the passage. A little flush crept into Challoner's
youthful face. He passed a hand once more nervously over the
refractory kink before he went forward and knocked.

A preoccupied voice said, "Come in."

Challoner obeyed. He stood for a moment just inside the door without
speaking.

It was not a very large room, and the first impression it gave one was
that it was frightfully overcrowded.

Every chair and table seemed littered with frocks and furbelows. Every
available space on the walls was covered with pictures and photographs
and odds and ends. The room was brilliantly lit, and at a
dressing-table strewn with make-up boxes and a hundred and one toilet
requisites, a girl was reading a letter.

At first glance she looked very young. She was small and dainty, with
clearly cut features and beautiful hair, the most beautiful hair in all
the world Jimmy Challoner thought for the thousandth time as he stood
in the doorway looking across at her with his foolish heart in his
eyes. She seemed to feel his gaze, for she turned sharply. Then she
drew in her breath hard, and hurriedly thrust the letter away in a
drawer as she rose to her feet.

"You!" she said; then, "Jimmy, didn't--didn't you get my letter?"

Challoner went forward. His confident smile had faded a little at the
unusual greeting. It was impossible not to realise that he was not
exactly welcome.

"No, I haven't had a letter," he said rather blankly. "What did you
write about? Is anything the matter?"

She laughed rather constrainedly. "No--at least, I can't explain now."
Her eyes sought his face rather furtively. "I'm in a hurry. Come
round after the first act, will you?--that's the longest interval. You
won't mind being sent away now, will you? I am due on almost directly."

She held her hand to him. "Silly boy! don't frown like that."

Challoner took the hand and drew her nearer to him. "I'm not going
till you've kissed me."

There was a touch of masterfulness in his boyish voice. Cynthia Farrow
half sighed, and for a moment a little line of pain bent her brows, but
the next moment she was smiling.

"Very well, just one, and be careful of the powder."

Challoner kissed her right on the lips. "Did you get my flowers? I
sent roses."

"Yes, thank you so much, they are lovely."

She glanced across the room to where several bouquets lay on the table.
Challoner's was only one of them.

That was what he hated--having to stand