rg was watching her brilliant eyes and her face. She was much
handsomer than she had been early in the evening. Excitement of this
sort enriched her. It was only under such excitement, he reflected, that
she was entirely illuminated, or wholly present. At other times there
was something a little cold and empty, like a big room with no people in
it. Even in her most genial moods there was a shadow of restlessness, as
if she were waiting for something and were exercising the virtue of
patience. During dinner she had been as kind as she knew how to be, to
him and to Archie, and had given them as much of herself as she could.
But, clearly, she knew only one way of being really kind, from the core
of her heart out; and there was but one way in which she could give
herself to people largely and gladly, spontaneously. Even as a girl she
had been at her best in vigorous effort, he remembered; physical effort,
when there was no other kind at hand. She could be expansive only in
explosions. Old Nathanmeyer had seen it. In the very first song Fred had
ever heard her sing, she had unconsciously declared it.

Thea Kronborg turned suddenly from her talk with Archie and peered
suspiciously into the corner where Ottenburg sat with folded arms,
observing her. "What's the matter with you, Fred? I'm afraid of you when
you're quiet,--fortunately you almost never are. What are you thinking
about?"

"I was wondering how you got right with the orchestra so quickly, there
at first. I had a flash of terror," he replied easily.

She bolted her last oyster and ducked her head. "So had I! I don't know
how I did catch it. Desperation, I suppose; same way the Indian babies
swim when they're thrown into the river. I HAD to. Now it's over, I'm
glad I had to. I learned a whole lot to-night."

Archie, who usually felt that it behooved him to be silent during such
discussions, was encouraged by her geniality to venture, "I don't see
how you can learn anything in such a turmoil; or how you can keep your
mind on it, for that matter."

Thea glanced about the room and suddenly put her hand up to her hair.
"Mercy, I've no hat on! Why didn't you tell me? And I seem to be wearing
a rumpled dinner dress, with all this paint on my face! I must look like
something you picked up on Second Avenue. I hope there are no Colorado
reformers about, Dr. Archie. What a dreadful old pair these people must
be thinking you! Well, I had to eat." She sniffed the savor of the