"Dear me! I'm afraid you've made a mistake, my boy," murmured the old man, innocently. "Letitia thinks that, in the case of daughters, you understand, the mother is in authority—is the head, so to speak—of the family. You—er, you should have spoken to her, but—now——"

"Yes, sir, now?" eagerly repeated Galt.

The old man rose. He held out his hand, which the younger man grasped tightly. "I believe you are an honest man, and since you have the power to care for and protect her I give you my Dorothy, than whom a truer, sweeter, purer girl God never gave to undeserving father or adoring lover!"

The two men stood eye to eye a long moment, then Leslie Galt said, slowly: "Thank you, sir!" dropped Lawton's hand, and, turning, walked rapidly away, leaving the shaken, excited, and confused old man in his gray green tent, trying to straighten things out and prepare himself for the meeting with his Letitia.

CHAPTER XIX

Walking slowly up the steep rise to the porch, he thought he heard high voices, and, opening the door, he stood amazed. Looking up, where at the stair-top German Lena stood, one outstretched hand against the wall, the other on the bannister, both feet braced firm and wide apart, her small blue eyes a-light, a girl on guard! And just beneath her, hair disarranged, face crimson, and eyes snapping, Mrs. Lawton, in high, piercing tones, was spitting and hissing abusive epithets:

"You! how dare you? You German steerage rat! You stupid wooden-headed, wooden-shod thing! How dare you—dare you! In my days of wealth, my housekeeper, my cook, wouldn't have allowed you to care for my pots and pans! My daughter's nothing to you! I can say what I please to her, and say it how I please! How dare you interfere! You shall feel the law for your Dutch insolence! Stand aside, and let me into that room!"

"Nein! nein!" said Lena, savagely. "Nein! I don't stand on my sides! I make by Herr Doctor's orders, und I keep my Miss Lady quiet uf I can!" Then, catching sight of John Lawton, she cried: "Oh, my Herr Mister! is dat you? Oh, you vas velcome as never vas!"

"John Lawton!" cried Mrs. Lawton, at the same time, "if you have one spark of manhood in you, if you even dimly remember your promise to protect and cherish me, you will order this crazy Dutch slattern to the scullery!"

"Letitia! Letitia!" remonstrated the mortified and bewildered man, "come away, I beg of you, and explain quietly what has happened."

But a perfect shriek of rage leapt from the woman's throat: "What has happened? Do you know, that thing there has struck me—me—a lady!"

"Nein! nein!" stoutly protested Lena, "I don't strike nobodys, my Herr Mister! She com' mad by me! for dat—dat doctor mans—ven he have put der sticks und shplinters on der Miss Lady's arm, dat com' got break by der Bergamots man, he com' say dat I must make for der quiet! Und two time he tell me dot! He say she make of der fever rite avay quick uf she com' get excite! und nobody shall com' by her, for much talk! Und I shall vatch until der odder vun, der Miss Sybells com', und take care by her! Und—und—I tell you true now, Herr Boss, he say der mutter downstair seem very hy-strikle like, und not fit to com' by der sickroom! Und den he go und der Frau Mistress, she com' fly in der room, und she com' mad like a vitch! Und she say some tings at my Miss Lady 'how she dare do sometings?' Und my Miss Lady, she com' vite, com' red, und begin shake! Und I say, 'Blease for go!' Und she say, 'Miss Doroty is a God-forsakens simpletons!' und I say vonce more, 'Blease!' und—und den I don't strike, I don't shuf der Frau Mistress, I youst pick her round by der waist, und I histe her out of der room! Und she shmack me on der cheek und try to come by der room again! Und I lock der door, und now I stand here und keep my Miss Lady quiet, youst so long as I have der legs to shtand by! Ja! So!"

The old man's face was a study of pained bewilderment. He slowly ascended the stairs, and taking by the arm the dishevelled creature, in whom it was hard for him to recognize his wife, he said: "Come to your room, Letitia. You will bring upon yourself an attack of nerves if this continues. You need some drops." And the innocently spoken words wrung a cry of rage from the woman, as she recalled how, down-stairs, a few minutes before, William Henry Bulkley had hurled the bottle across the room to the sofa, with the courteous words: "There's your damned old drops! Much good they've done us, haven't they!"

"Come!" continued John. Then, looking back, he added to Lena: "Open Miss Dorothy's door and tell her 'my love' and I'll be with her directly, and will read a little out of Sybbie's play to her while you get tea ready."

"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed Mrs. Lawton. "When you hear of her outrageous conduct it will be a lecture, not Sybil's play, that you will read! Anything, anything but slyness in a girl!"

"Letitia!" The tone rather startled the angry woman. She allowed herself to be led into her room, where John filled the basin with water, added a little cologne, and opened out a fresh towel ready for use. For though Letitia had had no maid for years past, she had not been without trained service. Now, however, she could not put aside her grievance even to lave her burning face. She went on: "Never have I been so—so discredited, so lowered, so belittled! One does not often meet two such hypocrites on the same day! She, with her pretended coyness and shyness! That any child of mine should be capable of such deception, such concealment!"

"My dear! my dear!" interrupted John Lawton, "you are not stopping to consider the force of your words. There has been no deception, no concealment. Our young people have been learning to love each other, wife, and we were too blind to see what was going on."

"W-why! w-why! do you know about it?" surprisedly questioned Mrs. Lawton. "Did Mr. Bulkley tell you, too, before he drove away?"

"Mr. Bulkley?" frowned Lawton, "I don't see what on earth Mr. Bulkley has to do with our affairs. Besides, he has been most unpleasant in his manner toward Leslie Galt."

"It's a pity that we have not followed his example—the young hypocrite! with his suave tone and underhand conduct!"

"No! no!" interrupted Lawton, "there has been nothing underhand in Leslie Galt's conduct. He loves Dorothy; there's no crime in that, surely, and he has come like a man and asked for her, and——"

"And you! Have you presumed to encourage that mere salaried clerk to hope to marry a Lawton? Understand this, if any child of mine ever went to live in a flat, I would not recognize her though she lay upon her death-bed! To be dragged down to poverty by another [the old man winced] is no crime, but to deliberately choose poverty is a vulgarity that is worse than crime! You will forbid this thing at once! What—love? They love each other? Bah! He's got a straight, flat back and good teeth and eyes—will they make up for a shabby wardrobe and no visiting list? Love? Love in poverty is an impossibility! I ought to know by this time!" she sneered, bitterly. "I've had plenty of opportunity for experimenting!" Without noticing the quivering of her husband's chin and mouth, she went on: "She's mad or a fool to throw away money and position for some hole-in-a-corner existence with a good-looking lawyer's clerk!"

"Letitia," broke in her husband very gently, "I don't just know what you mean, my dear, but I suppose you are speaking figuratively of money and position; but if you will let me explain all about young Galt's present standing and his future prospects, I think you will yourself sanction an engagement."

"The prospects of a mere clerk!" she jeered. "What a poor-spirited, broken thing you have become, calmly permitting one daughter to go upon the public stage, and giving the other to the first poverty-stricken applicant that asks for her! No! I'm not speaking figuratively of money and position! They are within her reach, and she shall accept them! She has no right to keep me in poverty, because she prefers it for herself! The time will come when she will thank me for my interference—that is, if she has not driven the man off forever! Perhaps even I may not be able to whistle back a Mr. Bulkley, once he is gone!"

"My God!" the words came in a sort of choking gasp. The man's pale eyes stared at her with a sort of questioning horror. "You do not mean—you can not mean?"

"I mean," recklessly responded the woman, "that with a few smiles and half promises from Dorothy and a little veiled management on my part, her well-ringed fingers might this moment be holding the strings of the Bulkley purse!"

"She must be mad!" interjected the trembling voice of the husband, as if thinking aloud. "It is a charity to believe her mad!"

"Then I'm mad from disappointment and wasted effort. Any opportunity is thrown away upon you! And Sybil hated him and opposed me at every turn! Yet with a little more time my finesse would have brought William Henry Bulkley to the point of marrying Dorothy!"

"Damnation!" cried John Lawton, as he sprang to his feet and stood a hard, breathing moment, holding fast to the corner of the dressing-table for support. His pale eyes shone with the phosphorescent glare of the angry cat. His long fingers opened and closed convulsively. For the first time in all her life, Letitia saw danger in him.

"You—are—an—infamous woman!" The words came slowly and with effort from his tremulous lips. "You have forgotten your motherhood, your womanhood! But you never forget the sweetly spicy savor of the flesh-pots of Egypt! No!" he cried with increasing anger, "nor have you forgotten the nature, the gross brutality, of this man, who has control of the flesh-pots you still dream of! You have not forgotten either the long, slow dying of his faithful wife, whom he crowned with public infamies! And since that time you know, as all people know, he has been one of the mightiest in a very sink of iniquity—know him to be a walking danger to unprotected innocence and a vainglorious 'friend' of fashionable vice! Yet to this immorality add an uncontrollably violent temper, impaired health, and a grandfather's years; and for a few fripperies and gew-gaws, a wrap or two of fur and velvet for the satisfaction of your vanity, you would fling, without a thought of her pure soul's fate—fling the white, sweet body of your innocent child into his foul embrace, relying on the name of wife to cover the iniquity! Dorothy, my little white-souled woman-child, and Bulkley? I—I wonder—I don't kill you, Letitia!"

He advanced toward her so fiercely that she shrank back, crying out in terror: "John! John! don't hurt me!"

"Why not?" he asked, savagely. "Why not? Do you know what you have done for me? You have dragged down the woman I have loved and honored as my wife—down, down to within one step of being a procu——!"

Her sharp scream of shame and terror cut across the hideous word.

"No, I won't hurt you; but oh, God! oh, God! to wake and find the wife you have pillowed on your breast for twenty years is, after all, a stranger to you! That hurts!—yes, that hurts!"

He passed his hand across his eyes, then he said, sternly: "Never bring that man into Dorothy's presence again—I forbid it! Yes, I told you you would make yourself ill!"

But as she lapsed into a faint she was dimly conscious that John was leaving the room. She had gone too far—her slave had rebelled for once. He who always had waited upon her himself in her previous attacks, now called on Lena to attend her and get her to bed, while he went to Dorothy's room and kissed and blessed her and made her very soul sing for joy, because he praised her beloved.

And in the silence, when his cheek rested on her piled-up sunny hair, she did not know of the bitter tears creeping down his face—tears of disapppointment and sorrow, because he had that day learned that the wife he believed to be but frivolous was in truth a personified selfishness.

CHAPTER XX

As Sybil tossed off her street garments and prepared to make Dorothy more comfortable, she said, heedlessly: "No wonder you believe so in your God, when He never fails to save you from danger. Let me put myself behind a vicious, bolting brute of a horse, and the Supreme Power would leave me to the broken neck appropriate to the situation; and a good diamond and a lover saved for—why! why! silly girl! I meant no harm! Did I say something irreverent? Oh, don't you understand? My heart's so full of gratitude for your safety, dear, that my head is turning a bit silly. You would trust Him anyway? Of course you would, you loyal little Christian! I have known your prayers unanswered many a long month, and that you thought the fault was somehow yours. You are one of those wonderful beings who could wring joy out of sorrow, believing that 'whom God loveth, He chasteneth'! I am not saint enough for that, but at this moment my very heart is beating out the triumphant old Doxology, 'Praise God from whom all blessings flow!' because you were not killed yesterday; but are here at home only a little chipped and scratched, and because you have a promised husband and I have a strapping big-promised brother. And I do pray, I honestly do! on my knees, dear! that God will bless you both, and so renew your love each day that it may never grow old. And there's a kiss for you [kissing her on the lips], and here's a kiss for him [kissing Dorothy's cheek], and, ah! you simpleton—you—you boiled beet! Oh, why have you an arm in splints? To blush so idiotically before just me! Oh, what joy it would be to pound you with a pillow! But sit up instead, and let me brush that tangled hair. The idea of poor papa trying to arrange it for the night, and yet his efforts were to be preferred to Lena's. Now, miss, while I am engaged behind you with the brush, you may proceed to explain how it feels to wear a solitaire—such a solitary solitaire! Poor little ringless-fingers girl! And you may also throw some light upon the feelings of a young person who engages herself to be married over her elder sister's head."

But Dorothy had groaned a little from pain, and Sybil silenced her teasing tongue, made Dorothy all orderly and comfortable, cast hemp-seed recklessly before noisy Dick to buy his quiet; and then, seating herself by the bed, was studying Juliet's lines while Dorothy dozed, until awakened by the arrival of a big bunch of flowers and a note.

For several days there seemed to be an odd constraint upon the household. John Lawton, always rather silent, now became fairly dumb. He never entered the sitting-room, but remained out of doors nearly all the time.

Mrs. Lawton looked heavy-eyed and nervous, and evidently greatly missed Dorothy's care and gentle coddling. Lena she had attempted to ignore; but, alas, she depended too utterly upon that sole servitor for food and drink and warmth and order. So she had to content herself with giving commands in a very cold voice, using very large words, and averting her face during their delivery. Her manner during her short visits to the girls' room was one of poorly restrained anger. She had not seen Dorothy alone since her attempted lecture on the day of the accident; and, as John Lawton had never resumed the interrupted subject of the hated engagement, she remained uninformed as to Leslie Galt's bright prospects until that day when, with nerve worthy of respect, he had presented himself before the irate mother of his sweetheart, and, remembering her contemptuous disregard of the famous warning against "Greeks bearing gifts"—knowing, indeed, that she really had no use for Greeks otherwise engaged—he kept some suggestive small packages in evidence as he entered the sitting-room.

And as he brought himself a chair and placed it close to her never-resting "rocker," he recognized in the buzzing swarm of verbal wasps she turned loose upon him the words "disrespectful—unnerved—paralysed—disingenuous—stealthy—infringing—intruding—inveigling," and with failing breath the last warning injunction: "And let me hear no panegyrical eulogy on poverty, if you please, sir!"

Then with a wisdom far beyond his years he retired to the background his lover's raptures, his glowing admiration for her daughter's beauty; and bringing forward the thrilling question of "pounds, shillings, and pence," they soon resolved themselves into a "ways and means committee." And presently Letitia's wasps turned to bees, and the bees began to bear the honey of sweet words.

Then she accepted most graciously these offerings, and bridled and declared she "already felt quite old at the prospect of mothering such a great wicked man!" And when he made the usual complimentary rejoinder, she pronounced him "saucy," and "wondered, if he talked in that fashion to her, what on earth he would not say to Dorothy!" and was full of regret when he insisted upon going out to look for Mr. Lawton. Then up she went to the room above, where Dorothy was holding the play-book in her free hand and giving the cues, while Sybil repeated her lines to see how nearly letter perfect she was.

Both girls exclaimed: "Why, mamma!" Her expression had changed so completely and her walk was so important—quite her old-time society movement. And then as she approached the bed they caught the first glimpse of a long fine chain of exquisite workmanship, strung at intervals of five or six inches with pale pink coral beads that were in turn girdled with a circle of tiny diamonds.

Mrs. Lawton ostentatiously lifted her lorgnon, and again the girls exclaimed: "Why, mamma!" And then, as she stooped over to kiss Dorothy, she remarked, quite patronizingly: "Yes, our Leslie is very generous and thoughtful. He wanted me to have a little memento of your engagement, dear fellow!"

She did not add that the other memento was a large Strasbourg pâté. She kept that fact, like the pâté, to herself.

Some weeks slipped by, and early winter was turning the old white house into a very Franz Joseph Land. "Oh!" cried Dorothy one day, "to think of your having to buy all the coal, Sybil! What stupid things the conventions are! I may accept any extravagant outlay of money in flowers or candy or fruit, but the entire family would be under the grand taboo if I received a ton of coal or a barrel of flour."

"Is the flour out, dear?" quickly asked Sybil, laying down her play-book. "Have you been worrying your poor little head? Don't hide things from me, Dorrie! If I have the money, I love to spend it for home. Of course my salary is small, but, dear heaven! what should we have done without it in this old sieve of a building, where fuel simply melts away, and the grate or stove is always calling out for more? Oh, Dorrie, if I could only make a hit in Juliet! Mr. Thrall would surely raise my salary; yes, in spite of the cost of those costumes that fall upon him, poor man! Are they not a wonderful people—Claire Morrell and Stewart Thrall? Think of the kindness of that woman to me, a nobody! And think of such an actor as Thrall—Stewart Thrall—taking the trouble to teach me the business of Juliet, his very self. Oh, I shall be so frightened! Dorrie, Mr. Roberts has been very patient, going over and over the scenes with me; telling me where I am to stand and where the other people will be, and what they will do, but he never has taught me anything about the actual acting of Juliet. And now to think that I am to be coached at God-mother Van Camp's house by Mr. Thrall in person! I only hope and pray he may not light up as he does sometimes when he is acting, for, if he does, I shall forget my own lines in rapturously listening to him. Do you know, Mr. Roberts is sorry that Mr. Thrall ever undertook the management of a theatre?"

"Why?" asked Dorothy, "he is successful—he must make a great deal of money?"

"That is the very thing poor Mr. Roberts bemoans. He says the artist in him has been suffocated by his commercially won money. He says that Mr. Thrall will himself admit that his acting to-day is not as convincingly true and fine as it was five years ago. Because then he was all enthusiasm, and believed in the dignity and beauty of the art of acting, while to-day he regards it as a means to an end—and that end, money. Poor Mr. Roberts, he seems to know so much about the profession, and yet only plays such small parts. It must be very humiliating. His lip curled so contemptuously when he told me he was going to play the Apothecary. Do you know, Dorrie, I have a suspicion about him, poor man! He always, always smells of cloves, and twice yesterday when he pulled out his handkerchief some cloves fell to the floor, and I said: 'I believe you have a corner on cloves, Mr. Roberts.' And, oh, his poor face turned so red, and I added, hurriedly, 'Don't you think the excessive use of cloves may be injurious to the digestion?' 'Possibly,' he answered, satirically, 'and doubtless still more injurious to the reputation.' I saw his trembling hands; I recalled the watery look his eyes sometimes have; his rapid, almost incoherent speech as opposed to his long silences; and, all at once, I suspected him of drinking."

"Sybil!" exclaimed Dorothy in a shocked voice, "and you have been under his care, and may be again, and he——"

"Has acted like some kind and patient old relative or friend of the family; don't let us forget that. Besides, I may be wrong and ungrateful in suspecting such a thing, but—but it would explain why Mr. Thrall, whom he so admires, only trusts him with such poor, small parts."

Sybil had been nursing her right elbow in her left hand while speaking, and now suddenly exclaimed: "Oh, where's the arnica bottle? I can't bear this last bruise—it's the worst one yet!"

"The bottle is on the wash-stand behind the ewer, but I'm afraid it's nearly empty, for Lena fairly baptized me with it that day of the——"

"Circus?" put in Sybil. "Just look, Dorrie." She pushed up her loose sleeve, and her sister gave a cry of pity at sight of a cruel black bruise on that most sensitive spot—the elbow.

"And your poor shoulder only yesterday?"

"And my poor knees only last week!" ruefully groaned Sybil, tenderly sopping some arnica dregs upon the bruised member.

"Oh, those black knees!" giggled Dorothy, "they looked as if you had knelt in the coal cellar!"

"You heartless little beast!" cried Sybil. "See here, if you laugh at my professional troubles and ensuing physical pains—I'll——"

"You can't pound me," triumphed Dorothy, "my arm is too weak!"

"No, but I can do worse! Lena has fully informed you of the horrors that follow upon 'calling a maid by a married name,' and the certainty that said maid will never have a married name to be called by, so Mrs.—Mrs.——"

"Oh, Syb! Syb! don't!" pleaded the repentant one. "Syb, I'm awfully sorry for your knees—honestly I am! And if I could fall for you, I would—gladly; though how in mercy's name actresses tumble down in faints or in death-scenes, without either breaking their bones or getting laughed at, is more than I can understand."

"Oh, it's the fear of being laughed at that tortures me, Dorrie. I could never, never face an audience again. Why, last summer out at the Soldiers' Home theatre, a woman had to fall in the play and the people fairly screamed with laughter, and a newspaper said that 'Miss —— had not fallen, but had tumbled down in sections.' Ever since I have been studying this part, I have agonized over my fall, and with what result? I've bruised myself from head to foot; shaken mamma's nerves—crumbled the ceiling—frightened papa out of the house at each crash, and"—actually tears were in Sybil's dark eyes—"and I always land in a hunched-up heap that would arouse scornful merriment in the very supers."

"Poor Sybbie!" condoled Dorothy. Then more brightly: "As you can't ask Mr. Thrall or Mr. Roberts to help you, why don't you go over to Brooklyn; make papa take you—Claire Morrell's playing there this week. Ask for just a moment's interview, and make a clean breast of your trouble to her. I'm sure she would help you—she's so kind."

"Oh, I hate to trouble her when she is working so hard; and, besides, I am afraid falling is a thing that can't be taught, Dorothy. But, oh, do you remember her lovely fall in 'Camille'—the ballroom one I mean—all stretched out so long and smooth, and yet falling with a crash that made you nearly leap from your chair? It's a mystery beyond my solving."

"Lena's mash-man told her—Miss Morrell's coachman told him—she was coming over home one day this week, and perhaps——"

Jangle-jangle interrupted the bell at the front door, followed by the peculiarly business-like tread of Lena that ever indicated a suspicion of pedler or tramp, and a shuffling, slippered flight by Mrs. Lawton, who hissed over the banisters: "Say I'm lying down, resting, but will descend—that is, if she has sufficient knowledge of the amenities of social life to ask for me instead of my offspring."

Then as the girls gazed wonderingly at each other Lena appeared, smiling broadly, but somewhat puzzled too, saying: "The big actor voman's com' und ask for der mudder und for der miss ladies. Und I say ja, dey all com' by der house, und blease com' in by der sittin'-rooms, 'cause we didn't ever make of der fire in der parlor. Und she say dat vas right, der parlor never com' like a home, und I com' up to tell. Und she leave all dose visitin' tickets on der hall table. Und I don't know for vy." And she held out five cards, adding, distressedly, "Und von of 'em has a man's name on it. Dat com' by mistake, eh? I take dat back to her?"

"No, no! Lena!" laughed the girls, "that's the card of her husband!"

"Vell, shall I take back of der extra tickets? She com', a nice voman, und it is too bad to have of der tickets vasted?"

"Oh, Lena! do go and tell mamma Miss Morrell is waiting, and leave the cards alone," said Dorothy, "and we will explain about them to you by and by!"

And after Mrs. Lawton had attempted to crush her caller by explaining the "wait" for her descent by the statement that she "hardly expected callers before three," Miss Morrell, with a gracious ignoring of the intended snub that the girls adored her for, proceeded to explain the necessity of calling early or not at all, as she had to return to Brooklyn in time for her play. Whereupon Mrs. Lawton found herself, to her own surprise be it stated, descending from her high horse and eagerly discussing the probabilities of English five-o'clock teas ever becoming really domesticated in America. And presently she went in search of Mr. Lawton (whom she knew to be in the kitchen whittling kindlings for the quick lighting of Lena's fire in the arctic-like morning).

And then Miss Morrell, happening to press Sybil's arm, brought forth a whimper of pain and an exhibition of bruises the cause of which she comprehended in a moment. "Oh, you poor mottled child—what a state you must be in? Have you been falling on the bare floor, then?"

"I've tried to fall on a mattress," confessed Sybil, "but some part of me always flies over on the floor."

Miss Morrell threw back her head and laughed till the tears stood in her eyes. "Then you must let me help you," she said, "it is very, very easy." She was drawing off her gloves as she spoke, and, tossing them to the piano, she stepped toward the centre of the room, saying, "You see, now—" She raised her hands toward her head, and without further preparation, without a warning word, she fell suddenly face downward with a crash that made things jingle on the mantel, and brought two startled screams from the girls and Mr. Lawton rushing to her assistance. That gentleman, bending over to lift her, was stricken helpless by her raising her head and asking, pleasantly: "My skirts are lying all right, aren't they?" Then she added: "Oh, how do you do, Mr. Lawton? Just give me your hand, will you? This dress is a little tight for falling in, and I can't get up." Then, turning to Sybil, she laughed at her astonished face: "I'm afraid you did not catch the trick, did you?"

"Oh!" answered the girl with her hand on her heart, "I never got such a scare in my life! How, oh, how do you do it? Just look at Dorothy! She's quite white."

And it was difficult for the girl to believe that Miss Morrell had not suffered in the least from such a fall.

"Why, it's just a trade secret," laughed the actress. "Some people never fall well because their nerve fails them at the last moment, but all their lives long are content with a sort of jointed fall—they drop on their knees and then forward on their faces. If it is done very quickly it passes, but one never looks graceful, and the immense effect of the crash of the fall is missing. Then, too, an actress who goes down in that manner not only runs the risk of being made fun of, but the bruising over and over again of the same spot may produce a lump with a very ugly and alarming name.

"But here is the whole wonderful secret." She held out her open hands, and both girls saw their palms were slightly reddened. "Always throw out your hand, both of them in beginning; keep your knees nearly stiff, and just topple over like a great tree, but strike on the flats of your open hands. The blow won't hurt them beyond making them sting a little. Your knees, elbows, head, shoulders, are all safe—yet you have fallen with immense force."

Sybil lifted her hands and made a movement as if about to try the trick, but stopped, looking rather frightened.

"No, no—not here!" said Miss Morrell. "Try on your mattress first, and close your eyes when you have marked where you want to strike, and then the distance won't frighten you so. The bolder you get, the less you will extend your hands. It requires nerve, but I'm sure that is a quality you possess, my dear. Besides, you may not play a part requiring a fall for a year or two yet."

And Sybil blushed hotly because she had been so charged to secrecy that she dared not tell even this woman who was so good to her that she was the girl about whom all the newspaper stories were appearing, and that she was being coached for Juliet.

After a few moments of general conversation the caller rose to go, and, while Mr. Lawton stepped to the door to signal the coachman, who had been keeping his horses moving, Mrs. Lawton explained that in former years the "porte cochère of her old home would have made such action needless, but this," waving her hand condemningly, "was not a home, but—er—er a mere shelter."

"Ah!" graciously responded the actress, "but you know there are people who have the gift of carrying the home atmosphere with them even to a—mere shelter."

And Mrs. Lawton really looked very handsome and quite impressive, for she felt she was receiving her due, and all the time Sybil was secretly squeezing the fingers of her friend, and in the hall, while her father gallantly opened the carriage door, she whispered: "I love you so for having helped me! And Dorothy prays for you!"

With quick anxiety in eye and voice the woman questioned: "Why not do it yourself, my child?" But good-byes were being repeated, and with that slight sense of dissatisfaction upon her she had to take her departure.

Then the floodgates of Mrs. Lawton's eloquence were opened, and Dorothy and John Lawton were caught in the swirl of eulogy and reminiscence until suddenly a heavy jar overhead and a rattling of mortar between the partitions was followed by a shrill cry of: "I've done it! I've done it! Dorothy! Papa! Mamma! Come here, quick! quick!"

They all fled up the stairs to find Sybil stretched out on her face on a mattress, kicking her slippers impatiently for their coming: "Look at me!" she cried. "See my skirts—they are just exactly as I fell! I haven't moved an inch!"

John said, slowly: "I-t wasn't an accident, was it, daughter? Are you sure you can do it again?"

"Oh, Sybbie!" cried Dorothy, "do try it once more—only be very careful not to fly over and get bruised!"

And willingly enough up scrambled Sybil, and, standing at the foot of the mattress, she threw up her hands and with closed eyes pitched recklessly forward, and arrived in good order to cries of admiration and wonder from the lookers-on when, suddenly, Lena appeared, saying: "Miss Sybbils, uf you blease, do dose yumps und tumbles in der odder room. Der ceilin's too tender under here, und a chunk com' by der floor down youst now."

And while Mr. and Mrs. Lawton went below to measure the disaster, Sybil threw her arm about Dorothy's waist, crying: "Oh, won't Mr. Thrall be surprised and delighted with me when he finds I can make a real Morrell fall!"

Then to the tune of "Take back the heart that thou gavest!" she burst into singing:

Take back the bottle thou gavest
What are my bruised knees to thee!

and tossed the arnica bottle at Dorothy, and renewed her everlasting study of Juliet.

CHAPTER XXI

Stewart Thrall knew perfectly what drudgery coaching meant, and perversely told himself, up to the very last moment, that he should send, in a day or two, to-morrow, next day, for "Mother Mordaunt" (whose home was irreverently termed "The Hatchery," because of the numbers of amateurs she ever had in training there), and place the Crown Princess in her hands, "for drill, tuition, and discipline," and with insidious self-deception he went so far as to write a note to summon her. Then he caught at the word "drill" to hang his changed opinion on. He did not want her "drilled" out of all the bright spontaneity that was in her now; and, come to think of it, all Mrs. Mordaunt's pupils were trained to the same pattern—they were merely weak copies of herself. He believed, after all, he would undertake the task himself, and he tore to bits the note summoning Mrs. Mordaunt, and wrote instead that line to Sybil, which had caused her so much surprised gratitude, and then remarked casually to Jim Roberts, who sat in the private office with him and carefully polished the metalled gauntlets that belonged to a coat of mail: "I don't know but what young Fitzallen is too inexperienced to do Romeo with a green-girl Juliet. It's rather too great a risk. Maybe I had better go on for it myself, though I suppose I'll scarcely look the part now, even in some new and youthful toggery?"

Roberts looked up from his task, with a queer expression of blended admiration and anger on his face, and answered: "You'll look the part all right, just as well as you ever did, but—what's the use of trying to deceive yourself, for you wouldn't condescend to try to deceive me surely. You know well enough that as long ago as when you telegraphed me to bring Miss Lawton back from the West you had already decided to play Romeo to her Juliet, and I knew it as well as you did, so what's the use?"

"Indeed! Why, you are becoming clairvoyant! Isn't that what they call the fellow who lies about seeing things that have never occurred? Jim, you're off your base!"

"Easy, Thrall!" answered Roberts, in a low tone. "A sneer more or less doesn't matter much, but we will draw the line at 'lying!' And if I'm off my base no one knows why better than you do!"

With a muttered oath Thrall left the room, but he took the note that summoned Sybil and mailed it himself.

They had worked hard and long in the old-timey drawing-room, for only the very last rehearsals were to be held upon the stage with the full company. Sybil had rehearsed until her head ached, her throat throbbed, and her lips were dry and parched. High-spirited, restless, quick-tempered, she forced herself to docility, and patiently repeated, went back, and began over, bore criticisms with hard-won meekness, and when she received an approving word her tired lips curled into the lovely smile that thrilled her teacher's nerves.

Then her patience, her determination to succeed, her passionate desire to understand the part, added to her keen appreciation of the beauty of the language, all appealed to the artist in him; while her attitude of reverent admiration toward himself touched even while it humiliated him, in that he knew he was not worthy of such reverence. Yet, in some strange way, he seemed to see in her the reincarnation of his own youthful sincerity, passionate ambition, and eager, loving labor, before the testing fires of life had found so much dross in him; and, with a great wave of tenderness swelling in his heart, he vowed she should not "lose the way," as he had done; that her dainty imaginings, her original ideas, should not be frightened back by sneer or sarcasm; and that her reverent love for the mighty playwright of the ages should not be ridiculed or "guyed" into a mere question of which of his plays had the most money in it.

She had the fire, the magnetism, the imaginative power of the artistic temperament, and, in guarding her from the banalities and the cheap cynicisms that are so deadly in their effect upon the enthusiastic young beginner, he somehow felt as if he were making reparation for the wrong he had done that younger self, who had hoped for fame, but had been given notoriety instead.

Nor was that the last excuse Thrall found for his willing work in training this young actress. The manager, the money-getter in him, was appealed to also. More and more plainly he saw in this young gentlewoman of the unusual beauty, whose very imperfections were just enough to humanize, to attract, the public—not to repel and chill as absolutely statuesque perfection has a way of doing, a "card" of great value. More and more surely he knew that there was "money in her," and he meant that every dollar she could be made to draw should roll safely into the box-office drawer. And so he told himself that in order to discount the dulled edge of a curiosity gratified she must be taught really to act—to act well. For that was what they would have to rely upon at the last—beauty and acting combined, when the drawing power of mere novelty was exhausted. Therefore, it was simply good, sound, business tactics to train and explain and repeat—repeat—repeat! and to be very stern sometimes, because a drooping figure and a white, tired face made him long so to gather the weary young body into his arms and whisper: "Rest! poor little queen to be! rest!"

All these reasons for coaching Sybil himself, instead of engaging Mrs. Mordaunt to do it for him, he acknowledged, and if there was yet another one, he ignored its existence until that morning when the first performance was but one week off.

Leslie Galt, the grave young lover of Dorothy, had from the first found a friend in Sybil, and she had been a willing screen for hardly secured hand-pressures at sundry partings; had made swift and fairly reasonable excuses for brief, but to Mrs. Lawton unaccountable, absences from porch or parlor; had given many a vital hint, that he had followed to his profit, and, in consequence, he had fallen into the habit of depending upon her sisterly advice in his love-affairs. "When in doubt, consult your Sybil!" was his way of describing the situation; and on that morning, being in doubt, he had appeared at Mrs. Van Camp's and had sought an interview before work began.

After greetings and a few commonplaces had been exchanged, a slight pause was broken by Sybil saying, briskly: "Brother-to-be! you are evidently on the anxious seat about something, so rise up like a little man and tell me all about what brought you there! Do you know [she cocked her head to one side in a ludicrous imitation of old Poll], you look like a young person who, having gone and done something he is half sorry for, is now in search of a friend who will brace him up and tell him how wondrous wise he has been?"

Galt laughed rather nervously, rather flatly, and a dismal "Ha! ha!" came in quick response from beneath the sofa.

"There!" the speaker went on; "did you hear that? There's the same clear, mirthful ring in that laugh that yours had just now—so hearty!"

He threatened the girl with the walking-stick he was rolling restlessly across his knee. "Upon my word," he said, "you are wonderfully well named. I believe you are a true descendant of the mighty Cumæan Sybil of old, whose peculiar business methods worried Tarquin of Rome—just as you will in all probability worry Mr. Thrall! Sybil, do you see what that wretched bird is about? He is cutting the buckle off your slipper."

"Go away!" exclaimed she, pushing the ancient torment from her.

"Scratch poor Poll!" hoarsely suggested the bird, cocking his head to one side in just the manner she had been imitating a moment before.

"I won't!" she refused. "I scratched your treacherous old head for half an hour, and had to trim my nails for my trouble! Go away, Poll! Oh, Leslie! take him off, he's getting cross, and he'll bite my skirt full of holes if you don't!"

And, after some little manœuvring, the green tyrant was induced to clamber laboriously and profanely on to the stick, and was thus carried to Mrs. Van Camp, who cried: "Come to his mamma, then, and stop his naughty damning! and let dear mamma scratch Poll's pretty head!" adding aside to Galt: "It's so odd, he always speaks so much more distinctly when he swears. Just hear how plainly he is damning me now, yet words that I have been trying with all possible care to teach him he gives in such guttural tones that only a loving ear can comprehend them."

"Yes," replied the young man, "it's probably an inherited preference, since it is common to all parrots. Sailors have told me that even the females—who do not talk, you know, save in the exceptional case that makes the rule—even they are capable of saying 'hell!' with apparent appreciation, though they never learn another word."

"Dear me, how interesting!" smiled Mrs. Van Camp, who then sweetly asked: "Are you, by any chance, concerned in the establishment of Sunday-schools in your river town?"

Amid general laughter Leslie returned to Sybil, who gurgled: "Oh, dear boy; never again try to poke fun at my god-mother! But now that Poll has gone, what is the matter?"

"Just this: day after to-morrow is Dorothy's birthday, and——"

"Oh!" murmured Sybil, and drew nearer with brightening eyes. "You want to get a present for her. Well?"

"I've already got it," said Galt, anxiously, "and now I'm wondering what she will think of it. May I show it to you, and will you tell me honestly whether I should offer it or get something else?"

She nodded her head, and first he drew from his coat-pocket a cabinet photograph of Mrs. Lawton, which he returned, thanking her for its, to her, mysterious loan. Then he took from its tissue wrapping a locket.

"Oh, how pretty!" cried Sybil. "A 'D' in pearls on one side, and on the other"—she gave him a roguish glance of understanding—"a violet in enamel!"

But his face kept its unsmiling, anxious look. "Open it," he said.

"Is there a picture, Leslie? Oh, I am glad! An empty locket always seems such an absurdity. Oh!" For two pictures were within. She gave a startled glance, and continued, "Mamma! Such a good likeness, too, and—" a pause, and, in a lower tone, she added, "and your mother!" For, looking at that fair-haired, gentle-faced woman, one saw at a glance from whom Galt had obtained his steady gray eyes.

"You don't think Dorothy will misunderstand, do you?" he asked. "Yet it has just occurred to me that some people shrink from reminders of, of— Sybil, there is just that one cloud upon my perfect joy that my beloved mother cannot know and love my promised wife!"

Raising big, tear-brimmed eyes to his face she said, gently: "Very likely Dorrie will tell you that she can, for her faith is absolutely boundless."

"God bless her!" whispered Galt.

"Amen! to that," answered her sister. "Leslie," she went on, "your gift is an inspiration! I did not know a man was capable of such delightful sentiment. And Dorothy will be touched to the heart by your pathetic little effort to share your happiness with the dear mother who is absent."

His face cleared. "Thank you!" he said. "I see no one wears lockets at the throat now, so I got this to suspend it from." He rose to bring from his pocket a box. The bell rang, but they did not notice it, and the man going to the door in his ancient and wonderfully cut mulberry livery for once failed to wring surreptitious laughter from the young visitor. The box held a heavy chain bracelet of gold.

"Goodness!" cried Sybil, "don't put that on Dorrie's left arm, or you will break it again!" Then, as he slipped the gifts back into his pocket, she said: "Leslie, dear, they are beautiful! Dorothy will be delighted, and I love you because you are so good to her!" She took his face between her hands, and, reaching up, kissed his cheek, and Stewart Thrall, unannounced, entering the front room, saw her, and stood stock still, while a sick qualm of jealousy drained the color from his face and turned his hands to ice.

Then, like one cruelly wounded by a treachery, he recalled, with fierce anger, those seemingly honest words, "I never had a lover in my life!" and, out of a momentary darkness about him, came the clear voice of Sybil, saying: "You are not looking well this morning, Mr. Thrall."

Being coldly assured he was quite as well as usual, she went on: "Let me introduce Mr. Galt, of whom I am very proud, because I never had a brother until Dorothy presented me with this one."

The sudden lighting of the new-comer's face, was startling as he turned his brilliant eyes on Galt and crushed his hand in hearty greeting. "Let me offer congratulations," he smiled. "Indeed, you should be doubly congratulated, your position is so much more secure and agreeable as a brother to this young lady than it would have been had she 'been a sister to you.'"

"Oh!" laughed Sybil, "he never gave me a chance to make him that offer! There's no flitting from flower to flower about a Galt! They may be a bit cool and hard, but they are true!"

Thrall winced at the unconscious thrust. She slipped her hand under Leslie's arm, and, giving it a little squeeze, added: "You see, I've been studying up your family records along with those of the Montagues and Capulets."

After a few courteous words the men saluted, and Sybil went on out into the hall with Leslie, to give some final message for Dorothy before saying good-by.

And Thrall walked to a window and leaned his head against the cool glass. He closed his eyes and muttered to himself: "Good God! Good God!" and yet again, in utter helplessness, "Good God!" He recalled that sick jealousy, the almost insensate rage, that had possessed him at the sight of that innocent caress, and said to himself: "It is useless to deny it longer, I love that child blindly, stupidly, senselessly!" Then he lifted his head quickly, indignantly saying: "No! no! that would mean infatuation—the besotting, mere physical attraction, that men who are not Galts yield to, and repent of so swiftly! No! In her, I love the dear ideal I sought and dreamed of in young manhood. It is the purity, the joyous spirit, the high ambition, the unawakened power of loving, and the beauty—the sullen, smiling, changing beauty—that charms, holds, and fascinates me! Oh, yes! I love her—no doubt left of that. And principally because she has no right in it at all she is becoming the ruling factor of my life. I knew the danger to myself of this daily close companionship; yet that being the devil's plan and he my honored master, I pretended doubt of Mordaunt's skill, and took the task of training into my own hands. And now—well, self-deception being over, I must trust to my powers of dissembling to hide from her the longing love that may only speak through lips dead three hundred years ago. Ah, Will! sweet Will Shakspere! you were ever a warm lover; but, depend upon it, your glowing words will not be the cooler from my delivery of them!"

He laughed at his own fancy, and Sybil, returning, said: "I'm glad to hear that laugh, Mr. Thrall; for positively, when I saw you first, I thought you looked almost ill. And, see how unconsciously selfish one can be, I was quite aware of a fleeting regret for a lost rehearsal, when my better self came forward in sympathy for you! But you will observe that I thought of my own interests first. Humanity must be very disappointing to its Creator! What on earth is the matter with god-mamma?"

Mrs. Van Camp, with ringed hands high in air, was summoning them both to come to the extension-room, from whence she distantly chaperoned all their many and prolonged rehearsals. "Come! come quickly!" she cried. "You, neither of you, really appreciate him! And you will doubt my assertions unless you hear him your own selves! Hush! hush!" She lifted a warning finger, and they drew cautiously near to the big sun-flooded window, where, on his perch, standing on one foot, the other curled up into a bluish gray ball, stood Poll, his head on one side, a white film drawn over his vicious old eye, while, in a rasping voice, he said, over and over again: "'Omeo! 'Omeo!"

"Is he not wonderful?" whispered his adoring mistress.

"Why? what?" began Thrall.

But Sybil shook her head warningly, and even while Mrs. Van Camp's eyes flashed ominously at him he understood, and exclaimed, in tones of amazed admiration: "If he is not calling Romeo, I'm a sinner!"

"'Omeo! 'Omeo!" rasped Poll, and Mrs. Van Camp, unable to restrain herself longer, clasped him to her bosom, whereupon he yelled and swore and screeched, and swallowed two buttons from the front of her gown.

"Perhaps they will kill him?" hopefully whispered Thrall.

"Not a bit of it!" laughed Sybil; "they do him good! He has bolted nearly half a string of beads for me since I've been here! Oh, is he not awful?"

Mrs. Van Camp was finally forced to put him in his cage for punishment, and to quiet him a blanket was being wrapped about the top, when suddenly, with surprising distinctness, he croaked "Dead! dead!" then "'Omeo! 'Omeo!" again. And Mrs. Van Camp, with emotion, pressed Thrall's hands and kissed Sybil, and blessed them for their long rehearsals, that were ending in instructing her dear, dear Polly! And the pair writhed in a very anguish of suppressed mirth, until Mrs. Van Camp went back to her embroidery, and their laughter in the drawing-room could be laid to the account of "acting."

Next day Sybil had been presented to the company, on the stage of the Globe. She was being announced as an amateur, and people were filled with wonder that a young girl could pass from the drawing-room directly to the stage. But her first scene was not over before some knowing smiles and glances were being exchanged, and one of the actresses was saying: "Amateur—drawing-room? Well, she is from the drawing-room, no doubt of that; but she has halted at some other theatre before reaching this one, for she is no amateur!"

"Oh, I don't know!" argued the "old woman," who was, of course, cast for the Nurse. "I find her quite novicey in the 'business' of our scenes."

"That may be," replied the other speaker, a blonde person, referred to by Roberts as "that devil divorcée!" the first term alluding to her malicious temper, the second to the scandalous divorce that preceded her appearance in New York. "It may be that she is not familiar with the 'business' of Juliet, but did you see her awhile ago looking for her boa? The carpenter told her it was hanging across a chair on the 'o. p.' side, and she crossed over instantly to get it? To an amateur the 'o. p.' side would have been Greek. And when something was said about 'the borders,' did you see how quickly she looked up at them? Amateur? Call up the marines to listen to that yarn, but I was not born yesterday!"

"No, dear!" pleasantly acquiesced the other. "No one who has seen you would make such a charge, I'm sure!"

"Oh, don't be too clever, for your own good! You shouldn't waste such brilliant bon-mots on a mere actress!"

"Merest mere!" interrupted a voice from behind her. "Don't glare so, you'll spoil your beautiful expression. Good Lord!"

For the angry face had suddenly wreathed itself in smiles, and the divorcée advanced with outstretched hand to meet Sybil, who, the scene being over, was hesitating which way to turn.

"Come and sit here by me," she cooed. "Does your throat get dry from long speaking? Mine does." And she offered a beautiful little bonbonnière, saying, "Try these French paste troches, they are delicious."

And the actor, Joseph Grant, who detested her, said, aside to old Mrs. Elmer: "Do you see that? Manice is not getting ready to pump, is she? She'll know that pretty girl's history clear from the very day of her birth before the next act is set."

"Not if Stewart Thrall is as clever as I think he is. There!" chuckled the old woman. "What did I tell you? Oh, do look at Manice's face!"

For Mr. Thrall had suddenly called out, seeing who was talking to her: "Miss Lawton! Here I am in the parquet. Your aunt would like to speak to you during this wait!"

And no one guessed that the white-haired, upright old person attending Sybil, as watchful chaperon, was really only Mrs. Van Camp's ancient maid, who, at the instigation of Thrall, had been commanded thus to masquerade. And the papers duly noted: "That the young society bud, who had abandoned all social delights for love of art, had arrived promptly at the stage-door, an aristocratic, white-haired lady—a relative—accompanying her, and waiting patiently during the entire rehearsal, thus disposing of the rumor that her family was bitterly opposing the step she was taking."

Truly Thrall was pulling the wires, even the very little wires, for small people must be made to dance as well as great ones, if your ballroom is to present a really animated appearance.

Miss Cora Manice was not in the bill, and her unnecessary presence at rehearsals met with such frowning disapproval from Thrall that she withdrew, but with a furious face that fully presaged, to those who understood, the tempest that burst later on, in that private office, whose secret, shade-hung door was never used.

The other members of the company were wholly indifferent as to whether the interloper sank or swam. Jim Roberts stood afar off, and watched with burning, eager eyes every movement the young girl made, and his swift anticipation of her slightest wish soon attracted attention and comment; and one day some fellow said: "I believe Jim's gone back on Thrall, at last, and has taken a new master."

"No," replied Joseph Grant, "you mean a new mistress!" and this exquisite joke almost strangled maker and hearer with laughter.

The rehearsals were almost over. Scenery and properties took up much time, and made them very wearying, but there was a delightful break when Thrall made coffee in his office, and with Margaret, the ancient maid, doing propriety, in the corner, he served his "queen to be" with all the skill of a French waiter, and all the tenderness of a mother, while, with a hearty girl's appetite, she disposed of dainty sandwiches, coffee, and fruit—save on that one day when she ran out and gave every blessed sandwich there was to a poor waif whom she saw from the window.

"Why did you not give him money?" Thrall asked.

"I had none," she frankly answered.

"You should have told me, then I would have given him something for you."

She frowned a bit, and answered: "He would not have dared enter any place about here, and I could not put him to the torture of waiting—forgive me!"

And one day—one threatening day, when gas was burning everywhere, so dark it was—Thrall told himself he could do no more for this creature who had grown so precious in his secret sight. Only one thing troubled his artistic sense: Sybil's Juliet was a trifle too frank—too boyishly honest in her love. The soft confusion, the flushing cheek and drooping eye, that sweetly contradict the open plainness of her speech, were missing. He knew why it was so; and when the artist in him asked if he would have it otherwise, the man, recalling that sick qualm of jealousy, answered: No! no!

Rehearsal being over, Sybil had sent old Margaret home in the carriage that Thrall had hired for them, and had herself turned downtown a few blocks, and had then gone across to a little shop, where stage shoes were to be tried on.

"I'm afraid Mrs. Van Camp will be angry if I leave you, Miss Sybil," the woman had protested. "There's an awful storm coming up, too!"

"Nonsense!" said the girl, who even then had to hold her hat on with both hands, so high was the wind. "Go on, god-mother needs you at once! I'll be home in no time, but I can't leave those shoes another day. Suppose they should be wrong in some way? By-by!" and, laughing, she faced the tearing wind.

Coming from the shop she felt the rain begin to fall. She fairly flew along the streets. Two cars passed without heeding her signal. What should she do? The theatre? She had a right to seek shelter there, surely, and that way she rushed. A sign came hurling through the air! She screamed, and the next moment dashed, damp, chill, dishevelled, into the vestibule.

At the bang of the great door young Barney, pale under the box-office gas-light, raised his head and looked through the little window, trying to see who was outside, but the darkness was almost that of night, and Sybil, catching her breath in gasps, said: "I beg your pardon, Mr. Barney, I—I have just run in here for shelter—it's awful outside! Don't you know me? I'm Miss—Miss—" She stopped, in confusion. A tall man was stooping to peer out over Barney's shoulder. Those well-shaped, amazingly brilliant eyes were unmistakable. Then a voice of incredulity, of pleased incredulity, was saying: "It's not Miss Lawton, alone in this fearful storm, surely?"

The door was pulled open, and through the out-streaming light came Stewart Thrall. His overcoat over one arm, and a closely furled umbrella in the hand, whose finger and thumb also held an unlit cigar, told plainly that he was just leaving, that had she been one single moment later she would have found only Barney in the theatre.

Only one moment, but, oh, there are single moments full, replete, and pregnant with possibilities—moments that may bring forth results dire and strange! William Henry Bulkley's one moment had been sufficient for the mad runaway of the big chestnut, and things more terrible than horses may fiercely break away from all restraint in equally brief time.

But Sybil, shaken, breathless, and embarrassed in the dusk, made, unconsciously, a mental, never-to-be-forgotten portrait of Stewart Thrall standing in that informing stream of light—handsome, debonair, stately of height, and graceful of bearing, and on his face that eager look that made it strangely young.

He held his hand out: "Miss Lawton, is it really you? Why—good heaven, you are wet and cold!" The wind rattled windows, doors, and signs so that she could scarcely hear his words; but the warm pressure of his clasping hand was comforting to her. "Where is your carriage? eh? I can't hear you!"

Something, probably a billboard, fell with a crash against the door, and the girl gave a violent start of terror. Suddenly Thrall turned, still holding her hand fast. He cast his coat, umbrella, and cigar into the office, saying sharply to Barney: "I'm not here—to anyone! You understand?"

Barney looked up inquiringly. Their eyes met fully, and Thrall repeated: "Not to anyone!" And, closing the box-office door, he felt for the baize ones leading to the auditorium, pushed one leaf open and entered, drawing Sybil after him by the hand. As it closed he reached up and softly pushed the bolt.

Outside, in the office, Barney stared stupidly, then began a double shuffle, chuckling to himself: "Oh, wait till Manice gets on to this! But one of these days the governor will stand up to her, and then she'll get a pointer on temper that will astonish her, I guess! He's too easy! I wish he'd chuck her out of the company—spiteful, bleached cat!" Undoubtedly a very vulgar-minded boy was Barney.

Inside the red baize doors Sybil was amazed to find almost perfect silence. The auditorium, being in the very middle of the building, was cut off from outer sounds. Even the wild shriek of the wind was greatly softened. The darkness seemed at first complete, but the accustomed eye could see a faint grayness at the stage end opposite them.

A row of open French boxes extended across the back of the lower circle. Thrall laid his hat in a chair in one of them as he passed, and still leading Sybil, said, in a cheerful, matter-of-course tone, intended to quiet any possible uneasiness of mind: "This way, Miss Lawton! Don't be afraid, there are no steps. The register is right in this corner, and there is at least enough heat on to dry your damp clothing. It would be a pretty serious thing, my young lady, for you to catch cold at this late hour. There, you can feel a little hot air, can't you?"

The building now fairly trembled under the force of the gale, and Thrall, with a tightening of his fingers on hers, asked, reproachfully: "In God's name, child, what induced you to face a storm like this? Tell me."

But in that warm, dark silence words would not come easily. She murmured something about "god-mamma's needing Margaret's services," paused, added a confused assurance that her "stage shoes had proved satisfactory," and became mute.

The empty auditorium was vast, the white linen hangings, draping boxes and dress-circle, were mysterious as the swaying mosses of a Southern swamp. A sense of isolation came upon her, of distance from the world. She did not seem to think consecutively, but in broken, fragmentary, foolish bits. She wondered why Mr. Thrall was so silent. Was it because—. She wondered if her dress was drying all around evenly—if her boots would spoil from the heat—her mother had thought them expensive, and—and how many nerves and pulses did one girl carry about with her? And why need they all quiver and beat at the same time?

She drew her hand gently from Thrall's, but he took up the other that was still in a wet and clammy glove. Silently, deftly unbuttoning and peeling it off, he softly chafed the little member. Sybil drew a long, slow breath—what was it that troubled her?

The darkness seemed to hide something—secret, sweet! A strange, evanescent perfume seemed to have been left out there by beauty, wealth, and fashion! In the mingling odors of rice-powder, orris, violet, and fine tobacco in the close warm air there was a sensuous suggestion of eyes and smiles, of whispers and pressed hands! The potent perfume of human love was all about her! She moved restlessly. "I—the heat! my head!" she whispered, and drew away from him.

He put his foot out and closed the register. "I—I must go now," she slowly added, when there came a sound—a steady, loud sort of even roar, and Thrall knew a very deluge of icy rain must be descending upon the city to be heard so plainly there.

"Go?" he queried, gently. "Go? Why, my child, you could not stand on your feet a moment—the gale would dash you to the earth. Stay here, where you are safe."

The silence closed about them again, yet she vaguely felt there was no calm in it—it seemed only dormant. Then dimly it came to her to ask Mr. Thrall to let her go to the box-office to wait, when suddenly the building shook as a toy house might have done, and there came a deafening, rumbling crash above their very heads, it seemed, though truly it was a chimney falling above the stage roof, and Sybil's one wild scream of terror was smothered on Thrall's breast!

"Don't, don't, my—!" he whispered, hoarsely, holding her trembling hand to his lips and covering it with kisses. "Don't shiver so! 'Twas nothing! You are quite safe—quite safe! Sybil—Princess! I'd shelter you in my arms, and guard you with my life—always! if I might! if I might!"

His arms were about her. The dull roar of the rain was like the roaring from a distant world—they were alone—utterly alone—in the dimness warm and fragrant. She was all unstrung and weak from fright. His words seemed half real, half dreamed. She raised her head—she put two impotent little hands against his breast.

"Please!" she gasped. "I am not frightened now! I—" A strange lassitude was upon her. A door somewhere banged heavily—she shivered as at a blow! Her head sank back upon his breast. He bent over her, his face all passion-pale, his heavy, drooping lids betraying their girl-like length of lashes.

"Sybil!" he breathed.

Her eyes, wide and startled, met his. "Sybil!" he entreated. "Sweetheart!" His lips met hers in one long, tender kiss, and the house rocked in the fury of the gale!