he numberless tiers of
seats rising above, black with packed, expectant humanity. Before
eight o'clock late comers had been confronted in the lobby with the
"Standing Room Only" announcement; and now even this had been turned to
the wall, while the man at the ticket window shook his head to
disappointed inquirers. And that was an audience to be remembered, to
be held notable, to be editorially commented upon by the press the next
morning.

There was reason for it. A child of Chicago, daughter in a family of
standing and exclusiveness, after winning notable successes in San
Francisco, in London, in New York, had, at last, consented to return
home, and appear for the first time in her native city. Endowed with
rare gifts of interpretation, earnest, sincere, forceful, loving her
work fervently, possessing an attractive presence and natural capacity
for study, she had long since won the appreciation of the critics and
the warm admiration of those who care for the highest in dramatic art.
The reward was assured. Already her home-coming had been heralded
broadcast as an event of consequence to the great city. Her name was
upon the lips of the multitude, and upon the hearts of those who really
care for such things, the devotees of art, of high endeavor, of a stage
worthy the traditions of its past. And in her case, in addition to all
these helpful elements, Society grew suddenly interested and
enthralled. The actress became a fashion, a fad, about which revolved
the courtier and the butterfly. Once, it was remembered, she had been
one of them, one of their own set, and out of the depths of their
little pool they rose clamorously to the surface, imagining, as ever,
that they were the rightful leaders of it all. Thus it came about,
that first night--the stage brilliant, the house a dense mass of mad
enthusiasts, jewelled heads nodding from boxes to parquet in
recognition of friends, opera glasses insolently staring, voices
humming in ceaseless conversation, and, over all, the frantic efforts
of the orchestra to attract attention to itself amid the glitter and
display.

Utterly indifferent to all of it, Ned Winston leaned his elbow on the
brass rail of the first box, and gazed idly about over that sea of
unknown faces. He would have much preferred not being there. To him,
the theatre served merely as a stimulant to unpleasant memory. It was
in this atmosphere that the ghost walked, and those hidden things of
life