ed. He was highly conscious of
his not now carrying out that principle of abstention he had brought to
such maturity before leaving Paris; but he contented himself with a much
cruder justification of this lapse than he would have thought adequate
in advance. It consisted simply in the idea that to be identified with
the first fresh exploits of a young genius was a delightful experience.
What was the harm of it when the genius was real? His main security was
thus that his relations with Miriam had been placed under the protection
of that idea of approved extravagance. In this department they made a
very creditable figure and required much less watching and pruning than
when it had been his effort to adjust them to a worldly plan. He had in
fine a sense of real wisdom when he pronounced it surely enough that
this momentary intellectual participation in the girl's dawning fame was
a charming thing. Charming things were not frequent enough in a busy
man's life to be kicked out of the way. Balaklava Place, looked at in
this philosophic way, became almost idyllic: it gave Peter the
pleasantest impression he had ever had of London.

The season happened to be remarkably fine; the temperature was high, but
not so high as to keep people from the theatre. Miriam's "business"
visibly increased, so that the question of putting on the second play
underwent some revision. The girl persisted, showing in her persistence
a temper of which Peter had already caught some sharp gleams. It was
plain that through her career she would expect to carry things with a
high hand. Her managers and agents wouldn't find her an easy victim or a
calculable force; but the public would adore her, surround her with the
popularity that attaches to a good-natured and free-spoken princess, and
her comrades would have a kindness for her because she wouldn't be
selfish. They too would, besides representing her body-guard, form in a
manner a portion of her affectionate public. This was the way her friend
read the signs, liking her whimsical tolerance of some of her vulgar
playfellows almost well enough to forgive their presence in Balaklava
Place, where they were a sore trial to her mother, who wanted her to
multiply her points of contact only with the higher orders. There were
hours when Peter seemed to make out that her principal relation to the
proper world would be to have within two or three years a grand battle
with it resulting in its taking her, should she