et lips
slightly to relax.

"Lane is the merest buffoon," he replied quietly. "You are an artist.
There is no comparison possible, Miss Norvell. The play itself is
utterly unworthy of your talent, yet you succeed in dignifying it in a
way I can never cease to admire."

She stood staring straight at him, her lips parted, apparently so
thoroughly startled by these unexpected words as to be left speechless.

"Why," she managed to articulate at last, her cheeks flushing, "I
supposed you like the others we have had with us--just--just a common
stage hand. You speak with refinement, with meaning."

"Have you not lived sufficiently long in the West to discover that men
of education are occasionally to be found in rough clothing?"

"Oh, yes," doubtfully, her eyes still on his face, "miners, stockmen,
engineers, but scarcely in your present employment."

"Miss Norvell," and Winston straightened up, "possibly I may be
employed here for a reason similar to that which has induced you to
travel with a troupe of barn-stormers."

She shrugged her shoulders, her lips smiling, the seductive dimple
showing in her cheeks.

"And what was that?"

"The ambition of an amateur to attain a foothold upon the professional
stage."

"Who told you so?"

"Mr. Samuel Albrecht was guilty of the suggestion.

"It was extremely nice of him to discuss my motives thus freely with a
stranger. But he told you only a very small portion of the truth. In
my case it was rather the imperative necessity of an amateur to earn
her own living--a deliberate choice between the professional stage and
starvation."

"Without ambition?"

She hesitated slightly, yet there was a depth of respect slumbering
within those gray eyes gazing so directly into her darker ones,
together with a strength she felt.

"Without very much at first, I fear," she confessed, as though
admitting it rather to herself alone, "yet I acknowledge it has since
grown upon me, until I have determined to succeed."

His eyes brightened, the admiration in them unconcealed, his lips
speaking impulsively.

"And what is more, Miss Norvell, you 'll make it."

"Do you truly believe so?" She had already forgotten that the man
before her was a mere stage hand, and her cheeks burned eagerly to the
undoubted sincerity of his utterance. "No one else has ever said that
to me--only the audiences have appeared to care and appreciate.
Albrecht and all those others have scarcely offered me