offered his hand as
she stepped out on to the path.

"This," she remarked, resting her daintily gloved fingers for a moment
in his, "is the beginning of a new order of things. Do you realize
that only the day before yesterday we passed one another here with a
polite stare?"

"I remember it," he answered, "perfectly. Long may the new order
last."

"But it is not going to last long--with me at any rate," she said,
laughing. "Don't you know that I am almost ruined? Mr. Thorndyke is
going to close the theatre. He says that we have been losing money
every week. I shall have to sell my horses, and go and live in the
suburbs."

"I hope," he said fervently, "that you will not find it so bad as
that."

"Of course," she remarked, "you know that yours is the hand which has
given us our death-blow. I have just read your notice. It is a
brilliant piece of satirical writing, of course, but need you have
been quite so severe? Don't you regret your handiwork a little?"

"I cannot," he answered deliberately. "On the contrary, I feel that I
have done you a service. If you do not agree with me to-day, the time
will certainly come when you will do so. You have a gift which
delighted me: you are really an actress; you are one of very few."

"That is a kind speech," she answered; "but even if there is truth in
it, I am as yet quite unrecognized. There is no other theatre open to
me; you and I look upon Istein and his work from a different point of
view; but even if you are right, the part of Herdrine suited me. I was
beginning to get some excellent notices. If we could have kept the
thing going for only a few weeks longer, I think that I might have
established some sort of a reputation."

He sighed.

"A reputation, perhaps," he admitted; "but not of the best order. You
do not wish to be known only as the portrayer of unnatural passions,
the interpreter of diseased desires. It would be an ephemeral
reputation. It might lead you into many strange byways, but it would
never help you to rise. Art is above all things catholic, and
universal. You may be a perfect Herdrine; but Herdrine herself is but
a night weed--a thing of no account. Even you cannot make her natural.
She is the puppet of a man's fantasy. She is never a woman."

"I suppose," she said sorrowfully, "that your judgment is the true
one. Yet--but we will talk of something else. How strange to be
walking here with you!"

Berenice was always a much-observed woman, but t