first time I came up against the disillusions of life.
Nothing but a little sweetened water. The next nickel went for peanuts,
and they were too stale for even a kid to chew."

"Ain't that just like a young one at the circus!" Mrs. Gallito laughed
loudly.

"What's the joke, mom?" drawled a lazy, sliding, soft voice on the
other side of her.

"A circus story, honey. Oh!" as the sudden formal silence recalled her
to her duty. "I forget. You two ain't been introduced, have you? Pearl,
make you acquainted with Mr. Hanson. He's in the show business."

Pearl bowed without lifting her eyes, giving Hanson ample opportunity to
note the incredible length, as it seemed to him, of the upcurling lashes
upon her smooth cheeks. But just as he bent forward to speak to her, she
half-turned from him and said something to one of the men beside her.

The manager's quickness saved him. He was perfectly aware of all those
jealous masculine eyes, flickering now with repressed and delighted
laughter over his discomfiture. He recovered himself in a moment and
slipped easily and with unabated geniality into a conversation with Mrs.
Gallito.

"Funny you should marry out of the profession," deftly catching up his
threads.

"She didn't," again that soft, sliding voice. "Pop was born in the
sawdust, too."

Without a change of expression in his face, Hanson waited imperturbably
for Mrs. Gallito's answer. Since his eyes were fixed on the red spark at
the end of his cigarette, who could see the quick flash in them?

Mrs. Gallito took a hasty gulp of beer. "It's just like Pearl says," she
murmured. "Her pop came of a long line of circus people, same as me, but
he broke clean away from it, couldn't bear the life." There was
unabated wonder in her tones. "I guess," resignedly, "it's the Spanish
of him."

"Say," cried Hanson, and now his voice rang with a new note in it,
something of gay, masterful, masculine dominance, "say, what you ladies
drinking beer and lemonade for? It's got to be wine to-night. Hey,
Jimmy. Wine for this table, and treat the house. Wine, understand? Got
enough to float 'em?"

"Hold on a minute, Jimmy." Hanson heard Bob Flick's voice for the first
time, soft as the Pearl's, liquidly southern, gentle, even apologetic.
"I'm sorry, stranger"--he leaned forward courteously to Hanson--"we all
would enjoy accepting your hospitality, but you see, it ain't
etiquette."

A silence that could be felt had fallen upon the room. Mr