y
swept the house, or a man's profile was silhouetted against a sputter of
blue flame.

Artheris and young Hazzard paced the stage, consulted, and disagreed.
Connie practised a fancy step in a wide circle, her skirt caught up, her
face quite free of self-consciousness. Julia sat on a box, soberly
looking from face to face.

Something had happened to her, she did not yet know what. She was
frightened, yet strangely bold; she experienced delicious chills, yet
her cheeks were on fire. Love of life flooded her whole being in waves;
she was wrapped, lulled, saturated, in a new and dreamy peace.

Julia felt a sudden warm rush of affection for Connie--dear old Con--the
best friend a girl ever had! She looked about the theatre; how she loved
the old "Grand!" Above all possible conditions in life it was wonderful
to be Julia Page, sitting here, the very hub of the world, a being to
love and be loved.

There, at that hour, she came to that second birth all women know; she
was born into that world of drifting sweet odours, blending and
iridescent colours, evasive and enchanting sounds, that is the kingdom
of the heart. Julia did not know why, from this hour on, she was no
longer a little girl, she was no longer dumb and blind and unseeing. But
a new and delightful consciousness woke within her, a new sense of her
own importance, her own charm.

When she and Connie strolled out again, it was, for Julia at least, into
a changed world. The immortal hour of romance touched even sordid
Mission Street with gold. Julia walked demurely, but conscious of every
admiring glance she won from the passers-by, conscious of a score of
swallows taking flight from a curb, conscious of the pathetic beauty of
the little draggled mother wheeling home her sleepy baby, the setting
sunlight glittering in the eyes of both.

"He's nothing but a big spoiled kid, if you want to know what I think,"
said Connie, ending a long dissertation to which Julia had only half
listened.

"He--who?" asked Julia, suddenly recalled from dreams, and feeling her
heart turn liquid within her. A weakness seized her knees, a delicious
chill ran up her spine.

"Hazzard--the smarty!" Connie elucidated carelessly.

"Oh, sure!" Julia said heavily. She made no further comment.

She and Connie wandered in and out of a few shops, asking prices, and
fingering laces and collars. They went into the dim, echoing old library
on Post Street, to powder their noses at the mirror