met and loved in the desert. Again he fell
to pleading. "Oh, Pearl, be like what you were again. Don't stand off
from me that way, honey. It ain't in you to be so cruel and hard. Come
back to me, here in my arms. Have your spells; treat me like you please;
but come back to me. Oh, honey, come."

She looked beyond him, not at him, and then ground a little heap of
freshly fallen pine needles beneath her heel.

"What's the use?" she said curtly. "It's over. We can quit right here,
Rudolf. I'm done with you, for good."

His outstretched arms fell by his side, his jaw set. "I guess that's
right," he said viciously. "Any bigger fool than me could see that; and
I'm not going to waste any more time crawling around on my hands and
knees after you; I can tell you that. But you can't fool me on the other
man proposition."

"I'm not trying to," she interjected cruelly.

"Who is he?" his voice was ragged and uneven. "Not Flick, I'll bet my
hat. He's been your dog too long for you to fling him anything but a
bone. You'll never tell me, though."

"Not I," she answered indifferently.

"Then I'll just satisfy myself--to-night."

She started and frowned. "You're not staying for that," harshly. "It's
not safe."

"Oh, yes, I am staying for that, just to satisfy a little curiosity I've
got, and I guess I'll find it safe enough. I guess you've been playing
with kids so far in your career, Miss Pearl Gallito; but you'll find
that the old man's not quite so easy disposed of as you think. I've got
an idea that you'll be down on your knees trying to make terms with him
before we're precisely 'quit' as you've just said."

"Bah!" she said. "Wind, wind. You can't frighten me with threats. Stay
and watch me dance all you please. That's the only way you'll ever see
me again--from the audience." Without any appearance of haste, she
lifted her scarf from the pine branch on which she had thrown it and
twisted it slowly about her head, then picking up her crimson cape from
the ground, she shook the pine needles from it, wrapped it about her,
and without another word to him, without even a look, took her way down
the trail.

She did not believe that he meant what he said, she did not believe that
he meant to stay and see her dance that evening. The thought that he
would do so had annoyed her at first, but as she walked downward through
the wine-like amber air, she realized that she did not particularly
care. Her whole being seemed absorbed