I'd never have thought it of myself, only it was kept pretty bright in
my mind," said Scanlon. "We got to be good friends--but I had to jump
away south. When I got back, Nora was in Denver playing a season. I
didn't see her for a year; and by that time she'd got her head full of
being a big star in the east, and so as I had nothing of value to dim
this idea, why, I pulled out without her ever knowing just how I was
feeling. In another year she was married--to Burton; and I was down for
the full c