h me, he
shall never know of your letters or of your visit to me in his behalf.

"With many thanks for your kindly expressions of good-will toward me, I
am

"Very truly yours,

"VALERIE WEST."

She had been too tired to call at Querida's studio, too tired even to
take tea at the Plaza with Neville.

Rita came in, silent and out of spirits, and replied in monosyllables to
Valerie's inquiries.

It finally transpired that Sam Ogilvy and Harry Annan had been
tormenting John Burleson after their own fashion until their inanity
had exasperated her and she expressed herself freely to everybody
concerned.

"It makes me very angry," she said, "to have a lot of brainless people
believe that John Burleson is stupid. He isn't; he is merely a trifle
literal, and far too intelligent to see any humour in the silly capers
Sam and Harry cut."

Valerie, who was feeling better, sipped her tea and nibbled her toast,
much amused at Rita's championship of the big sculptor.

"John is a dear," she said, "but even his most enthusiastic partisans
could hardly characterise him as a humorist."

"He's not a clown--if that's what you mean," said Rita shortly.

"But, Rita, he _isn't_ humorous, you know."

"He _is_. He has a sense of humour perfectly intelligible to those who
understand it."

"Do you, dear?"

"Certainly ... And I always have understood it."

"Oh, what kind of occult humour is it?"

"It is a quiet, cultivated, dignified sense of humour not uncommon in
New England, and not understood in New York."

Valerie nibbled her toast, secretly amused. Burleson was from
Massachusetts. Rita was the daughter of a Massachusetts clergyman. No
doubt they were fitted to understand each other.

It occurred to her, too, that John Burleson and Rita Tevis had always
been on a friendly footing rather quieter and more serious than the
usual gay and irresponsible relations maintained between two people
under similar circumstances.

Sometimes she had noticed that when affairs became too frivolous and
the scintillation of wit and epigram too rapid and continuous, John
Burleson and Rita were very apt to edge out of the circle as though for
mutual protection.

"You're not posing for John, are you, Rita?" she asked.

"No. He has a bad cold, and I stopped in to see that he wore a red
flannel bandage around his throat. A sculptor's work is so dreadfully
wet and sloppy, and his throat has always been very delicate."

"Do you mean to say