ended to be a record of her short career, and everything was in
it--the programme selling, the dressing, the foreign clubs--all the
refuse of her former existence, set in a sinister light and leaving the
impression of an abject up-bringing, as of one who had been _in_ the
streets if not on them.

Well, she had chosen her life and must take it at its own price. But, oh,
the cruelty of the world to a woman, when her very success could be her
shame! She felt that the past had gripped her again--the pitiless
past--she could never drag herself out of the mire.

That night she wrote to John Storm, and next morning before Rosa had
risen--her duties kept her up late--she heard a voice downstairs. Her dog
also heard it and began to bark. At the next moment John was in the room
and she was laughing up into his splendid black eyes, for he had caught
her down at the sofa holding the pug's nose and trying to listen.

"Is it you? It's so good of you to come early! But this, dog"--breaking
into the Manx dialect--"she's ter'ble, just ter'ble!" Then rising and
looking serious: "I wished to tell you that I knew nothing about the
church, nothing whatever. If I'd had the least idea... but they told me
nothing--it was very wrong--nothing. And the first thing I knew was when
I saw it in all the newspapers."

He was leaning on the end of the mantelpiece. "If they deceived you like
that, how can you go on with them?"

"You mean" (she was leaning on the other end, and speaking falteringly),
"you mean that I ought to give it all up. But it's too late for that now.
It was too late when I came to know. Besides, it would do no good; you
would be in the same position still, and as for me--well, somebody else
would have the theatre, so where's the use?"

"I was thinking of the future, Glory, not the past. People who deceive us
once are capable of doing so again."

"True--that's true--only--only----"

She was breaking down, and he turned his eyes away from her, saying,
"Well, it's all over now, and there's no help for it."

"No, there's no help for it."

He tried to think what he had come to say, but do what he would he could
not remember. The moment he looked at her the thread of his thoughts was
lost, and the fragrance of her presence, so sweet, so close, made him
feel as if he wanted to touch her. There was an awkward silence, and then
he fidgeted with his hat and moved.

"Are you going so soon?"

"I'm busy, and----"

"Yes, you must