suddenly the wickedness of marrying him just to escape her own prison. She understood clearly that only love could have justified her—no other motive than that. She saw the evil of fastening her past to an honourable man whose good name and family demanded of him something better. She felt as if the writer had torn aside a veil and shown her her naked soul. And—and—though the book was a good book, and did not condemn sinners—she was shocked, she was horrified, at what it made her see."

Rosemary suddenly closed her hand upon the shining stone, and turned fully and resolutely to the man beside her.

"That night changed Rosa Mundi," she said; "changed her completely. Before it was over she wrote to the young man who loved her and told him that she could not marry him. The letter did not go till the following evening. She kept it back for a few hours—in case she repented. But—though she suffered—she did not repent. In the evening she had an engagement to dance. The young man was there—in the front row. And he brought his friend. She danced. Her dancing was superb that night. She had a passionate desire to bewitch the man who had waked her soul—as she had bewitched so many others. She had never met a man she could not conquer. She was determined to conquer him. Was it wrong? Anyway, it was human. She danced till her very heart was on fire, danced till she trod the clouds. Her audience went mad with the delight of it. They raved as if they were intoxicated. All but one man! All but one man! And he—at the end—he looked her just once in the eyes, stonily, piercingly, and went away." She uttered a sharp, choking breath. "I have nearly done," she said. "Can you guess what happened then? Perhaps you know. The man who loved her received her letter when he got back that night. And—and—she had bewitched him, remember; he—shot himself. The friend—the writer—she never saw again. But—but—Rosa Mundi has never forgotten him. She carries him in her heart—the man who taught her the meaning of life."

She ceased to speak, and suddenly, like a boy, sprang to her feet, tossing away the stone that she had treasured in her hand.

But the man was almost as quick as she. He caught her by the shoulder as he rose. "Wait!" he said. "Wait!" His voice rang hard, but there was no hardness in his eyes. "Tell me—who you are!"

She lifted her eyes to his fearlessly, without shame. "What does it matter who I am?" she said. "What does it matter? I have told you I am Rosemary. That is her name for me, and it was your book called Remembrance that made her give it me."

He held her still, looking at her with a growing compassion in his eyes. "You are her child," he said.

She smiled. "Perhaps—spiritually. Yes, I think I am her child, such a child as she might have been if—Fate—had been kind to her—- or if she had read your book before—and not after."

He let her go slowly, almost with reluctance. "I think I should like to meet your—Rosa Mundi," he said.

Her eyes suddenly shone. "Not really? You are in earnest? But—but—- you would hurt her. You despise her."

"I am sorry for her," he said, and there was a hint of doggedness in his voice, as though he spoke against his better judgment.

The child's face had an eager look, but she seemed to be restraining herself. "I ought to tell you one thing about her first," she said. "Perhaps you will disapprove. I don't know. But it is because of you—and your revelation—that she is doing it. Rosa Mundi is going to be married. No, she is not giving up her career or anything—except her freedom. Her old lover has come back to her. She is going to marry him now. He wants her for his wife."

"Ah!" It was the man who was eager now. He spoke impulsively. "She will be happy then? She loves him?"

Rosemary looked at him with her clear, unfaltering eyes. "Oh, no," she said. "He isn't that sort of man at all. Besides, there is only one man in the world that she could care for in that way. No, she doesn't love him. But she is doing the right thing, and she is going to be good. You will not despise her any more?"

There was such anxious appeal in her eyes that he could not meet it. He turned his own away.

There fell a silence between them, and through it the long, long roar of the sea rose up—a mighty symphony of broken chords.

The man moved at last, looked down at the slight boyish figure beside him, hesitated, finally spoke. "I still think that I should like to meet Rosa Mundi," he said.

Her eyes smiled again. "And you will not despise her now," she said, her tone no longer a question.

"I think," said Randal Courteney slowly, "that I shall never despise any one again."

"Life is so difficult," said Rosemary, with the air of one who knew.

They were strewing the Pier with roses for Rosa Mundi's night. There were garlands of roses, festoons of roses, bouquets of roses; roses overhead, roses under foot, everywhere roses.

Summer had returned triumphant to deck the favourite's path.

Randal Courteney marked it all gravely, without contempt. It was her hour.

No word from her had reached him, but that night he would meet her face to face. Through days and nights of troubled thought, the resolve had grown within him. To-night it should bear fruit. He would not rest again until he had seen her. For his peace of mind was gone. She was about to throw herself away upon a man she did not love, and he felt that it was laid upon him to stop the sacrifice. The burden of responsibility was his. He had striven against this conviction, but it would not be denied. From the days of young Eric Baron's tragedy onward, this woman had made him as it were the star of her destiny. To repudiate the fact was useless. She had, in her ungoverned, impulsive fashion, made him surety for her soul.

The thought tormented him, but it held a strange attraction for him also. If the story were true, and it was not in him to doubt it, it touched him in a way that was wholly unusual. Popularity, adulation, had been his portion for years. But this was different, this was personal—a matter in which reputation, fame, had no part. In a different sphere she also was a star, with a host of worshippers even greater than his own. The humility of her amazed him. She had, as it were, taken her fate between her hands and laid it as an offering at his feet.

And so, on Rosa Mundi's night, he went to the great Pavilion, mingling with the crowd, determined when her triumph was over, to seek her out. There would be a good many seekers, he doubted not; but he was convinced that she would not deny him an interview.

He secured a seat in the third row, avoiding almost by instinct any more conspicuous position. He was early, and while he waited, the thought of young Eric Baron came to him—the boy's eager-face, the adoration of his eyes. He remembered how on that far-off night he had realized the hopelessness of combating his love, how he had shrugged his shoulders and relinquished the struggle. And the battle had been his even then—a bitter victory more disastrous than defeat.

He put the memory from him and thought of Rosemary—the child with the morning light in her eyes, the innocence of the morning in her soul. How tenderly she had spoken of Rosa Mundi! How sweetly she had pleaded her cause! With what amazing intuition had she understood! Something that was greater than pity welled up within him. Rosa Mundi's guardian angel had somehow reached his heart.

People were pouring into the place. He saw that it was going to be packed. And outside, lining the whole length of the Pier, they were waiting for her too, waiting to strew her path with, roses.

Ah! she was coming! Above the wash of the sea there rose a roar of voices. They were giving her the homage of a queen. He listened to the frantic cheering, and again it was Rosa Mundi, splendid and brilliant, who filled his thoughts as she filled the thoughts of all just then.

The