ind or feelings in regard to him or his
actions. Here was the punishment for his "even you," and he pondered
long over it.

"What on earth did she marry me for? She doesn't care a straw about me,
only what I can make of myself," he mused, a trifle bitterly. But he
went to work at "Success" with the abandon of a house-wrecker, pulling
it to the foundation. He used the sledgehammer on scenes he loved. He
loosened and pitched out phrases he had mulled over long, and in the
dust of the affray he forgot the sting that lay behind Bambi's words. If
she wanted him famous, famous would he be.

XIV

Three boiling days, and the major part of three boiling nights, Jarvis
sweated and toiled over the scenario for the revised two acts. It was
work that irked him, because he hated doing things over when the first
glad joy of inspiration was gone, but he stuck to it. And the fourth day
he set out for the house far up the Riverside Drive, armed with his
manuscript and a sense of triumph.

Arrived at his destination, the butler announced that Miss Harper had
gone on a motor trip for two days. No, she had left no word. Angry at
himself for not having provided against such a situation by an
appointment with the lady, furious at the thought of two days' delay, he
betook himself to the Parke offices in the hope of finding some word for
him there. Mr. Parke was busy and could not see him, announced the
keeper of the keys to heaven, who sat at the outer gate. No, Mrs. Parke
had left no word for a Mr. Jocelyn. No, she knew nothing of Mrs. Parke's
plans or movements. No, she could not ask Mr. Parke. Besides, he
wouldn't know.

Jarvis descended the many stairs in a thickening gloom. Wait, wait,
wait! That was part of the discipline Bambi talked of so wisely. Well,
he then and there decided that the day would come when he would walk
past every managerial outpost in the city, and invade the sanctum
without so much as presenting a visiting-card.

The automobile trip lasted four days instead of two, and he spent them
in a fret of impatience. He worked at the third act, sure of her
approval. On the fifth day she received him. She liked the idea of the
second act--she would have none of the new third act. At the end of his
enthusiastic sketch of how it would run, the reading of new scenes, the
telling of new business, she yawned slightly, and said she didn't like
it at all. Unless he could get a good third act, she wouldn't care for
the piec