betty brown was the prettiest girl in littletown.
everybody liked her.
she had a very nice smile.
and a kind heart, especially for cats and dogs and raccoons.
her grandmother taught her to bake pies and cakes and cupcakes.
she liked lemonade, especially in the summertime.
miss quinlan, the drama teacher at the high school, encouraged betty to try out for the lead part in the school play.
melissa jones also tried out for the part.
you can just guess what happened next.
it was kind of inevitable.
when miss quinlan chose betty for the part over melissa, melissa’s friends were outraged.
betty herself was surprised, as melissa was a passionate student of the drama, and she, betty , had only tried out in order to humor miss quinlan, and betty conceded that melissa was much the better actress.
in vain did miss quinlan try to pour oil on the waters by pointing out that melissa’s part - of the dominating matriarch - was the real lead - and that betty was only the ingenue.
melissa’s supporters were having none of it, and neither was melissa.
betty offered to give up the part to melissa, if she “really wanted it that bad.”
this was not good enough for melissa and her friends, or for melissa’s staunchest supporter - her mother.
melissa’s mother let it be known that she had demanded that the school fire miss quinlan, and perhaps put the little schemer betty on some sort of probation.
my, my, mrs henderson, the school principal exclamed to mr filson, the assistant principal, i thought we only had these kind of problems with the cheerleaders.
it’s all very strange, mr filson agreed. i don’t know what this world is coming to.
i have an idea, mrs henderson said to mr filson.
how do you mean? mr filson replied absently.
let us forego our dreary existences in this turgid backwater, and run away and join the circus.
mr filson stopped doing his crossword puzzle.
is that possible in this day and age? he asked mrs henderson.
what day and age might that be? mrs henderson retorted. as far as i am concerned it is always the year zero.
be that as it may, mr filson said, i don’t think my wife would be too happy about it.
my understanding is that she would be overjoyed to see you go.
do you really think so?
i know so. she expressly told me so herself.
and so mrs henderson and mr filson ran away and joined the circus.
they worked up a most excellent knife throwing act, combining laughs and thrills in equal measure.
mrs henderson threw the knives, and got most of the good lines, wth mr filson being the straight man.
sometimes in the winter, or when the circus business was slow, they did their act on the stage, usually third or fourth bill.
one night ,in joplin missouri, they were on the bill with a singing and comedy act called ma johnson and her two lovely daughters.
imagine their amazement when ma johnson turned out to be none other than miss quinlan, and her two lovely daughters were betty brown and melissa jones!
how about that?
it just goes to show you that you never know.
the fivesome had a great time swapping yarns and badmouthing the squares back in littletown, before it was time for ma johnson and her two lovely daughters to go on.
they knocked them dead.
because that’s show biz!
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