Front matter (continued 5)

"They're just as clever as they can be," said Cleland, "—infernally clever, Grismer. Are they commissions?"

"I'm sorry to say they are not," replied Grismer with a smile.

"But a man who can do this work ought never to want for commissions," insisted Cleland.

"I'm exceedingly glad you like my work," returned Grismer pleasantly, "but as for orders——" he shrugged—"when I didn't need them they came to me. But, Cleland, when the world learns that a man needs anything it suddenly discovers that it doesn't need him! Isn't it funny," he added good-humouredly, "that prosperous talent is always in demand, always turning down work which it has no time to do; but the same talent on its uppers is universally under deep suspicion?"

He spoke lightly, impersonally, and without the slightest trace of bitterness. "Sit down and light one of your own cigarettes," he said. "I've only pipe-tobacco, and you probably wouldn't care for it."

Cleland seated himself in the depths of a big, threadbare arm-chair.

Grismer said with a smile:

"No use informing you that I'm obliged to live economically. Models are expensive; so is material. Therefore, I live where I can afford both, and a roof to cover them.... And do you know, Cleland, that after all it doesn't matter much where one sleeps——" he made a slight gesture toward the screen at the end of the room. "I used to think it did until I had to give up a place of my own full of expensive and beautiful things.

"But it really doesn't matter. The main idea is to be free—free of debt, free of expensive impedimenta which cause one anxiety, free from the importunities and restrictions of one's friends." He laughed and dropped one long leg over the other.

"I've niggers and Chinamen for neighbours. They cause me no inconvenience. It's rather agreeable than otherwise to sit here and work, or lounge about and smoke, wondering whether a commission is already on its way or whether it has not yet even taken shape in the brain of some person unknown who is destined by fate some day to exchange his money for my bronze or marble.... It's an amusing game, Cleland, isn't it?—the whole affair of living, I mean.... Not too unpleasant, not too agreeable.... But if one's heart-action were not involuntary and automatic, do you know, if it lay with me I'd not bother to keep my heart ticking—I'd be too lazy to wind it up."

He stretched himself out in his chair gracefully, good-humoured, serenely amused at his own ideas.

"Did you have a good time abroad?" he inquired.

"Yes.... When you get on your feet you ought to go to Paris, Grismer."

"Yes, I know." He looked humorously at his well-shaped feet stretched out before him in shabby slippers. "Yes; it's up to my feet, Cleland. But they're a wandering, indifferent couple, inclined to indolence, I fear.... Is your work getting on?"

"I'm busy.... Yes, I think it's taking shape."

He looked up at Grismer hesitatingly, frankly troubled. "Grismer, we were school-mates.... I wouldn't wish you to think me impertinent——"

"Go ahead, Cleland."

"Are you quite sure?"

"I'm sure of you," returned Grismer, with a singular smile. "I know you pretty well, Cleland. I knew you in school, in college.... We fought in school. You were civil to me at Harvard." He laughed. "I've always liked you, Cleland—which is more than you can say about me."

Cleland reddened, and Grismer laughed again, lightly and without effort:

"It's that way sometimes. I think that you are about the only man I have ever really liked. You didn't know that, did you?"

"No."

"Well, don't let it worry you," added Grismer, smiling. "Go on and say what you were about to say."

"It was—I was merely wondering—whether you'd take it all right if——" He began again from another angle: "I've a country place—up in the Berkshires—my father's old place. And I thought that a fountain—if you'd care to design one——"

Grismer had been watching him with that indefinable smile in his golden eyes, which perplexed men and interested women, but now he rose suddenly and walked to the barred windows and stood there with his back turned, gazing out into the area. After an interval he pivoted on his heels, sauntered back and seated himself, relighting his pipe.

"All right," he said very quietly. "I'll do your fountain."

Cleland drew a breath of relief. "If you like," he said, "come up with me to Runner's Rest in June and look over the garden. There ought to be a pool there; there are plenty of springs on the mountain to feed a fountain by gravity. I think it would be fine to have a pool and a fountain in the old garden. Is it understood that you'll do it for me?"

"Yes.... I don't wish to be paid."

"Good Lord! You and I are professionals, Grismer, not beastly amateurs. Do you think I'd write for anybody unless I'm paid for it?"

Grismer's eyes held a curious expression as they rested on him. Then his features changed and he smiled and nodded carelessly:

"I'll do your fountain on your own terms. Tell me when you are ready."

Cleland rose:

"Won't you change your mind and lunch with me somewhere?"

"Thanks, no." Grismer also had risen, and the two men confronted each other for a moment in silence.

Then Grismer said:

"Cleland, I think you're the only man in the world for whom I have any real consideration. I haven't much use for men—no delusions. But it always has been different about you—even when we fought in school—even when I used to sneer at you sometimes.... And I want, somehow, to make you understand that I wish you well; that if it lay with me you should attain whatever you wish in life; that if attainment depended upon my stepping aside I'd do it.... That's all I can say. Think it over and try to understand."

Cleland, astonished, looked at him with unconcealed embarrassment.

"You're very kind," he said, "to feel so generously interested in my success. I wish you success, too."

Grismer smiled:

"You don't understand me after all," he said pleasantly. "I was afraid you wouldn't."

"You are offering me your friendship, as I take it," said Cleland awkwardly. "Isn't that what you meant?"

"Yes. And other things...."

He laughed with a slight touch of malice in his mirth:

"There's such a lot yet left unsaid between you and me, which you and I must say to each other some day. But there's plenty of time, Cleland.... And I shall be very glad to design and execute a fountain for your garden."

He offered his hand; Cleland took it, the embarrassed flush still staining his face.

"Yes," he said, "there is a matter that I wish to talk over with you some day, Grismer."

"I know.... But I think we had better wait a while.... Because I wish to answer everything you ask; and for the present I had rather not."

They walked slowly to the area gate and Grismer unlocked it.

"I'm glad you came," he said. "It's a bit lonely sometimes.... I have no friends."

"When you feel that way," said Cleland, "drop in on me."

"Thanks."

And that was all. Cleland went away through the ill-smelling streets, crossed the sunny square, and walked thoughtfully back to his own studio.

"He's a strange man," he mused, "—he was a strange boy, and he's grown into a curious sort of man.... Poor devil.... It's as though something inside him is lacking—or has been killed.... But why in God's name did Steve marry him unless she was in love with him? ... It must be.... And his pride won't let him take her until he can stand on his own feet.... When I dig that pool I'll dig a pit for my feet.... A grave for a fool...."

He unlocked his studio and went in.

"I'm done with love," he said aloud to himself.

The jingle of the telephone bell echoed his words and he walked slowly over to the table and detached the receiver.

"Jim?"

"Is it you, Steve?"

"Yes. Would you like some tea about five?"

"All right. I've had no lunch and I'll be hungry."

"You know, Jim, I'm not going to provide a banquet for you. Why don't you go out and take lunch?"

"I forgot it. I don't feel like work. Shall I come down and talk to you now?"

"I'm going out to take a dancing lesson in a few moments. I'll talk to you while I'm putting on my hat."

He said "All right," took his hat and stick and went downstairs again.

She opened the door for him, offering him her cool, slim hand, then she opened a hat-box and lifted from it a hat.

"I believe I'll join the Russian ballet," she said. "I do dance very nicely. You should hear what the ballet master says. And Miss Duncan and Miss St. Denis watched me yesterday, and they were very complimentary and polite."

"Nonsense. It's good exercise, but it would be a dog's life for you to lead, Steve. Where is Helen?"

"Out hunting a model for her Pegasus. She asked me to pose for the mounted figure, but I haven't time. I can fancy myself, in a complete state of nature, scrambling onto some rickety old livery hack——" She threw back her head and laughed, then inspected her new hat, and, facing the studio mirror, pinned it to her chestnut hair.

"Do you like it, Jim?"

"Fine. You make all hats look well."

"Such a nice, polite boy! So well brought up! But unfortunately I heard you say the same thing to Helen.... Where have you been, Jim? I called you up an hour ago."

"I went to see Grismer," he said, coolly ignoring her perverse and tormenting humour.

"You did? Bless your dear, generous heart!" cried the girl. "Do you know that if it were in me to be sentimental over you, what you did would start me? Continue to behave like a real man, dear friend, and I'll be head over heels in love before I know it!"

"Why?" he asked, conscious again of her gaily derisive mood and not caring for it.

"Because," she said, "you have acted like a man in calling on Oswald, and not like a spoiled boy. You resented Oswald's marrying me. You have been sullen and suspicious and aloof with him since you came back. I know Oswald better than you do. I know that he has felt your attitude keenly, though he never admitted it even to me.

"He is a man of few friends, admired but not well liked; he is wretchedly poor, fiercely proud, sensitive——"

"What!"

"Did you think he wasn't?" she asked. "He is painfully sensitive; pitiably so. I think women divine it, and it attracts them."

"He hasn't the reputation of being very thin-skinned," remarked Cleland drily.

"The average man who is sensitive would die to conceal it. You ought to know that, Jim; it's your business to dissect people, isn't it?"

She thrust a second pin through the crown of her hat and adjusted it deftly.

"Anyway," she said, "you are a nice, polite boy to go to see him, and you have made me very happy. Good-bye! I must run——"

"Have you lunched?"

"No, but I'm going to."

"With whom?" he asked incautiously.

"A man."

"You're usually just going out to lunch or dine with some man," he said sullenly.

"I like men," she said, smiling at him.

"What you probably mean is that you like admiration."

"I do. It's agreeable; it's sanitary; it's soothing. It invigorates one's self-confidence and self-respect. And it doesn't disarrange one's hair and rumple one's gown. Therefore, I prefer the undemonstrative admiration of a man to the indiscreet demonstrations of a boy."

"Do you mean me?" he asked, furious.

But she ignored the question:

"Boys are funny," she said, swinging her velvet reticule in circles. "Any girl can upset their equilibrium. All a girl has to do is to look at a boy sideways—the way Lady Button-eyes looked at you yesterday afternoon——"

"What!"

"At the Rochambeau. And you got up and went over and renewed your friendship with her. Helen and I saw you."

"I was merely civil," he said.

"So was she. She fished out a card and wrote on it. I don't know what she wrote."

"She wrote her telephone call. There isn't the slightest chance of my using it."

Stephanie laughed:

"He certainly is the nicest, politest boy in all Manhattan, and sister is very, very proud of him. Good-bye, James——"

She offered her lips to him audaciously, bending forward on tip-toe, both hands clasped behind her. But her grey eyes were bright with malice.

"Nice, polite boy," she repeated. "Kiss little sister."

"No," he said gloomily, "I'm fed up on sisterly kisses——"

"You insulting wretch! Do you mean you won't? Then you shall——!"

She started toward him, wrath in her eyes, but he caught her wrists and held her.

"You're altogether too well satisfied with yourself," he said. "You've no emotions inside your very lovely person except discreet ones. Otherwise, you've got the devil inside you and it's getting on my nerves."

"Jim! You beast!"

"Yes, I am. What of it? Beasts have emotions. Yours have either been cultivated out of you or you were born without any. I'm glad I am part beast. I'm glad you know it. The rest of me is human; and the combination isn't a very serious menace to civilization. But the sort of expurgated girl you are is!"

"Don't you think I'm capable of any deep emotions?" she asked. The smile had died on her lips.

"Maybe. I don't know."

"Who should, if you don't?"

He shrugged:

"Your husband, perhaps."

"Jim! I told you not to call him that!"

"Well, a spade is a spade——"

"Do you mean to be offensive?"

"How can that offend you?"

She released her wrists and shot a curious, inexplicable look at him.

"I don't understand you," she said. "You can be so generous and high-minded and you can be so unkind and insolent to me."

"Insolent?"

"Yes. You meant it insolently when you spoke of Oswald as my husband. You've done it before, too. Why do you? Do you really want to hurt me? Because you know he isn't my husband except by title. He may never be."

"All right," he said. "I'm sorry I was offensive. I'm just tired of this mystery, I suppose. It's a hopeless sort of affair for me. I can't make you love me; you're married, besides. It's too much for me—I can't cope with it, Steve.... So I won't ever bother you again with importunities. I'll go my own way."

"Very well," she said in an even voice.

She nodded to him and went out, saying as she passed:

"There'll be tea at five, if you care for any." And left him planted.

Which presently enraged him, and he began to pace the studio, pondering on the cruelty, insensibility and injustice of that devilish sex which had created man as a convenience.

"The thing to do," he said savagely to himself, "is to exterminate the last trace of love for her, tear it out, uproot it, trample on it without remorse——"

The studio bell rang. He walked to the door and opened it. A bewilderingly pretty girl stood there.

"Miss Davis?" she inquired sweetly. "I have an appointment."

"Come in," said Cleland, the flush of wrath still on his countenance.

The girl entered; he offered her a chair.

"Miss Davis happens to be out at the moment," he said, "but I don't believe she'll be very long."

"Do you mind my waiting?" asked the pretty girl.

"No, I don't," he said, welcoming diversion. "Do you mind my being here? Or are you going to put me out?"

She looked surprised, then she laughed very delightfully:

"Of course not. Miss Davis and I have known each other for a long while, and I owe her a great deal and I am devoted to her. Do you think I'd be likely to banish a friend of hers? Besides, I'm only one of her models."

"A model?" he repeated. "How delightful! I also am a model—of good behaviour."

They both laughed.

"Does it pay?" she inquired mischievously.

"No, it doesn't. I wish I had another job."

"Why not take the one I've just left?"

"What was it?"

"I was dancing at the Follies."

"All right. Will you try me out?"

"With pleasure."

"I'll turn on that music-box."

The girl laughed her enchanting little laugh, appraised him at a glance, then turned her pretty head and critically surveyed the studio.

"I believe," she said, "I'm to pose for Miss Davis seated on a winged horse. Isn't that exciting?"

"You'd be delightful on a winged horse," he said.

"Do you think so?"

"I suspect it. What did you do in the Follies?"

"Nothing very interesting. Have you seen the Follies?"

"You ought to know I haven't," he said reproachfully. "Do you suppose I could have forgotten you?"

She rose and dropped him a Florodora curtsey. They were getting on very well. She glanced demurely at the music box. He jumped up and turned it on. The battered disc croaked out a tango.

"Shall I take up those rugs?" he inquired.

"What on earth would Miss Davis say if she found us dancing?"

"She isn't here to say anything. Shall I?"

"Very well.... I'll help you."

They dragged the rugs aside.

The studio was all golden with the sun, now, and the brilliant rays bathed them as she laid her gloved hand in his and his arm encircled her waist.

She was a wonderful dancer; her supple grace and professional perfection enchanted him.

From time to time he left her to crank up the music-box; neither of them tired. Occasionally she glanced at her jewelled wrist-watch and ventured to voice her doubts as to the propriety of continuing in the imminence of Miss Davis's return.

"Then let's come up to my studio," he said. "I've a music-phone of sorts. We can dance there until you're tired, and then you can come down and see Miss Davis."

She demurred: the music-box ran down with a squawk.

"Shall we take one more chance here?" he asked.

"No, it's too risky.... Shall I run up to your place for just one little dance?"

"Come on!" he said, taking her hand.

They went out and he closed the door. Then, hand-in-hand, laughing like a pair of children, they sped up the stairs and arrived breathless before his door, which he unlocked. And in another minute they were dancing again while a scratched record croaked out a fox-trot.

"I must go," she said, resting one gloved hand on his arm. "I'd love to stay but I mustn't."

"First," he said, "we'll have tea."

"No!"

But presently they were seated on his desk, a plate of sweet biscuits between them, their glasses of sherry touching.

"Unknown but fascinating girl," he said gaily, "I drink to your health and fortune. Never shall I forget our dance together; never shall I forget the charming stranger who took tea with me!"

"Nor shall I forget you!—you very nice boy," she said, looking at him with smiling intentness.

"Would it spoil if we saw each other again?"

"You know that such delightful encounters never bear repetition," she answered. "Now I'm going. Farewell!"

She laughed at him, touched her glass with her lips, set it aside, and slipped to the floor.

"Good-bye!" she said. He caught her at the door, and she turned and looked up gravely.

"Don't spoil it," she whispered, disengaging herself.

So he released her, and she stretched out her hand, smiled at him, and stepped out. The music-phone continued to play gaily.

A girl who was coming upstairs saw her as she left Cleland's studio; and, as the pretty visitor sped lightly past her, the girl who was mounting turned and watched her. Then she resumed her ascent, came slowly to Cleland's open door, stood there resting a moment as though out of breath.

Cleland, replacing the rugs, glanced up and caught sight of Stephanie; and the quick blood burnt his face.

She came in as though still a trifle weary from the ascent. Neither spoke. She glanced down at the two empty wine glasses on his desk, saw the decanter, the biscuits and cigarettes. The music-phone was expiring raucously.

"Who is that girl?" she asked in an even, colourless voice.

"A girl I met."

"Do you mind telling me her name?"

"I—don't know it," he said, getting redder.

"Oh. Shall I enlighten you?"

"Thank you."

"She's Mary Cliff, of the Follies. I've seen her dance."

"Really," he said carelessly.

Stephanie leaned against the desk, resting one hand on it. An odd sense of mental fatigue possessed her; things were not clear in her mind; she was not very sure of what she was saying:

"I came up to say—that I'm sorry we quarrelled.... I'm sorry now that I came. I'm going in a moment.... You've already had tea, I see. So you won't care for any more."

After a flushed silence, he said:

"Did you have a successful lesson, Steve?"

"I've had two—lessons. Yes, they were quite—successful."

"You seem tired."

"No." She turned and walked to the door. He opened it for her in silence.

"Good night," she said.

"Good night."

CHAPTER XXIII

Cleland's unhappy interpretation of the episode was masculine and therefore erroneous—the interpretation of a very young man whose reverence for the restless sex might require revision some day or other unless he died exceedingly young. For he concluded, now, that he had thoroughly disgusted Stephanie Quest; first by his vulgar flirtation with Lady Button-eyes, then by losing his temper and admitting to her his own odious materialism; and, furthermore and flagrantly, by his hideous behaviour with a pretty girl whose name even he had not known when he entertained her at his impromptu thé-dansant.

He saw himself quite ruined in the unemotional grey eyes of a girl who, herself, was so coldly aloof from the ignoble emotions lurking ever and furtively in the masculine animal.

He had had little enough chance with Stephanie, even when his conduct had been exemplary. Now he was dreadfully certain that his chances were less than none at all; that he had done himself in. What had he to hope of her now?

To this unconventional yet proud, pure-hearted girl had been offered the very horrid spectacle of his own bad temper and reprehensible behaviour. And, although there had been no actual harm in it, she could never, never understand or forgive it. Never!

Her virginal ears had been insulted by the cynical avowal of his own masculine materialism. Of the earth, earthy, he had vaunted himself in his momentary exasperation—"of humanity, a shamelessly human example."

With her own incredulous, uncontaminated eyes she had seen him pocket Lady Button-eye's telephone number. Her shrinking ears had heard the mutilated record in his music-phone dying out in a tipsy two-step; her outraged gaze had beheld a perfectly strange young girl's gaily informal exit from his own bachelor apartment, where sherry still stood in both glasses and the rugs lay scattered in disorder against the wall. Elimination was naturally the portion he had to expect. And he gloomily schooled himself to endure annihilation.

According to his philosophy there was nothing else on earth to do about it. Doubtless she'd ultimately forgive him, but her respect he couldn't hope for at present; and as for any deeper sentiment, if ever there had been any hope in his heart that he might one day awaken it, now he knew it was wriggling in its death-throes, making him, by turns, either frightfully unhappy or resentfully reckless.

The hopeless part of it was that, unlike weaker men, he had no desire to drown sorrow in any irregular and unworthy fashion.

Many men of many minds turn to many things seeking the anodyne in one form or another—the nepenthe of forgetfulness, rarer than the philosopher's stone.

Neither wine nor the dreary quest for heart-ease among frailer companions ever appeals to any but weak minds. And the boy, not knowing what to do, turned to his work with a renewed energy resembling desperation.

It is the only hope for ultimate anesthesia.

Also, he took to prowling by night, being too unhappy to remain in his studio so near to Stephanie.

He prowled about Broadway and Long Acre with Badger Spink, whose restless cleverness and self-absorption ended by wearying him; he prowled with Clarence Verne one night, encountering that strange sphinx by accident, and strolling with him at hazard through the purlieus of Chelsea. Both men seemed deeply preoccupied with problems of their own, and though they knew each other only slightly they maintained the reticence of intimacy—an odd assumption, as Cleland thought afterward. Yet, one of them was very sick for love, and the other very sick of it; and, besides, there roved with them a third and unseen companion, through the crooked, lamp-lit streets, whose shrouded arm was linked in Verne's. And perhaps that accounted for the sombre silence which brooded between these men in trouble.

Verne said at parting—and gazing absently at nothing while he spoke:

"The tragedy of civilization—of what the world calls civilization!—that is the most terrible of all, Cleland. That is the real and only hell. Not the ruthless eruptions of barbarism; not the momentary resurgence of atavistic violence—of red-blooded rapine and lust—but the ordered, lawful, stealthy, subtle horrors of civilization: they slay men's souls."

"I don't get you, Verne."

"No, Cleland. But somebody else will—somebody else will get me—very soon, now.... Good-bye."

A few days later Cleland prowled with Harry Belter, intent upon supper somewhere in the outer marches of the town.

For an episode had occurred that shook them both with the most sobering and distressing jar that youth experiences in fullest mental and physical vigour.

"I don't see how a man can kill himself," said Cleland. "I don't see why he can't go somewhere else and cure himself of his unhappiness. Travel, change, new faces——"

"Perhaps he wants to be rid of faces," muttered Belter.

"There are wonderful wildernesses."

"Perhaps he's too tired to admire 'em. Perhaps he's half dead for sleep."

"You talk as though you sympathized and understood, Harry."

"I do."

"You! The indefatigable optimist! You, the ever-welcome, the gay consoler, the irrepressible spirit among us!"

"If I didn't play that rôle I'd do what Clarence Verne did!"

"What!"

"Long ago," added Belter.

"For God's sake, why? I never dreamed——"

"You were away, three years, having a good time abroad, weren't you? How should you know what happened to others?"

"Did something happen to you, Harry?"

"It did. If you wish to know exactly what, I'll tell you what happened to me was a woman. Now you know something that nobody else knows—except that demon and myself."

"But such things——"

"No. Such things destroy, ultimately. I'll die of her, one day."

"Nonsense!"

But Belter, the jester, laughed a terrifying laugh and sauntered into the open door of the restaurant which they had walked a mile or two to find.

"It's a low pub," he remarked, "and suitable to my mind." They seated themselves at a cherry table. One or two newspaper men nodded to Belter. A confidence man, whispering to a painted mulatto girl, turned to scrutinize him; a ruffianly bar-keeper saluted him cordially.

There was a grill glowing beyond the bar. A waiter, chewing a tooth-pick, came up and stood leaning on their table with both hairy hands spread flat on the polished top.

"Well, gents, what is it?" he asked hoarsely.

They gave their order. Then Belter, leaning forward and planting both elbows on the table, said in a low voice:

"They call me a caricaturist, but, by God, Cleland, I'm a realist! I've learned more about women by caricaturing them than I ever read in their smooth countenances. They are caricatures, in their secret souls—every one of them; and when I exaggerate a weak point and ignore everything but the essential character lines and contours, by jingo, Cleland, I've discovered 'em—exposed 'em as they really are!—distorted caricatures of human beings."

Cleland disagreed with him, gloomily, amazed at his bitterness.

"No," said Belter, "if you tell the mere truth about them they're a nuisance! We don't understand 'em. Why? There's very little to understand and that's all on the surface as plain as the nose on your face!—too plain for us to notice. And you writers explore and dissect 'em, seeking deeps where there are shallows, mysteries where there are facts, subtleties where everything is obvious. They haven't much mind, they have few traits because they have precious little character. They are not like humans; they resemble Fabre's insects—strange, incomprehensible Martians, doing things not from intelligence, not from reason, impulse, desire, but merely from an inherited instinct that apes intelligence, that parodies passion."

"What have they done to you, Harry?"

"Nothing, in years.... Because I won't let 'em. But the spectacle of the world suddenly crawling with women, all swarming restlessly over the face of the globe, not knowing why or whither—it appalls me, Jim. And we men continue flinging at them everything we can think of to stop them, quiet them, and keep them still—personal liberty, franchise, political opportunity, professional and industrial chances—and still they twist and wriggle and squirm and swarm over everything restlessly, slowly becoming denatured, unsexed, more sterile, more selfish, insolent, intolerable every day. They are the universal nuisance of the age; they are slowly smothering us as shifting dunes threaten the fertile plain——"

"For heaven's sake——"

"There's the unvarnished truth about woman," insisted Belter. "She's got the provocative câlinerie of a cat; the casual insouciance of a sparrow; the nesting and hatching instinct of the hen; the mindless jealousy of a Pekingese.

"The creative mind that marries one of 'em is doomed either to sterility or to anguish. Their jealousy and malice stultify and slay the male brain; there is no arguing with them because they have no real mind to appeal to, no logic, no reason. Like the horrible praying Mantis they suffer the embrace of the male and immediately begin to eat him, commencing with the head——"

Cleland began to laugh. His mirth, unrestrained, did not disturb Belter, who continued to eat his club sandwich and wash it down with huge draughts of Pilsner.

"Do you think I'd marry one of 'em?" he demanded scornfully. "Do you know what really happened to Clarence Verne?"

"No."

"Well, he married a dainty little thing and expected to continue earning two thousand dollars for every magazine cover he designed. And do you know what happened?"

"No, I don't."

"I'll tell you. The dainty little thing turned jealous, hired a shyster who hired detectives to follow Verne about and report to her what he did inside and outside his studio. She doped his food when she thought he had a rendezvous; she had his letters stolen. In his own world, any woman he found agreeable was cut out by his wife; if, in the jolly and unconventional fellowship of Bohemia, he ever stopped on the street to chat with a pretty girl or took one, harmlessly, to lunch or supper, or offered any of 'em tea in his studio, her detectives reported it to her and she raised hell.

"It killed spontaneity, any gaiety of heart, any incentive in Verne. It embittered him, aged him, strangled him. Look at his work to-day! Nothing remains except the mechanical technique. Look at the man. Dead in his bathroom. Don't talk to me about women."

"Why didn't he divorce her if he knew of all this she was doing?"

"He had a little girl to think of. After all, Verne had lived his life. Better snuff it out that way and leave the child in decent ignorance of family dissension.... And that was the matter with Clarence Verne, Cleland. And I tell you that into the heart of every man who has been fool enough to marry, some canker is eating its way. There is not one woman in a million with mind enough and humanity enough to keep her husband's love—not one who knows enough to

'Let him alone

And he'll come home—'

Not one with the brains, mental resource, wisdom, to mate without becoming a parasite. And still, all over the world the asses are solemnly asking each other, 'Is marriage a failure?' Bah! The world makes me very sick!"

They went to Verne's funeral a few days later. The widow was very pretty in her deep mourning. Her little girl was with her.

But the affair was not even a nine-days' gossip in the artists' world. Verne had stalked wistfully among them for a few years, but had never been of them since his marriage: he had lived at home in one of the fashionable quarters, although his studio—and his heart—were in Chelsea.

So his well-known magazine covers were missed more than he was, and people soon ceased discussing him and his fate; and in a month nobody remembered whether it had been done with a razor or a revolver. And very few cared.

As for Cleland, he had never known Verne well, and the damnation of his taking off affected him only superficially. Besides, busy men have little time to bother about death; and Cleland was now extremely busy with his novel, which began to take definite shape and proportion under unremitting labour.

He now saw Stephanie much as usual; and the girl did not seem seriously changed toward him in behaviour. Her spirits appeared to be high always; she seemed to be always doing something interesting and delightful, dining out, going to theatres—though the choice was now limited, as many were already closed for the summer—motoring out to the country, taking her dancing and dramatic lessons, entertaining in the studio.

It is true that he seldom or never saw Stephanie alone now, but that seemed accidental, because he really had been absorbed in his work and she was usually out somewhere or other during the day. But she appeared to be cordial to him—just as full of gay malice and light banter as ever—full of undisguised interest in the progress of his work and delighted with his promise to let her read the manuscript when it was typed and before he submitted it to any publisher.

So all seemed to go serenely between them; he resolutely told himself that he had given her up; she did not appear to be aware of anything altered or subdued in his cordiality toward her—apparently missed nothing in his attitude that might once have been to her significant of any deeper feeling.

Yet, once or twice, when a gay company filled her studio, amid the chatter and music and movement of dancers, he became aware of her level, grey eyes gravely intent on him—but always the gravity he surprised in them turned to a quick, frank smile when his gaze encountered hers, and she always made him some pretty signal of recognition across the animated scene.

As for Helen, he always got on delightfully with that charming and capable girl. There was something very engaging about her, she was so wholesome, so energetic, so busy, so agreeable to look at.

He had acquired a habit of dropping in on his way out to lunch to watch her working on the sketches and studies for "Aspiration;" but one day she forgot to warn him and he blundered into the courtyard where, on a white circus-horse, a lovely, slender, but rather startling figure hid its face in its hands and desperately attempted to make a garment of its loosened hair, while an elderly female holding the horse's head cried "Shoo!" and Helen hustled him out, a little perturbed and intensely amused.

"I ought to have told you," she said. "I wouldn't mind, but even professional models object to anybody except, occasionally, another artist."

"I'm sorry," he said. "Please tell little Miss Eve that I didn't mean to scare her."

They chatted for a few minutes, then Helen smilingly excused herself and went back to her work, and Cleland continued on his way to lunch, chagrined at his stupidity.

"I wonder," he thought, "if that was my little unknown dancing partner? Now, she will think I've 'spoiled it all.'"

He was in masculine error again. Disconcerted beauty has the consolation that it is beautiful. Otherwise, it remains merely outraged modesty; and bitterness abides in its soul.

Helen, laughingly mentioning the affair to Stephanie, still immensely amused at Cleland's distress and apologetic blushes, added that the model, Marie Cliff, had been sensible enough to appreciate the humour of it, too.

"You mean," said Stephanie, coldly, "that she didn't care." And, not smiling, went on with her sewing.

"She's rather a refined type," said Helen, looking curiously at the girl who, bent over her mending, was plying her needle furiously.

Stephanie shrugged.

"Don't you think so, Steve?"

"No. I think her typically common."

"How odd! She's quite young, and she's really very nice and modest—not the type of person you seem to imagine——"

"I don't like her," interrupted Stephanie calmly. But her slender fingers were flying, and she had set her teeth in her under lip, which had trembled a little.

Helen, chancing to mention Cleland that night as they were preparing for bed, was astonished at Stephanie's impatient comment:

"Oh, Jim's quite spoiled. I'm rapidly losing interest in that young man."

"Why?" asked Helen, surprised.

"Because he runs about with queer people. No man can do that and not show it in his own manner."

"What people, Steve?"

"Well, with Lady Button-eyes for one. With your modest and bashful little model, for another."

"Does he?" Then she began to laugh. "I'm glad he displays good taste, anyway! The little Cliff girl is charming."

"Isn't that rather a horrid and cynical thing to say?" demanded Stephanie, flushing brightly.

"Why? I think she's quite all right. Let them play together if they like. It's none of my business. Are you, the high-priestess of tolerance, becoming intolerant?" she added laughingly.

"No. I don't care what he does. But I should think he'd prefer to frivol with one of his own class."

"It's a matter of chance," remarked Helen, brushing out her curly brown hair. "The beggar-maid or Vere-de-Vere—it's all the same to a man if the girl is sufficiently attractive and amusing."

"Amusing?" repeated Stephanie. "That is a humiliating rôle—to amuse a man."

"If a girl doesn't, men soon neglect her. Men go where they are amused. Everybody does. You do. I do. Why not?"

Stephanie, still hotly flushed, shook out her beautiful chestnut hair and began to comb it viciously.

"I don't see how a common person can amuse a well-born man," she said.

"It's a reflection on us if we give them the opportunity," retorted Helen, laughing. "But if we're not clever enough to hold the men of our own caste, then they'll certainly go elsewhere for their amusement."

"And good riddance!"

"But who's to replace them?"

"I can get along perfectly without men."

"Steve, you're talking like a child! What happens to be the matter with you? Has anything gone wrong?"

"Absolutely nothing——" She turned sharply; her comb caught in her hair and she jerked it free. Perhaps that accounted for the sudden glint of tears in her grey eyes.

Helen slipped her arm around her, but the girl's rigid body did not yield and she kept her head obstinately averted.

"Are you getting tired of your idiotic bargain with Oswald?" asked Helen, gently.

"No, I am not! He never bothers me—never gets on my nerves—never is unjust—unkind——"

"Who is?"

"I don't know.... Men in general—annoy me—men in—general."

"None in particular?"

"No.... It isn't very agreeable to know that one's brother goes about with a shameless dancer from the Follies."

"Are you sure he does?"

"Perfectly. He gives her a party in his studio, too, sometimes."

"But there's no harm in——"

"A party for two! They drink—together."

"Oh."

"They drink and dance and eat, all by themselves! They take up the rugs and turn on the music and—and I don't know what they do!—I—d-don't know—I don't—I don't——!"

Her head fell into her hands; she stood rigid, her body shaken by emotions too unhappy, too new, too vague for her youthful analysis.

"I—I can't bear to think of him that way——" she stammered, "—he was so straight and clean—so clean——"

"Some men drift a little—sometimes——"

"They say so.... I don't know. I am too miserable about him—too unhappy——"

She choked back a sob, and the slender hands that covered her eyes slowly clenched.

Helen looked at her in consternation. Girls don't usually betray so much emotion over some casual irregularity of a brother.

Stephanie pressed her clenched hands mutely against her lids for a while, then, her lips still quivering, she reached for her brush and began to groom her splendid hair again.

And Helen, watching her without a word, thought to self:

"She behaves as though she were falling in love with him.... She'd certainly better be careful. The boy is already in love with her, no matter how he acts.... If she isn't very, very careful she'll get into trouble with him."

Aloud she said cheerfully:

"Steve, dear, I really think I'm clever enough to have taken the measure of your very delightful brother. And I honestly don't believe it is in him to play fast and loose with any woman ever born."

"He is doing it!"

"With whom?"

"That—Dancing girl——"

"Nonsense! If it's an ephemeral romance, which I don't believe, it's a gay and harmless one. Don't worry your pretty head about it, Steve."

After Stephanie was in bed she kissed her lightly, smiled reassuringly, switched off the light and went to her own room, slowly.

Very gravely she braided her hair before the mirror, looking at her pale, reflected face.

Yet, though pale, it was still a fresh, wholesome, beautiful face. But the brown eyes stared sadly at their twin brown images, and the girl shook her head.

For the nearest that Helen Davis had ever come to falling in love was when Cleland first walked into her studio. She could have fallen in love with him then—within the minute—out of a clear sky. She realized it after he had gone—not too deeply astonished—she, who had never before been in love, recognized its possibility all in a moment.

But she had learned to hold herself in check since that first, abrupt and clear-minded recognition of such a possibility.

Never by a word or glance had she ever betrayed herself; yet his very nearness to her, at times, set her heart beating, set a faint thrill stealing through her. Yet her eyes always met his pleasantly, frankly, steadily; her hand lay calm and cool in his when she welcomed him or bade him good-bye. Always she schooled herself to withstand what threatened her, gave it no food for reflection, no sustenance, no status, no consideration.

Love came as no friend to her. She soon realized that. And she quietly faced him and bade him keep his distance.

She looked at herself again in the glass. Her brown eyes were very, very serious. Then the smile glimmered.

"Quand même," she murmured gaily, and switched off the light.

CHAPTER XXIV

It was a warm day in early June and Cleland, working in trousers and undershirt, and driven by thirst to his tin ice-box, discovered it to be empty.

"Confound it," he muttered, and rang up Stephanie's studio. A maid answered, saying that Miss Quest had gone motoring and Miss Davis had not yet returned from shopping.

"I want to borrow a lump of ice," explained Cleland. "I'll come down for it."

So he concealed his lack of apparel under a gay silk dressing gown, picked up a pan, and went down, not expecting to encounter anybody.

In the kitchenette, in the rear, the obliging maid gave him a lump of ice. Carrying it in one hand, aloft, as an expert waiter carries a towering tray of dishes, and whistling a gay air with great content—for his work upstairs had gone very well that morning—he sauntered out of the culinary regions, along the alley-like passageway, into the studio.

And as he started for the door which he had left ajar, a figure opened it from without and entered hurriedly—a scared, breathless little figure, bare-footed, swathed in a kimono and a shock of hair.

They stared at each other, astonished. Both blushed furiously.

"I simply can't help it," said the girl. "I was sitting on that horse waiting for Miss Davis, when a bee or a horsefly or something stung him and he began to rear and kick all around the court, and I slid off him and ran."

They both laughed. Cleland, clutching his pan of ice, said:

"I seem doomed to run into you when I shouldn't. I'm terribly sorry."

She blushed again and carefully swathed her waist in the obi.

"You didn't mean to," she said. "It was rather startling, though."

"It was, indeed. And now we're having another unconventional party. Shall I leave this ice here and go out and quiet the nag?"

"He'll surely kick you."

"I'll take a chance——" He set the pan of ice on a table, girded up his dressing-gown, and went out into the court. The horse stood quietly enough now. But Cleland soon discovered a green-eyed horsefly squatting on the wall and rubbing its forelegs together in devilish exultation.

"I'll fix you," he muttered, picking up a lump of wet clay and approaching with infinite caution. He was a good shot; he buried the bloodthirsty little demon under a spatter of clay. Then he went back for his ice.

"The deed is done," he said cheerily. "It was a horsefly, as you said.... Good-bye.... When are we going to have another dance?"

"We'd better not," she said smilingly. She had seated herself on the sofa and had drawn her pretty, bare feet up under her kimono.

"You won't let me give another party for you?" he inquired.

"I ought not to."

"But will you?"

"I don't know. This kimono party we're having now seems sufficient for the present; and I think you'd better go."

"Anyway," he said, "when a desire for innocent revelling seizes you, you know where to go."

"Yes, thank you."

They laughed at each other.

"Good-bye, pretty stranger," he said.

"Good-bye, you nice boy!"

So he went away upstairs with his ice, and she stole out presently and ventured into the courtyard where the placid white horse stood as calmly as a cow.

And Stephanie, lying on her bed in her own room, twisted her body in anguish and, hands clenched, buried her face in her arms.

Helen, returning an hour later, and glancing into Stephanie's bed-room as she passed, saw the girl lying there.

"I thought you were motoring!" she exclaimed.

"The car is laid up," said Stephanie, in a muffled voice.

"Oh. Don't you feel well, Steve?"

"N-not very."

"Can I do anything? Wait a moment——" She continued on to her bed-room, unpinned her hat, drew on her working smock, and came slowly back, buttoning it.

"What's wrong, Steve?" she inquired.

"Nothing," said the girl, drearily. "I'm just—tired."

"Why—you've been crying!" murmured Helen, bending over her. "What is making you so unhappy, Steve? Don't you wish to tell me?"

"N-no."

"Shall I sit here by you, dear? I can work this afternoon——"

"No.... It's nothing at all—truly it isn't."

"Had you rather be alone?"

"Yes."

Helen went slowly away toward the court where her nag and its rider were ready for her. Stephanie lay motionless, dumb, wretched, her bosom throbbing with emotions too powerful for her—yet too vague, too blind, to enlighten her.

Unawakened to passion, ignorant of it, regardless and disdainful of what she had never coped with, the mental and spiritual suffering was, perhaps, the keener.

Humiliation and grief that she was no longer first and alone in Cleland's heart and mind had grown into a sorrow deeper than she knew, deeper than she admitted to herself. All the childish and pettier emotions attended it, mocking her with her own frailty—ignoble jealousy, hard resentment, the primitive sarcasm born of envy—the white flash of hatred for those to whom this man turned for amusement—this man whom she had adored from boyhood.

Why had he cast her out of the first place in his heart and mind? He had even told her that he was in love with her. Why had he turned to this shameless dancer?

And to what others did he also turn to find amusement when she did not know where he was?

Had it been her fault? No. From the very first night that he had come back to her—in the very face of her happiness to have him again—he had shown her what kind of man he was—there at the Ball of All the Gods—with that dreadful Goddess of Night.

She turned feverishly, tortured by her thoughts, but neither they nor the hot pillow gave her any rest. They stung her like scorpions, setting every nerve on edge with something—anger, perhaps—something unendurable there in the silence of her room.

And at last she got up to make an end of it, once and for all. But the preparations took her some time—some cold water, brush and comb, and a chamois rag.

Cleland, now dressed for luncheon, humming a comic song under his breath and contentedly numbering his latest pencilled pages, heard the tap at his open door, and looked up cheerfully, hoping for Marie Cliff, a pre-prandial dance, and a pretty companion at luncheon. Tragedy entered, wearing the mask of Stephanie Quest.

"Hello!" he cried gaily, jumping up and coming toward her. "This is too delightful. Are you coming out to lunch with me, Steve?"

"Sit down a moment," she said. But he continued to stand; and she came over and stood beside his desk, resting one hand on it.

And, after a moment, lifting her grey eyes to his:

"I have borne a great deal from you. But there is an insult which you have offered me to-day that I shall not endure in silence."

"What insult?" he demanded, turning red.

"Making my studio a rendezvous for you and your—mistress!"

He knew what she meant instantly, and his wrath blazed:

"It was an accident. I don't know how you heard of it, but it was pure accident. Also, that is a rotten thing to say——"

"Is it! You once told me that you prefer to call a spade a spade! Oh, Jim!—you were clean once. What have you done!"

"But it's a lie—and an absurd one!"

"Do you think that of me, too—that I tell lies?"

"No. But you evidently believe one."

"It is too obvious to doubt——" Her throat was dry with the fierceness of her emotions and she choked a moment.

"Who told you?"

"I was there."

"Where?"

"In my bed-room. I had not gone out. I heard the maid tell you I was out motoring. I meant to speak to you—but you have been so—so unfriendly lately.... And then that woman came in!" ... Her grey eyes fairly blazed.

"Why do you do this to me?" she cried, clenching both hands. "It is wicked!—unthinkable! Why do you hold me in such contempt?"

Her fierce anger silenced him, and his silence lashed her until she lost her head.

"Do you think you can offer me such an affront in my own studio because I am really not your sister?—because your name is Cleland and mine is not?—because I was only the wretched, starved, maltreated child of drunken parents when your father picked me out of the gutter! Is that why you feel at liberty to affront me under my own roof—show your contempt for me? Is it?"

"Steve, you are mad!" he said. He had turned very white.

"No," she said, "but I'm at the limit of endurance. I can't stand it any longer. I shall go to-night to the man I married and live with him and find a shelter there—find protection and—f-forgetfulness——" Her voice broke but her eyes were the more brilliant and dangerous for the flashing tears:

"I know what you and my aunt talked over between you," she said. "You discussed the chances of my developing erratic, unscrupulous, morbid, immoral traits! You were anxious for fear I had inherited them. Probably now you think I have. Think as you please——!" she flashed out through her tears; "you have killed every bit of happiness in me. Remember it some day!"

She turned to go, and he sprang forward to detain her, but she twisted herself out of his arms and reeled back against the desk.

Then he had her in his arms again, and she stared at his white, tense face, all distorted by her blinding tears:

"I love you, Steve! That's all the answer I give you. That's my reply to your folly. I never loved anybody else; I never shall; I never can. I am clean. I don't know how it happens, but I am! They lie who tell you anything else. I'm like my father; I care for only one woman. I'm incapable of caring for any other.

"I don't know what I've done to you to make you say such things and think them. I consider you as my own kin; I respect and love you like a kinsman. But—God help me—I've gone further; I love you as a lover. I can't tear you out of my heart; I've tried because I saw no hope that you ever could fall in love with me—but I couldn't do it—I couldn't.

"If you go to the man you married I shall never love any other woman. That is the truth, and I know it, now!"

Her body was still rigid in his arms; her tense hands lay flat on his breast as though to repulse him.

But there was no strength in them and they had begun to tremble under the hard beating of his heart.

Her mouth, too, was quivering; her tear-wet eyes looked mutely into his; suddenly her body relaxed, yielded; and at his fierce embrace her hot mouth melted against his.

"Steve," he stammered—"Steve—can you care for me—in my way——?"

Under the deep-fringed lids her grey eyes looked at him vaguely; her lips were burning.

"Steve——" he whispered.

Her slowly lifted eyes alone responded.

"Can you love me?"

Her eyes closed again. And after a long while her lips responded delicately to his.

"Is it love, Steve?" he asked, trembling.

"I don't know.... I'm so tired—confused——"

Her arms fell from his neck to his shoulders and she opened her eyes, listlessly.

"I think it—must be," she said.... "I'm quite sure it is!"

"Love?"

"Yes."

CHAPTER XXV

Cleland, tremendously thrilled and excited by the first but faint response to his ardour which he had ever obtained of Stephanie, but uncertain, too, and almost incredulous as to its significance and duration, retained sufficient common sense and self-control to restrain him from pressing matters further. For Stephanie seemed so listless, so confused, so apparently unable to comprehend herself and these new and deep emotions which threatened her, that he forebore to seize what seemed to be an undue advantage.

They parted very quietly at her studio door; she naïvely admitting physical fatigue, headache, and a natural desire to be down in her darkened room; he to return to his studio, too much upset to work or to eat, later, when the dinner hour drew near.

However, he took his hat and stick and went down stairs. When he rang at her studio, Helen admitted him, saying that Stephanie was asleep in her room and had not desired any dinner. So they chatted for a while, and then Cleland took his departure and walked slowly up the street toward the Rochambeau. And the first person he met on University Place was Marie Cliff.

Perhaps it was the instinct to make amends to her for the unjust inferences drawn to her discredit a few hours before—perhaps it was the sheer excitement and suddenly renewed hope of Stephanie that incited him. Anyway, his gay greeting and unfeigned cordiality stirred the lonely girl to response, and when they had walked as far as the Beaux Arts, they were quite in the mood to dine together.

She was grateful to be with an agreeable man whom she liked and whom she could trust; his buoyant spirits and happy excitement were grateful for somebody on whom they could be vented.

In that perfumed tumult of music, wine, and dancing they seated themselves, greeted cordially by Louis, the courtly and incomparable; and they dined together luxuriously, sometimes rising to dance between courses, sometimes joining laughingly in a gay chorus sustained by the orchestra, sometimes, with elbows on the cloth and heads together, chattering happily of nothing in particular.

Men here and there bowed to her and to him; some women recognized and greeted them; but they were having much too good and too irresponsible a time together to join others or to invite approaches.

It was all quite harmless—a few moments' pleasure without other significance than that the episode had been born of a young man's high spirits and a young girl's natural relief when her solitude was made gay for her without reproach.

It was about eleven o'clock; Marie, wishing to be fresh for her posing in the morning, reminded him with frank regret that she ought to go.

"I wouldn't care," she said, "except that since I've left the Follies I have to depend on what I earn at Miss Davis's studio. So you don't mind, do you, Mr. Cleland?"

"No, of course not. It's been fine, hasn't it?"

"Yes. I've had such a good time!—and you are the nicest of men——"

Her voice halted; Cleland, watching her with smiling eyes, saw a sudden alteration of her pretty features. Then he turned to follow her fixed gaze.

"Hello," he said, "there's Harry Belter. Are you looking at him?"

Her face had grown very sober; she withdrew her gaze with a little shrug of indifference, now.

"Yes, I was looking at him," she said quietly.

"I didn't know you knew him."

"Didn't you? ... Yes, I used to know him."

He laughed:

"The recollection doesn't appear to be very pleasant."

"No."

"Too bad. I like Belter. He and I were at school together. He's enormously clever."

She remained silent.

"He really is. And he is an awfully good fellow at heart—a little pronounced, a trifle tumultuous sometimes, but——"

She said, evenly:

"I know him better than you do, Mr. Cleland."

"Really!"

"Yes.... I married him."

Cleland was thunderstruck.

"I was only seventeen," she said calmly. "I was on the stage at the time."

"Good Lord!" he murmured, astounded.

"He never spoke of it to you?"

"Never! I never dreamed——"

"I did. I dreamed." She shrugged her shoulders again, lightly. "But—I awoke very soon. My dream had ended."

"What on earth was the matter?"

"I am afraid you had better ask him," she replied gravely.

"I beg your pardon; I shouldn't have asked that question at all!"

"I didn't mind.... It is my tragedy—still. But let a man interpret it to men. A woman would not be understood."

"Are you—divorced?"

"No."

Cleland, still deeply astonished, looked across the room at Belter. That young man, very red, sat listening to Badger Spink's interminable chatter—pretending to listen; but his disturbed gaze was turned from time to time on Marie Cliff; and became hideously stony when it shifted to Cleland at moments without a sign of recognition.

"Shall we go?" asked the girl in a low voice.

They rose. A similar impulse seemed to seize Belter, and he got up almost blindly and strode across the floor.

Cleland, suddenly confronted at the door of the cloak-room, from which Marie was just emerging, said:

"Hello, Harry," in a rather embarrassed manner.

"Go to hell," replied the latter in a low voice of concentrated fury, and turned on his wife.

"Marie," he said unsteadily, "may I speak to you?"

"Certainly, but not now," replied the girl, who had turned white as a sheet.

Cleland touched the man's arm which was trembling:

"Better not interfere," he said pleasantly. "The disgrace of a row will be yours, not your wife's."

"What are you doing with my wife!" whispered Belter, his voice shaking with rage.

"I'll tell you, Harry. I'm showing her all the respect and friendship and sympathy that there is in me to to show to a charming, sincere young girl.... You know the sort of man I am. You ought to know your wife but evidently you don't. Therefore, your question is superfluous."

Belter drew him abruptly back to the foot of the stairs:

"If you're lying I'll kill you," he said. "Do you understand?"

"Yes. And if you make any yellow scene here, Harry, after I've taken your wife home, I'll come back and settle you. Do you understand? ... For God's sake," he added coldly, "if you've got any breeding, show it now!"

The tense silence between them lasted a full minute. Then, very slowly, Belter turned toward the cloak-room where, just within the door, his wife stood looking at him.

His sanguine features had lost all their colour in the greyish pallour that suddenly aged him. He went toward her; she made the slightest movement of recoil, but faced him calmly.

"I'm sorry," he said in a voice like a whisper. "I am—the fool that you—think me.... I'll—take myself off."

He bowed to her pleasantly, turned and passed Cleland with his hat still in his hand:

"I'm sorry, Jim; I know you're all right; and I'm—all wrong ... all wrong——"

"Come to the studio to-morrow. Will you, Harry?" whispered Cleland.

But Belter shook his head, continuing on his way to the street.

"I'll expect you," added Cleland. "Come about noon!"

The other made no sign that he had heard.

CHAPTER XXVI

Stephanie was awake with the sparrows the next morning, and her face betrayed not a trace of the pallour and fatigue which had made Helen a little anxious when she came into the studio after her interview with Cleland.

"I never had such a sleep in my life!" she announced, sauntering into Helen's room, already bathed and dressed, when at last she heard the latter's bath running. "I feel about sixteen, Helen."

"You look it, dear. What was the matter with you last night? Jim came about nine."

"Did he?" said the girl, turning to conceal a smile. "What did you do to entertain him."

"Talked about you," said Helen, watching her where she stood at the sunny window, absently pleating the sash curtains between idle fingers.

"Was he edified?"

"He seemed to be. When I changed the subject he went away."

Stephanie, at the window, suddenly laughed outright, but her back remained turned.

"Men are funny," she said.

"Women are funnier, Steve."

"What! Are you a traitor to your sex?"

"Sometimes," said Helen, absently. "I feel that my sex betrays me—and a few others of my own mind."

Stephanie turned and looked at her, still laughing:

"Like the Kiltie," she said, "you complain that the rest of the regiment is marching out of step with you."

"There's only a corporal's guard of us in step to the music," smiled Helen.... "You're looking radiant, Steve! I've never seen you as enchanting."

"I feel like enchanting the world—like a sorceress all ready for business.... This is a wonderful day, Helen."

"What are your engagements?"

"Two lessons this morning.... I don't know whether I'll go. Luncheon with Oswald at Tinto's. But it's so stuffy there in June, and the summer garden is so grubby."

"You're not going, then?"

"I don't know. I don't want to hurt his feelings," said the girl, reluctantly.

Helen sat up, flung off the bed clothes, and swung her superb young body out of bed.

"My bath's running over. Sit there and talk, Steve——"

But Stephanie turned to the window, her lips still edged with the same indefinable smile, and gazed at space through the netted squares of sunshine.

Breakfast was served in the studio presently. Helen joined her in bathrobe and slippers, knotting the belt around her waist.

"I'm wonderfully hungry," exclaimed Stephanie.

"It's more than you've been for several weeks, Steve."

Again the girl laughed, not meeting Helen's glance.

"What do you think of marriage?" she inquired presently. "I hope you haven't the very horrid ideas of Harry Belter."

"What are Harry's ideas?"

"He says it's the curse of civilization," said Stephanie, "and the invention of meddlesome and superstitious imbeciles. He says that the impulse toward procreation is mechanical and involuntary, and ought to be considered so without further personal responsibility; and that the State should nourish and educate whatever children were worth saving to replenish the waste, and put the others out of the way."

"Harry," remarked Helen, "talks for talking's sake very often."

"He's quite serious. His ideas are revolting. Never have I known a man who is so savagely an iconoclast as Harry Belter."

Helen smiled.

"Harry is a talker, dear. He doesn't believe a word of it. Harry Belter is, by nature, a fat, happy, witty, clever and very sentimental young man who also is so overwhelmingly selfish that anything which happens to annoy him he considers a cataclysmic catastrophe involving the entire civilized world in ruin!"

"What!"

"Do you wish to know what really is the matter with Harry Belter? Shall I tell you what actually has inspired this noisy iconoclast and moral anarchist with the urge for talking?"

"I'd like to know."

"I'll tell you. Three years ago he married a child of seventeen and started to mould her to suit himself. The only trouble was that she had a mind. She knew what she wanted to do and to be. She could not understand why this was incompatible with being his wife, especially as he had won her by his loudly reiterated advocation of personal liberty and the fundamental necessity for the development of individualism."

"How do you know this?"

"She told me."

"When?"

"Three years ago."

"Who is she, Helen?"

Helen answered pleasantly, looking into the curious grey eyes:

"Her name, on the stage, is Marie Cliff. I have known her a long while and I am very fond of her."

Stephanie, scarlet, winced under her faintly humourous smile.

"They are divorced, then," she managed to say.

"No."

"Why not?"

"She has never given him any cause," said Helen, slowly. "No woman, of her own knowledge, can truly say one word against her character; nor can any man. She merely revolted at the tyranny he attempted, in the guise of affection, of course. She refused to be deprived of the liberty to think and act as she chose. She rejected the worn-out conventions with which he attempted to chain her—this apostle of personal freedom. She cared for her profession—he married her when she was on the stage—and she resolutely insisted on her liberty to continue it.

"The result was a family smash—her return to the stage. And since then she has refused to accept a penny from him and has supported herself by her profession, and, sometimes, by posing for artists.

"And that is the real story of Harry Belter and Marie Cliff. So you can believe as much as you choose of his views on matrimony."

After a flushed and painful silence, Stephanie said:

"Do you believe this to be true?"

"If one woman can judge and understand another, what I have told you is true, Steve. Long ago I won the child's confidence. She told me this quite frankly, and in a manner which makes the truth of it unmistakable.... We have become great friends, this little dancer and I. I don't think I ever knew a simpler nature or a more transparently honest one.... And that is why I was not worried at any little ephemeral romance that might amuse the child with Jim Cleland.... I was too certain of them—both," she added, looking calmly into the grey eyes that winced again and fell under her serene gaze.

"I'm a rotten little beast," said Stephanie.

"You're very feminine."

"Oh, Helen, I'm not. I'm a rotter. I didn't know it was in me. I thought I was above such things——"

"Nobody is, Steve, until they make the effort. High thinking requires more than a natural generosity and sympathy—more than innate sentiment. It is an attainment; and there is none without effort. And effort sometimes hurts."

"I want to speak to that girl when she comes in," said Stephanie. "I never have; I've never noticed her at all. I shall ask her to tea."

Helen laughed:

"She'll be here pretty soon. Of course you're not supposed to know about Harry."

"Of course not. But I'll make amends for my incivility. I was a beast! But—it's confusing—and hard for a girl to understand when a girl like that is so unconventional with one's—one's——"

"Brother?" suggested Helen drily.

"Yes.... I'm terribly ashamed.... Does Jim know?"

"About Harry Belter? No. I don't think anybody does."

"What a sham that man is!" exclaimed Stephanie hotly.

"No. He's a typical man, dear. Some women yield, some resist; that's all. And the man never has the slightest idea that he is tyrannizing. If you tell him that he'll be amazed and furious. He'll point out to you all the love and affection and solicitude and money he's lavished on the object of his adoration; he'll portray for you her obstinacy, her coldness, her shocking ingratitude for benefits received. He really believes himself a martyr.

"Steve, man's idea is still that to the victor belong the spoils. We are the spoils of the chase, dear. His conventions were made to contain us in a sort of game-preserve before capture; cage us after we are made prisoner. His laws fetter us; a misstep ruins us; irregularities never impair him. That is the ancient view; that, still, is the secret view of man; that is his inborn conviction regarding us and himself.... And, very slowly, we are beginning his education."

"I didn't know you felt that way," said Stephanie.

"I do.... But if I were in love"—she laughed gaily—"I'd be inclined to take my chances with this monster I have painted for you."

"You do believe in marriage?"

"What else is there, dear? Harry's piffle means nothing except that a plucky girl has begun his education, and it hurts. I don't know what else there is to take the place of marriage. It's the parties to the contract who don't understand its essence."

"What would you suggest?" inquired Stephanie curiously.

"Education. A girl should be brought up to master some trade or profession. She should support herself by it. She should never go to her husband empty-handed and unable to support herself.

"If, then, under the mutual marriage contract, her earning capacity be necessarily checked by child-birth, and by the later and natural demands of progeny, these alone should temporarily but only in part interrupt her in the exercise of her trade or profession. And he should pay for them.

"But she should have a life work to do; and so should he, no matter how ample their means. Domestic drudgery must be done by others hired for the purpose, or else by themselves, sharing alike. In no other way that I see can marriage remain endurable."

After a silence Stephanie said naïvely:

"I haven't any trade or profession."

"You are a graduate nurse."

"Oh. I forgot. That is comforting!"

"Also you are already married."

The girl looked up in a startled way, as though hearing this information for the first time. Helen gazed gravely into the troubled grey eyes:

"Do you regret it, Steve?"

"I don't know. I haven't had time to think about it."

"It's high time, isn't it?"

"Y-yes.... I've got to do a—a lot of thinking some day, I suppose." She gazed absently into space for a few moments; then again the faintest of smiles curved her lips and she bent her head and remained very still, deep in reflection.

... "Did you wish to speak to Marie Cliff?" asked Helen, breaking the prolonged silence.

The girl looked up, dim-eyed, confused:

"Yes."

"I think she just went into the court-yard."

Stephanie's wool-gathering wits returned; she sprang up and walked swiftly out to the court, where the white horse was just being led in and the pretty dancer stood unpinning her hat.

She turned when Stephanie entered, and the girl went up to her, smilingly, and offered her hand.

"Miss Davis will be here in a few moments," she said. "I thought I'd come and tell you."

"Thank you," said Marie Cliff, curiously.

"Also," said Stephanie, "I wanted to tell you how very lovely you are on that horse. I had a glimpse of you last week, and you were too enchanting! No wonder Helen's study is so exquisite."

The little dancer flushed brightly. Her gloved hand still lay lifelessly in Stephanie's, who had retained it; her childish eyes asked for the reason of this kindness from a girl who had never noticed her.

Then, reading the unuttered question, Stephanie blushed too:

"I'm not much older than you are," she said, "and I'm not nearly as sensible. I've been rude enough to ignore you. Could you forgive me and be friends?"

"Yes," said Marie Cliff.

That was all the explanation offered or asked.

"Will you come to tea at five?"

"I should like to."

"I'd love to have you. And if it doesn't bore you, would you tell me something about your very beautiful profession? You see, stage dancing fascinates me, and I'm taking lessons and I've an inclination to become a professional."

"I'd love to talk about it with you!" said Marie Cliff impulsively. "I'll tell you everything I know about it.... And I do know a little, because I have been on the stage since I was a child."

"You're one now," said Stephanie, laughing, "—an adorable one!" And she bent and kissed the little dancer on the lips.

"I'm glad we're friends," she said. "Don't forget five o'clock."

"N-no," said Marie Cliff unsteadily.

CHAPTER XXVII

At five o'clock that afternoon Cleland, working fiercely on his manuscript toward a climax he had not planned for but which, suddenly but logically developing, threatened with disaster his leading lady and the young gentleman playing opposite, heard a step on the threshold of his open door.

"Hello, Harry!" he said with a friendly but vague wave of his pencil—for he had not stepped quite clear of the story in which he had been living among people never born—"I'd rather given you up. Come in and close the door."

"I couldn't keep away," said Belter hoarsely. He came in and closed the door. He looked even more grey and haggard than he had the night before.

"I expected you this morning," said Cleland, stepping clear of his story now, and looking very soberly at his old school-friend.

"I didn't intend to come at all." He seated himself in the chair indicated. "But I couldn't keep away."

"You look about all in."

"I didn't sleep."

Cleland got up, walked to the ice-box, knocked off a bit of ice with a tack-hammer, and leisurely constructed a highball.

"Here you are, Harry. I can't; I'm working. There are cigars by your elbow, cigarettes, too."

Belter looked vacantly at the iced bracer, then he dropped both elbows on the edge of the desk and took, his drawn face between his hands.

Cleland began to pace the studio. Presently he halted by Belter's chair.

"Hell," he said pleasantly, "cut out the tragedy! It's good enough for my novel, where the poor devils I write about have to do what I make 'em. But you and I are free to do what we choose."

"Yes.... And I've done it.... I've done what I chose. Where has it landed me, Cleland?"

He looked at the frosty glass, pushed it away from him:

"That was a sorry spectacle I made of myself last night. Can you beat that for degradation—a man who has made a damnable failure of marriage, skulking at his wife's heels to snap and snarl at any decent man who is civil to her?"

"Don't talk so bitterly——"

"I'm indulging in a luxury, Cleland—the luxury of truth, of honesty, of straight thinking.... I've been bragging about it, celebrating it, extolling it for years. But I never did any until last night."

"You're rubbing it in pretty hard, Harry. A man is bound to make mistakes——"

"I'm the mistake! I realize it, now—as Verne realized it. That's why he did what he did. You don't, if you are right.... I never supposed I could behave as rottenly as I did last night. But it's been a long strain.... You heard that rotten outbreak of mine concerning women—the night we heard what Verne had done? Well, the strain was showing.... It broke me last night...."

He lifted his head and looked intently at Cleland:

"It was the shock of seeing her in a public place with another man. I had never seen her with any other man. It's nearly three years, now, since I made a damned ass of myself, and she very quietly went her way leaving me to go mine.... And in all that time, Cleland, there has not been a breath of suspicion against her. She has been in the lighter and more frivolous shows almost continuously; but she has lived as straight a life as any woman ever lived.... And I know it.... And I knew it—cur that I was—when I spoke to her as I did, and turned on you like a rotter——"

He extended his hand and took hold of the iced glass, but let it rest there.

"I've lied and lied and lied," he said, "to myself about myself; to others about my estimate of women.... I'm just a four-flusher, Cleland. The best of 'em are better than our stars. The remainder average as well as we do.... Verne got what was coming to him.... And so have I, Cleland—so have I——"

"Wait a moment——"

"Wait?" Belter laughed mirthlessly. "All right. I know how to wait. Waiting is the best thing I do. I've waited for nearly three years before I've told myself the truth. I've told it now, to myself, and to you.... But it's too late to tell it to her."

"Do you think it is?"

Belter looked up in pallid surprise:

"Of course."

"I wonder," mused Cleland.

Belter's sunken gaze had become remote and fixed again. He said, half to himself:

"I couldn't let her alone. I couldn't learn to mind my own business. I'd been bawling aloud my theories for years, Cleland, but I couldn't apply them to her or to myself. I bragged about my mania for personal liberty, for tolerance; I lauded the maxim of 'hands off.' But I couldn't keep my meddling hands off her; I couldn't understand that she had the right to personal liberty—freedom in the pursuit of happiness. No; I tried to head her off, check her, stampede her into the common corral whither all men's wives are supposed to be driven—tried to rope her and throw her and blindfold, hobble and break her to suit myself.... And, Cleland, do you know what happened? I found I had come upon a character, a mind, a personality which would not endure the tyranny we men call domestic affection.... That's what I discovered.... And I did not do the breaking. No; she has accomplished that. And—here I am, to admit it to you.... And I think I'll go, now——"

Cleland walked slowly to the door with him, one arm resting on his shoulder:

"I wish you'd tell her what you've told me, Harry."

"It's too late. She wouldn't care, now."

"Are you very sure?"

"Do you think a man can use a woman the way I have used her, and make her care a straw about what I say to her now?"

Cleland said in a low voice:

"I can't answer you. I don't understand women; I write about them.... I have troubles of my own, too. So I can't advise you, Harry.... Are you still in love with her?"

He said in a dead voice:

"I've always been. It's done things to me. I'll die of it, one day. But that's no argument."

"I don't know. Tell her."

"It's no argument," repeated Belter. "It's purely selfish. That's what I am—purely selfish. I'm thinking of myself. I'm in love with her.... And she's better off without me."

"All the same, I think I'd take a chance. I think I'd tell her. After all, you owe her that much—whatever she may choose to do about it."

"She doesn't care, now."

"Still, you owe it to her. You're not a welcher, you know."

They had reached the foot of the stairs. Helen, coming out of the enclosed court, met them face to face; and they exchanged amiabilities there outside her studio door.

"Come in and have some tea," she said. "Harry, you look ill. Are you? Anyway, a cup of tea won't slay you in your tracks——" fitting her key to the door all the while she was talking—"so come in like two polite young men——"

The door swung open; they entered.

"Oho!" exclaimed Helen; "Steve must be here because the kettle-lamp is lighted. We'll have something to nibble presently, I expect. Find a chair, Harry, and watch that kettle. Jim, show him the cigarettes. I'm going to take off this blouse and I'll be back with Steve in a moment——"

She stopped short: Stephanie and Marie Cliff, coming from the kitchenette, appeared at the further end of the studio, the former bearing a big bowl of strawberries, the latter a tray of little cakes.

Stephanie greeted the newcomers with an airy wave of her hand; Marie Cliff promptly lost her colour; but there was nothing to do except to advance, which she continued doing, moving very close to Stephanie's elbow.

The situation was going to be as awkward as the people involved made it: Cleland, secretly aghast, came forward to relieve Stephanie and Marie of their burdens:

"If there isn't enough food for a party, I'll take Harry and go," he said gaily. "It isn't done—this grasshopper-like invasion of your natural resources."

"Piffle," said Helen, "there's plenty."

Harry Belter, who had been standing in the middle of the floor as though petrified, wrenched himself out of his trance and put his legs in motion. His face was very red: he greeted Stephanie elaborately but mutely; he bowed mutely to his wife.

She had managed to recover her self-control: a deep flush invaded her pallour. Then, under the eyes of them all, very quietly she did a thing which confirmed the admiration and respect of everybody there: she extended her child-like hand to her husband, saying:

"It is nice to see you again, and I'm very sure that there is enough tea for everybody."

Her hand lay in her husband's for an appreciable moment; then he bent over it, lower, to conceal the nervous working of his features—and touched it with trembling lips—something he had never before done in all his life—and passing, by the same token, out of the free and arid desert of his folly, he rested, sub jugum, beside the still waters of eternal truth.

Helen went on toward her room to shed her clay-stained smock; Stephanie investigated the kettle which was approaching the boiling point, and Cleland deposited the provender on a neighbouring table.

"Keep away from them," whispered Stephanie, close beside him—so close that the fragrance of her hair and breath caressed his cheek.

"You darling," he motioned with his lips.

"Oh, dear! Are we on such a footing!" she asked, with a little quick-drawn breath of smiling dismay.

"Why not?" he said under his breath. "You're awake, now."

"Am I?"

"Are you not, dearest?"

"I—had a wonderful sleep last night," she said perversely. "I don't know whether I'm awake or not."

"Oh, Steve!——"

"I don't, I tell you!——" keeping her gaze smilingly averted and very busy with kettle and tea-caddy.... "Where have you been all day?"

"I came down, but you had fled to your lesson. Then I had a date with H. Belter, but he didn't appear until nearly five. It was a strenuous interview."

She lifted her eyes to his, full of interested inquiry.

"Yes," he nodded; "he's found out he's an ass, and he's in love with his wife. If she can stand for him now, after these three years, I think he'll make a better husband than the average."

"She's a dear," murmured Stephanie. "What a painful situation!—but wasn't she dignified and sweet? Oh, I do hope she cares enough for Harry to give him another chance.... Are they amiable together over there? I don't want to turn around."

He cautiously surveyed the scene out of a corner of his eye:

"She's seated beside the piano. It's evident she hasn't asked him to be seated. They are horribly serious. He looks ten years older."

"We must let them alone. Tea is ready, but I sha'n't say so until they move.... What was it you asked me, Jim?—whether I am awake? ... Do you know that I believe I'm stirring in my slumbers because—because, now and then—just for an instant—a stab of contrition goes through and through me. Do you know why? I have a glimmering of guilty misgiving concerning this painful throb of conscience——"

She looked about her, searching among the paraphernalia of the tea tray. "Oh, the deuce! I remember, now, that we're out of lemons! You have some, haven't you?"

"Yes, I'll run up and——"

"I know where they are in your ice box. I'll find them——"

"What nonsense! Wait!——"

She had started already; but swiftly as her light feet sped he overtook her on the stairs; gathered her into his arms, all pink and breathing rapidly:

"Steve—my darling!——"

"I thought you might do this.... I wanted to see——"

"What?"

"Whether it could happen to me again—what I experienced with you——"

There was a silence: her young lips melted against his; lingered; her arms tightened around his neck. And the next instant she had freed herself, hot-cheeked, disconcerted.

"Oh, it, was—quite true——" she stammered, resting against the banisters with one hand pressed tightly over her heart. "My curiosity is satisfied.... Please!—Jim, dear—we ought to behave rationally—oughtn't we?"

But she did not resist when he framed her face between his hands; and she suffered his lips again, and again her slight response and the grey eyes vaguely regarding him shook his self-control.

"Will you try to love me, Steve?"

"I seem to be doing it."

"Is it really love, Steve? Do you truly care for me?"

"Oh, dear, yes!" she said, with a quick-drawn breath which ended in a quiet sigh, scarcely audible. Then a faintly humorous smile dawned in her eyes: "You're changing, Jim. You always were very wonderful to me, but you also were mortal. Now, you're changing; you are putting on a glorious, iridescent immortality before my eyes. I'm quite bewildered—quite dazzled—and my mind isn't very clear—especially when you kiss me——"

"Are you making fun of me?"

"No, I'm not. That's the way with the gods when they start a love affair with a mortal girl. Sometimes she runs, but they always catch her or turn her into a tree or a waterfall or something they can acquire and fence in, and visit like a plot in a cemetery. And if she doesn't run away, then she just falls into a silly trance with her Olympian lover, and somebody comes along and raises the dickens with them both.... And now I'd like to know what's going to happen to me?"

"You're going to try to fall in love with me first."

"Oh. And then?"

"Marry me."

"Oh. And what will old lady Civilization say? I told you somebody would raise the dickens!"

"Who cares?"

"I suppose I wouldn't care if I loved you enough."

"Will you try?"

"Oh, dear." ... She freed herself gracefully, stepped back a stair lower, and leaned on the rail, considering.

"Oh, dear," she repeated under her breath. "What a tangle! ... I don't know why I've let myself—care for you—in your way. I ought to stop it. Could you stand it?" she added naïvely. And the reply in his eyes scared her.

"Oh, this is serious!" she murmured. "We've gotten on much further than I realized.... I remember, when you began to make love to me, I thought it very sweet and boyish of you—to fall in love with your own sister. But I've begun to make love to you, now.... And I ought not to."

"Because you are married?" he asked under his breath.

"Oh, yes. It won't do for me to make advances to you."

"When have you made any advances?"

"I came out here. I wanted you to—kiss me. Oh, this isn't going to do at all. I can see that, now!——" She framed her face in her hands and shook her head. "Jim—dearest, dearest of men—it won't do. I didn't realize that I was caring for you in this way. Why," she added, her grey eyes widening, "it is almost dangerous!"

"The thing to do," he said, reddening, "is to tell Oswald."

"I can't tell him!"

"You've got to, if you fall in love with me."

"Oh, Jim, it would be too heartless! You don't know——"

"No, I don't!" he exclaimed impatiently, "and I think it's time I did! You can't be in love with two men at the same time."

She blushed furiously:

"I—he never even touched my fingers with his lips! And you—you take me into your arms with no more hesitation than if I were a child.... I believe I've behaved like one with you. I'm old enough to be ashamed, and I'm beginning to be."

"Is it because you're married?"

"Yes, it is! I can't let myself go. I can't let myself care for—for what you do—to me. I came out here to give you the chance—ready to learn something—desiring to. I mustn't take any more lessons—from you."

He said:

"I am going to tell Oswald that I care for you, Steve."

To his astonishment, tears flashed in the grey eyes:

"If you do," she said, "it will be like killing something that makes no resistance. It—it's too cruel—like murder. I—I couldn't bring myself——"

"Why? Did you marry him out of pity?"

She bit her lip and stood staring into vacancy, one hand tightening on the stair-rail, the other worrying her lips.

"I tell you," she said slowly, her gaze still remote, "the only thing to do is to do nothing.... Because I'm afraid.... I couldn't bear it. I'd have to think of it all my life and I—I simply couldn't endure it.... You mustn't ask me any more."

"Very well," he said coldly. "And I think we'd better go back to the studio——"

As he passed her he paused, waiting for her to precede him. She turned; her hand fell from the banisters and hung beside her; but the slender fingers groped for his, slipped among them, tightened, drawing him partly toward her; and her left foot moved forward a trifle, blocking his way and bringing them closely confronted.

"I—love you," she faltered. "And I don't know what to do about it."

Crushed into his embrace she did not seem to know any the more what she was going to do about it. Her flushed cheek lay hot against his; her hands moved restlessly on his shoulders; she tried to think—strove to consider, to see what it was that lay before her—what she had to do about this matter of falling in love. But her fast beating heart told her nothing; a listless happiness invaded her; mind and body yielded to the lethargy; thought was an effort, and the burden lay with this wonderful being who held her in his arms—who, once mortal—had assumed the magic of immortality—this youthful god who was once a man—her lover.

"It's got to come right somehow, my darling," he whispered.

"Yes—somehow."

"You'll explain it some day—so that I shall understand how to make it come right."

She did not answer, but her cheek pressed closer against his.

When they entered the studio Helen, seated by the tea table, rose with a gesture of warning:

"That child is in my room and Harry is with her. They were standing together over there by the piano when I came out of my room. I saw at once that she was on the verge of something—she tried to look at me—tried to speak; and Harry didn't even make the effort. So I said, quite casually, 'It is frightfully close in the studio, Marie. But you'll find it cool in my room. Better lie down in there for a moment.' ... They're in there. I don't know what I hope, exactly. She is such a dear.... Where on earth have you two been?"

"On the stairs," said Stephanie. "We started to get something—what was it, Jim? Oh, yes; there's no lemon here——"

"Did you get any?"

"No; we just conversed." She picked up a cake, nibbled it, selected a strawberry and nibbled that, too.

The tea wasn't fresh, but she sipped it, sitting there very silent and preoccupied with now and then a slow side-glance at her lover, who was attempting to make the conversation general.

Helen responded lightly, gaily, maintaining her part in a new and ominous situation which had now become perfectly recognizable to her.

For these two people on either side of her had perfectly betrayed themselves—this silent, flushed girl, still deep under the spell of the master magic of the world—this too talkative, too plausible, too absent-minded young man who ate whatever was handed to him, evidently unaware that he was eating anything, and whose eyes continually reverted to the girl.

The smile on Helen's lips was a little fixed, perhaps, but it was generous and sweet and untroubled. A man sat at her elbow whom she could care for, if she let herself go. A girl sat on the other side who was another man's wife, and who was already in love with this man. But the deep anxiety in Helen's heart was not visible in her smile.

"What about that very tragic pair in my room?" she asked at last. "Shall we clear out and give them the whole place to settle it in? It's getting worse than a problem play——"

She looked up; Oswald Grismer stood on the threshold of the open door.

"Come in!" she said gaily. "I'll give you tea in a few minutes."

Grismer came forward, saluted her with easy grace, greeted Stephanie with that amiable ceremony which discloses closer intimacy, turned to Cleland with that wistful cordiality which never seemed entirely confident.

"Oswald," said Helen, "there's a problem play being staged in my bed-room."

"Marie Cliff and Harry Belter," explained Stephanie in a low voice.

Grismer was visibly astonished.

"That's amusing," he said pleasantly.

"Isn't it?" said Helen. "I don't know whether I'm pleased. She's such a little brick! And Harry has lived as he pleased.... Oh, Lord! Men are queer. People sneer at a problem play, but everybody ever born is cast for some typical problem-play part. And sooner or later, well or badly, they play it."