, she'd put all this paint and powder right
out of court.

But she was sitting afar off in a quiet flat, softly lighted,
ineffably cosy, in the place called home, where husbands were not
wanted.

He confessed to himself: "It used to be pretty beastly for her; a
little delicate thing--three babies and no nurse; no help with
anything. I suppose I could have done a lot, but how's one to think of
these things? I suppose I've failed as a husband, but what am I to do
about it now? It's all over and can't be helped."

He went to his stall at the Piccadilly, and, looking about him at
other men's clothes, decided that he must have new ones. The price of
an evening suit need not trouble him now. He settled down and began to
enjoy the play.

Roselle was on the stage, in the beauty chorus, looking magnificent,
and her eyes were sweeping the stalls. They paused here and there in
their saucy habit, lingering upon more than one man with one of her
tiny inscrutable smiles winging a message, but their search continued
until at last she had found Osborn Kerr sitting on the lefthand side
in the third row. He had scribbled on the card which accompanied his
flowers, "Look for me to-night," and when her look met his, he had a
sudden thrill of pleasure. Watching her eyes sweeping here and there,
it had been exciting to wait for the moment when they should fall on
him. After he had signalled back a discreet smile in answer, he put up
his glasses and looked at her eagerly.

Her beauty returned to his senses like a familiar thing; he had
admired the way her hair grew from her temples, and to-night it was
dressed to show the unusual charm; her ankles had always been
wonderfully slim, and to-night they looked finer than ever atop of
twinkly little Court shoes in a vivid green hue; her eyes had that
deep, still look which expressed her inanity, while having the result
of concealing it.

During the first interval he scribbled a note to her, and sent it
round with an imperative request for an answer. The note asked:

"My dear Roselle, come out to supper? And shall I wait for you at the
stage door?--O.K."

And her reply, in her big, silly back-hand writing, said laconically:

"Right. I'll be out at eleven.--R.D."

Eleven found him waiting by the stage-door entrance, and she did not
keep him long. Soon she came, big and brilliant, out from the gloomy
gully, in the inevitable fur-coat which he remembered so well, but
which had begun now to