serving his design to have her finally and forever disgusted
and done with the stage.

Finally there came a performance in which the audience--the
gallery part of it--"booed" her--not the play, not the other
players, but her and no other. Brent came along, apparently
by accident, as she made her exit. He halted before her and
scanned her countenance with those all-seeing eyes of his.
Said he:

"You heard them?"

"Of course," replied she.

"That was for you," said he and he said it with an absence of
sympathy that made it brutal.

"For only me," said she--frivolously.

"You seem not to mind."

"Certainly I mind. I'm not made of wood or stone."

"Don't you think you'd better give it up?"

She looked at him with a steely light from the violet eyes,
a light that had never been there before.

"Give up?" said she. "Not even if you give me up. This thing
has got to be put through."

He simply nodded. "All right," he said. "It will be."

"That booing--it almost struck me dead. When it didn't, I for
the first time felt sure I was going to win."

He nodded again, gave her one of his quick expressive,
fleeting glances that somehow made her forget and forgive
everything and feel fresh and eager to start in again. He said:

"When the booing began and you didn't break down and run off the
stage, I knew that what I hoped and believed about you was true."

Streathern joined them. His large, soft eyes were full of
sympathetic tears. He was so moved that he braved Brent. He
said to Susan:

"It wasn't your fault, Miss Lenox. You were doing exactly as
Mr. Brent ordered, when the booing broke out."

"Exactly," said Brent.

Streathern regarded him with a certain nervousness and veiled
pity. Streathern had been brought into contact with many
great men. He had found them, each and every one, with this
same streak of wild folly, this habit of doing things that
were to him obviously useless and ridiculous. It was a
profound mystery to him why such men succeeded while he
himself who never did such things remained in obscurity. The
only explanation was the abysmal stupidity, ignorance, and
folly of the masses of mankind. What a harbor of refuge that
reflection has ever been for mediocrity's shattered and
sinking vanity! Yet the one indisputable fact about the great
geniuses of long ago is that in their own country and age "the
common people heard them gladly." Streathern could not now
close his mouth