some detail, with touches of his own. He was so boyishly elated over it that she was fired with some of his enthusiasm.

"But look here, Jerrymander, how about the big mural designs? How about my portrait? This pageant won't get you anywhere."

"Won't it? You should have heard me tell the Abercrombie Brendon that I would try my best to put off my portrait sitters. You, my dear Bobs, are my portrait sitters."

"It will ruin your winter's work. They'll pick your brains, that crowd, and take your time, and you can whistle for your money."

"I wasn't in kindergarten yesterday, Bobs. I know a thing or two about the dear rich. They will pay-as-we-go, one good big deposit down in advance."

"Get you all out of the work spirit—make you yearn for the flesh pots."

"Well, Bobs, I never did choose a diet of figs and thistles."

"That's just the trouble with you. It's nip and tuck all the time between the artist and the senses, Jerry. That uptown crowd can ruin you for good."

"Dear old Bobs! If they ruin me, I'll come to you for a scourge. Let's go to Buffanti's for a celebration. We'll get Chat and Jinny for a foursome, what? Are the Chatfields at home to-day, Jane?" he added.

"Yes; I was there this morning," she answered.

"Come on, old wailing banshee!" he cried.

"All right; but I don't like it, just the same. This very night may mark the grave of Jerome Paxton, painter."

"Well, think up some jolly epitaph and we'll sing it in our cups. Don't dree, Bobs; you're as bad as Jane."

At his mention of her, they both glanced at the silent bent figure, so indifferent to their presence.

"Time to close up, Miss Judd; we're off to dinner," said Jerry.

She quietly rose and put away the mended things. She set things to rights, as noiseless as a wraith. The other two went on talking and laughing, until she came toward them in her hat and coat.

"What do I owe you?" Jerry asked.

"Just for to-day."

"I haven't any change. Can you let it go until next time?"

"No," she said simply.

"Well, old Shylock, here's five. Consider yourself paid as long as that lasts."

"I don't wish to do that. I'll bring you change."

"Bother you, Jane Judd; what difference does it make whether you get it all at once, or in driblets?"

"Here, Jerry, I've got it even. You owe me," Bobs said.

"All right; much obliged."

Jane hesitated a moment, then took it with a bow, and went to the door.

"Good-night, Jane Judd," said Bobs.

"Good-night," the woman answered mechanically.

"Night," said Jerry, searching for cigarettes among his impedimenta.

"Queer creature, that," Bobs mused.

"What's that?"

"Jane Judd. What do you suppose she thinks of us all?"

"God knows, and I care as little as He does."

"I care. I'd like to know her. She's like steel, clean-cut, shining, efficient, silent, unbreakable."

"Is she? I've never noticed," said Jerry indifferently.

"She knows all our secrets, our economies, our loves, and hates. She mends us up, keeps us in order. Jane Judd is the law and order of our set. She glides among us, and we say everything we know before her, as if she were a wall."

"Gog and Magog! Do I have to listen to you ramble on about Jane Judd? She interests me about as much as a Wheeler and Wilson sewing machine. Come on to dinner."

Bobs rose and stretched herself luxuriously, with a yawn.

"Man is the most incomprehensible animal evolved from protoplasm," she remarked.

"That remark doesn't seem to have any point, Bobs, but I suppose it has."

"Thanks. From now on, I suppose only Bible allusions will have point to you."

"Well, there's nothing Biblical about Jane Judd."

"Humph! She might be the dim and vasty void out of which creation sprang."

"Good Lord!" cried Jerry, turning out the light. He took her by the elbow and led her out, closing the door on that conversation.

CHAPTER II

Jane Judd, in her old brown coat and a hat of many seasons flown, walked slowly from Macdougal Alley toward the model tenement house where she shared a flat with a family by the name of Biggs, and had what is known as "light housekeeping privileges." The English of this elegant phrase was, that, before or after the Biggs family had disposed of its meals, Jane could slip into the kitchen and prepare her repast. She disliked the arrangement intensely, but on the whole she preferred it to any boarding-house which she could afford.

No matter how tired she was after her day's work in the various studios, she always enjoyed this walk home, with the misty lights, the far-distant vista of the sky at the street ends. She speculated about the people she passed; sometimes she stopped to watch the children shouting and playing in the streets. She never spoke to them but she knew many of them by sight.

It was in some such way she watched the artist folk who gave her employment. She wondered about them; sometimes behind her mask she laughed at their childishness.

Jane Judd's history up to this point has no more dramatic interest than the history of any drab woman of twenty-eight, picked out at random from the army of workwomen which marches daily to and from the factories and stores.

She had lived in Warburton, a small New Jersey town, until she was twenty-two, keeping house for her father, who had a grocery store. He was her only relation. When he died she sold the store and came to New York to make a living. She was trained for nothing. She had had a High School education, which left her with a taste for books and a consuming ambition to write them. Being a dumb creature at best, she had never spoken of this dream to a human soul, except her mother. The town paper had published several of her stories, signed with a pen name, and she secretly cherished the idea that she had talent.

So when her release came, she did as so many girls do these days, she put her little all into her pocketbook and came to the big town to grapple with success. She applied at newspaper offices, at first, with her village paper clippings as justification. She admitted to such editors as she saw that she had no nose for news, but she liked to write stories, and thought maybe she could do special stuff. She was shy and frightened. Nobody wanted her.

She found a cheap room and gave herself a month in which to write short stories. With one new one, and two old ones worked over, she tried the magazines. It was a weary round with rejection at every point, while the reserves in her bank grew smaller and smaller. During the whole month she never talked to any one, and she knew a loneliness as bitter as pain.

Finally, one day an editor of a magazine let her come into his office. He looked at her keenly.

"Miss Judd," he began, "I've read these stories of yours and I want to give you a bit of advice. Are you trying to make a living out of this kind of thing?"

"Yes, sir."

"Can you do anything else to support yourself?"

"I don't know."

"Where have you lived?"

Jane told him.

"You're alone in the world?"

"Yes."

"Unmarried?"

"Yes."

"May I tell you quite frankly how I feel about your case?"

"I wish you would."

"You make the common mistake of thinking that anybody can write. Now, putting words together is not writing; making fine sentences is not writing; elaborating striking plots is not writing. Of all the arts, literature is the most exacting mistress. With some idea of the technique of painting, or music, coupled with a