was not, because when she laughed it was
with the merriment of a gay child and when she was serious she was
sweetly grave. Sometimes he played for her and sometimes she sang for
him, and both did what they did so well that the critic in the other
found no disappointment.

Unpremeditatedly and very naturally they had struck the basis of a
dependable comradeship. She saw the occasional flash of genius in his
musical creativeness and his need of practical attributes. To him she
was something of a mystery. To her, save for his well-kept secret of
loving Loraine, he was an easily read human document. She told him of
her broader experiences, always tinging them with a delicious humor in
the recital, which twisted into comedy what might have been related as
little tragedies, and because she had seen so much of life, where he had
seen so little, she was willing to recognize his lovable qualities and
overlook his weaknesses.

But just as Paul did not talk much to her of his own affairs and the
people of his set, so he did not talk with them of her.

At first she had interested him as an experiment; then as affording the
possibility for a new type of adventure in friendship, and when he came
to know her in that degree which represented their present association,
he ceased to ask why she interested him, and only knew that she did.

Of late she had been unusually gay because of revival of hope. A part
which she knew she could play had been half-promised her which would
bring Broadway recognition and the chance to be judged on her merits.
More than that it would mean the possibility of bringing her small
daughter back from the relatives who were playing parents in these days
of uncertainty.

CHAPTER XXI

One gray and penetrating afternoon laid its depressing fingers on Paul
Burton's heart with a heavier touch than usual. Even Hamilton was
wearing a frowning and unsympathetic brow these days, and when the
musician saw Mary, despite the inflexible courage of her eyes, there was
something in them that hurt him to the quick. He knew and shared his
mother's grief, but could not bear the trace of unshed tears in her
voice. So, seeking asylum from the anxious ghosts that stalked between
the walls of his house, he made his way down-town and rang the bell on
Marcia Terroll's door. There are women men go to in triumph and women
they go to when hurt. Often they are not the same women. It was a raw,
bleak afternoon of dishearten