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the wife of Verne Miller. Verne owns Miller's Hardware Store. Verne was Harry's boss.
    "Lydia," I said to her, "have we got a play or have we got a play?"
    "Yes," she said, "you've got a play, all right." She made it sound as though I'd committed some kind of crime, done something just terrible. "You should be very proud of yourself."
    "What do you mean by that?" I said.
    Before Lydia could answer, Harry yelled at me from the stage, asked if I was through with him, asked if he could go home. I told him he could and, still Marlon Brando, he left, kicking furniture out of his way and slamming doors. Helene was left all alone on the stage, sitting on a couch with the same gaga look she'd had after the tryouts. That girl was drained.
    I turned to Lydia again and I said, "Well—until now, I thought I had every reason to be happy and proud. Is there something going on I don't know about?"
    "Do you know that girl's in love with Harry?" said Lydia.
    "In the play?" I said.
    "What play?" said Lydia. "There isn't any play going on now, and look at her up there." She gave a sad cackle. "You aren't directing this play."
    "Who is?" I said.
    "Mother Nature at her worst," said Lydia. "And think what it's going to do to that girl when she discovers what Harry really is." She corrected herself. "What Harry really isn't," she said.
    I didn't do anything about it, because I didn't figure it was any of my business. I heard Lydia try to do something about it, but she didn't get very far.
    "You know," Lydia said to Helene one night, "I once played Ann Rutledge, and Harry was Abraham Lincoln."
    Helene clapped her hands. "That must have been heaven!" she said.
    "It was, in a way," said Lydia. "Sometimes I'd get so worked up, I'd love Harry the way I'd love Abraham Lincoln. I'd have to come back to earth and remind myself that he wasn't ever going to free the slaves, that he was just a clerk in my husband's hardware store."
    "He's the most marvelous man I ever met," said Helene.
    "Of course, one thing you have to get set for, when you're in a play with Harry," said Lydia, "is what happens after the last performance."
    "What are you talking about?" said Helene.
    "Once the show's over," said Lydia, "whatever you thought Harry was just evaporates into thin air."
    "I don't believe it," said Helene.
    "I admit it's hard to believe," said Lydia.
    Then Helene got a little sore. "Anyway, why tell me about it?" she said. "Even if it is true, what do I care?"
    "I—I don't know," said Lydia, backing away. "I—I just thought you might find it interesting."
    "Well, I don't," said Helene.
    And Lydia slunk away, feeling about as frowzy and unloved as she was supposed to feel in the play. After that nobody said anything more to Helene to warn her about Harry, not even when word got around that she'd told the telephone company that she didn't want to be moved around anymore, that she wanted to stay in North Crawford.
    So the time finally came to put on the play. We ran it for three nights—Thursday, Friday, and Saturday—and we murdered those audiences. They believed every word that was said on stage, and when the maroon curtain came down they were ready to go to the nut house along with Blanche, the faded sister.
    On Thursday night the other girls at the telephone company sent Helene a dozen red roses. When Helene and Harry were taking a curtain call together, I passed the roses over the footlights to her. She came forward for them, took one rose from the bouquet to give to Harry. But when she turned to give Harry the rose in front of everybody, Harry was gone. The curtain came down on that extra little scene—that girl offering a rose to nothing and nobody.
    I went backstage, and I found her still holding that one rose. She'd put the rest of the bouquet aside. There were tears in her eyes. "What did I do wrong?" she said to me. "Did I insult him some way?"
    "No," I said. "He always does that after a performance. The minute it's over, he clears out as fast as he