SCENE I--_A seaside hotel._ MRS. ALLJOY’S _sitting-room, prettily

furnished. Table and chairs_ R. _Sofa_ L. _Doors_ R. _and_ L. _At rise of curtain_ MR. ALLJOY _is discovered seated_ R. _of table reading a newspaper_. MRS. ALLJOY _is lying upon sofa_.

MRS. ALLJOY. (_sighing_) O dear!

MR. ALLJOY. (_looking over top of paper_) What is the matter now, Lolly?

MRS. ALLJOY. The same old thing, this pain in my side, and there is a strange feeling in the back of my head. I wonder what it is!

MR. ALLJOY. Oh, you want something to distract you. Come, jump up, and let us go down-stairs and hear the music. You might as well be at home as moping up in this room. Come, it will do you good.

MRS. ALLJOY. O Joey! I couldn’t possibly dress and go down to-night. Just suppose I should faint!

MR. ALLJOY. Well, suppose you do; you are not likely to, you know. You would soon get over it, and you wouldn’t be a mile from your own room.

MRS. ALLJOY. You are so heartless. I think it is cruel of you to talk that way. Even if I didn’t faint, those parlors are so draughty, and the music always makes my head ache.

MR. ALLJOY. Very well, we needn’t go. (_Silence, excepting the rustling of the paper._)

MRS. ALLJOY. Joe, can’t you read without making such a noise with the paper? It does distract me so. My poor nerves cannot stand much.

MR. ALLJOY. I cannot very well spend my evening spelling out the advertisements on one side of the paper. (_Sarcastically_) Perhaps I may be able to find a newspaper of a single sheet only--one of those patent-inside arrangements--if so, I certainly shall take it. (_Getting up_) Since I am so unpleasantly distracting, I had better leave you in peace. They don’t mind speaking above a whisper at the club. (_Throws down paper and takes up his hat_) Good-night; don’t sit up for me. (_Goes out_, R.)

MRS. ALLJOY. (_burying her head in the pillow and sobbing_) There he goes again to that hateful old club, leaving poor forlorn me all alone. Oh, these heartless men! (_A knock at the door_, R.)

(_Enter_ MRS. FRISK.)

MRS. FRISK. Why, Lolly, what is the matter?

MRS. ALLJOY. (_sitting up and wiping her eyes_) O Anna! I am so glad you came in! It is the same old story, of course. Joe has gone over to the club, leaving me alone with nothing to do; I cannot do fancy work, it makes my back ache; I cannot read, for it makes my head ache, and so here I am deprived of everything, even my husband’s society. I am a perfect martyr.

MRS. FRISK. (_laughing_) Laura, you do make me laugh, you are so bent upon being miserable. Now, don’t put on that injured look. I have something to tell you.

MRS. ALLJOY. (_brightening up_) Have you? What is it? I am dying to hear.

MRS. FRISK. First, look at me. Do you see this new gown?

MRS. ALLJOY. Yes. How well you look in it.

MRS. FRISK. (_triumphantly_) That is just it. I am one inch longer in the waist than I was two months ago, and it is all due to physical culture.

MRS. ALLJOY. Physical culture?

MRS. FRISK. Yes. You have no idea what it does for one, and it would be just the thing for you.

MRS. ALLJOY. Oh, no! I never could swing those dreadful Indian clubs and jump over a rope four or five feet high or squirm in and out of little square places like a snake. As for a trapeze, I have a perfect horror of one.

MRS. FRISK. Nonsense! That isn’t what you have to do. Why, it is as simple as can be, to begin with, and has cured more headaches and backaches than I could begin to tell you of. See, I will show you a few of the first exercises. (_Rises, and goes through a few movements rather awkwardly_) There, now, that isn’t so dreadfully hard, is it? Come, Laura, say you will join our club.

MRS. ALLJOY. Club! Did you say you had a club?

MRS. FRISK. Yes; one must do something in Lent, and it is awfully stupid down here, so we have organized a club, the X. Y. Z. The culmination of knowledge, you see, as opposed to A. B. C. The X. Y. Z. Club, composed of about a dozen ladies who are seeking different ends through the same means; I, for instance, am bent upon decreasing my size; even “add a cubit to my stature,” and it would not come amiss if I were able to stretch up to it and out of my avoirdupois. Mrs. Bodkin, on the contrary, pines for flesh, for breadth of chest, and mightiness of muscle. Miss Doting, the dear soul, thinks the movements “such lines of beauty,” and her prophetic eye sees herself, though spare of flesh, an undulating, willowy figure, gliding before some hero’s vision and into his heart; while dear Mintra, her niece, who has come down here with her, does it all “just for the fun of the thing.”

MRS. ALLJOY. Well, I really believe I will join you, since Mr. Joe is so absorbed in his club, and I will show him that I can have a club, too. Yes, I really will join you.

MRS. FRISK. (_delightedly_) That is right. We meet to-morrow in Mrs. Bodkin’s rooms at three o’clock. Now I must go. Good-night. Don’t get up.

MRS. ALLJOY. Oh! I feel better already. I will go to the door with you. (_They go toward door_, L.)

CURTAIN