s the crime on his shoulders to screen the brother of
the girl he loves, and it was an awful hit. Naturally Vida was never so
good before and Clyde proved to be another find. He can straighten up and
look nobler when he's wrongfully accused of a crime than any still actor
I ever see. He's got now to where they have to handle him with gloves
or he'd leave 'em flat and go with another company. Vida wrote me only
last week that they had a play for him where he's cast off on a desert
island with a beautiful but haughty heiress, and they have to live there
three months subsisting on edible foods which are found on all desert
islands. But Clyde had refused the part because he would have to grow
whiskers in this three months. He said he had to think of his public,
which would resent this hideous desecration. He thought up a bully way
to get out of it. He said he'd let the whiskers grow for a few scenes and
then find a case of safety razors washed ashore, so he could shave
himself just before the haughty millionaire's daughter confessed that she
had loved him from the first and the excursion steamer come up to rescue
'em. I believe he now admits frankly that he wrote most of the play, or
at least wrote the punch into it. A very happy couple they are, Clyde
having only one vice, which is candy that threatens his waistline. Vida
keeps a sharp watch on him, but he bribes people to sneak chocolate
creams into his dressing room. The last night I was there he sung
"Good-night, Good-night, Beloved!" so well that I choked up myself.

Of course women are crazy about him; but that don't bother Vida a little
bit. She never wanted a husband anyway--only a son. And Clyde must have
had something wake up in his brain them years he was away. He had a queer
look in his eyes one night when he said to me--where Vida couldn't hear:
"Yes, other women have loved me, but she--she knows me and loves me!"
It's the only thing I ever heard him utter that would show he might be
above a pet kitten in intellect.

And, of course, these letters he gets don't mean anything in his life but
advertising--Oh, yes! I forgot to tell you that his stage name is J.
Harold Armytage. He thought it up himself. And the letters coming in
by the bushel really make Vida proud. In her heart she's sorry for the
poor fools because they can't have as much of dear Clyde as she has. She
says she's never deserved her present happiness. I never know whether I
agree with her or not.