r--no, not gold, but of the white-gray of
wood ashes, and tinted with gold! No wonder it was difficult to tell
just what color her hair was. Hair like that was ready to be of any
color. And there were her arms, so symmetrical in her rather tight
sleeves, and emerging into view in the most delicate wrists. What a
marvelous skin!

"Have you ever posed?"

She startled and the color flamed in her cheeks. Her eyes shot a glance
of terror at him. "I--I," she stammered. Then almost defiantly, "Yes, I
did--for a while. But I didn't suppose anyone knew. At the time we
needed the money badly."

Norman felt deep disgust with himself for bursting out with such a
question, and for having surprised her secret. "There's nothing to be
ashamed of," he said gently.

"Oh, I'm not ashamed," she returned. Her agitation had subsided. "The
only reason I quit was because the work was terribly hard and the pay
small and uncertain. I was confused because they discharged me at the
last place I had, when they found out I had been a model. It was a
church paper office."

Again she poised her pencil and lowered her eyes. But he did not take
the hint. "Is there anything you would rather do than this sort of
work?" he asked.

"Nothing I could afford," replied she.

"If you had been kind to Miss Burroughs yesterday she would have helped
you."

"I couldn't afford to do that," said the girl in her quiet, reticent
way.

"To do what?"

"To be nice to anyone for what I could get out of it."

Norman smiled somewhat cynically. Probably the girl fancied she was
truthful; but human beings rarely knew anything about their real selves.
"What would you like to do?"

She did not answer his question until she had shrunk completely within
herself and was again thickly veiled with the expression which made
everyone think her insignificant. "Nothing I could afford to do," said
she. It was plain that she did not wish to be questioned further along
that line.

"The stage?" he persisted.

"I hadn't thought of it," was her answer.

"What then?"

"I don't think about things I can't have. I never made any definite
plans."

"But isn't it a good idea always to look ahead? As long as one has to be
moving, one might as well move in a definite direction."

She was waiting with pencil poised.

"There isn't much of a future at this business."

She shrank slightly. He felt that she regarded his remark as preparation
for a kindly hint that she was not gi