have to make her a face, for she's too pale," remarked one of
them.

They rubbed her face with a layer of white cosmetic, shaded this
with rouge, carmined her lips, underscored her eyes with a little
pencil dipped in black pigment, and curled and pinned her hair. She
was passed on from hand to hand and given a thousand advices and
warnings.

"On entering the stage look straight at the public, so that you
don't trip."

"And before you enter, see that you cross yourself."

"Always enter with your right foot foremost."

"Now you look fine! . . . but do you want to appear on the stage in
short skirts without wearing tights?"

"I haven't any! . . ."

All began to laugh at her embarrassed look.

"I will loan you a pair," cried Zielinska. "I think they'll fit
you." They treated her with undisguised favor, for they had heard
that she was to teach Cabinska's daughter and that Pepa had loaned
her a costume.

Janina, looking in the mirror, hardly recognized herself. It seemed
as though she wore a mask, only slightly resembling her own face and
with that strange expression that all the chorus girls wore.

She went downstairs to Sowinska.

"My dear madame, tell me truly, how do I look?" she begged, all
excited and flushed.

Sowinska scrutinized her from all sides and, with her finger, spread
the rouge more thoroughly on her cheeks.

"Who gave you that costume?" she asked.

"Madame Directress loaned it to me."

"Oh! something must have melted her today!"

"She told me such sad stories. . . ."

"The actress! . . . if she only played that way on the stage there
would be no better in the world."

"You must be joking, madame! . . . She told me about Lwow and her
past."

"She's a liar, that old hag! She was then the sweetheart of some
hussar and made such scandals that they turned her out of the
theater. What was she at the Lwow theater? . . . a chorus girl only.
Ho! ho! those are old tricks. . . . We all know them here long
since!"

"Tell me how I look?" asked Janina at length.

"Beautiful. . . . I'll wager they'll all be chasing after you!"

An increasing nervousness seized Janina. She walked up and down the
stage, peered through the hole in the curtain, viewed herself in all
the mirrors, and then tried to sit still and wait, but could not
endure it. The feverish excitement and nervousness attendant upon a
first appearance shook her as with the ague. She could not stand or
sit still for a single moment.