t in a shower should be put aside for a rainy
day. We talked and we giggled. The rain stopped. We forgot to get down.
We went to the end of the line and still we forgot to get down. The
conductor collected a double fare, and afterward I took her home."

(Antony thought to himself, "Just what I did not do.")

"She is angelic, Tony, delightful, an artist's dream, a writer's
inspiration, and a poor man's fairy."

Fairfax laughed.

"Don't laugh, old man," said Dearborn simply. "I have never heard you
rave like this about the peerless Mary."

Fairfax said, "No. But then you talk better than I do." He shook
Dearborn's hand warmly. "You know I am most awfully glad, don't you?"

"I know I am," said Dearborn, lighting a cigarette.

He settled himself with a beautiful content, asking nothing better than
to go on rehearsing his love affair.

"We have been engaged a long time, Tony. It is only a question of how
little two people can dare to try to get on with, you know, and I have
determined to risk it."

As they went up the steps of the studio together, Fairfax said--

"She is coming to-night, Bob, you say? Does she know anything about me?"

At this Dearborn laughed aloud. "She knows a great deal about me, Tony.
My dear boy, do you think we have talked much about anything but each
other? Do you talk with Mrs. Faversham about me? Nora knows I live here
with a chum. She doesn't even know your name."

As Dearborn threw open the door they could hear Potowski playing softly
the old French ballad, "J'ai perdu ma tourterelle."

A woman sat by Potowski in a big chair, and the lamp on the piano shone
yellow upon her. When the two men entered the studio she rose, and
Potowski, still playing, said--

"Let me present, at last, my better half. Mes amis, la Comtesse
Potowski."

Dearborn greeted her enthusiastically, and Tony stood petrified. The
comtesse, more mistress of the moment than Tony was, put out one hand
and smiled, but she had turned very pale.

It was his Aunt Caroline....

"Mr. Rainsford," she lifted her brows, "I think I have seen you before."

Tony bowed over her hand and Potowski, still smiling and nodding,
cried--

"These are great men and geniuses, _ma cherie_. You have here two great
artists together. They both have wings on their shoulders. Before they
fly away from us and are lost on Olympus, be charming to them. Carolina,
_ma cherie_, they shall hear you sing."

Robert Dearborn put his hand on Poto