figuratively speaking, I have said good-by to the others—to Broadway, and all it stands for. You alone know of my going. I am making no promises. If I fail no one will know—nor care. When I make good I will return—and then——"

The girl looked up. Their glances met, and in the depths of the steady gray eyes the soft blue ones read purpose—unflinching purpose to fight and win for the glory of an infinite love.

Her eyes dropped. She felt the hot blood mount to her face under the compelling magnetism of his gaze. She loved this man. In all the world no other could so move her. She loved—yet feared him. The very strength of him—the overmastering force of his personality—his barbaric disregard of conventionality at once attracted and frightened her.

In that moment she knew, deep down in her heart, that if this man should take her in his arms and hold her close against the throbbing of his great heart, his lips find hers, and should he pour into her ears the pent-up torrent of his love, her surrender would be complete.

His was the master mind, and in all the years to come that mind would rule, and she, the weaker one, would be forced under the yoke of its supremacy. She prayed for strength.

Let those who believe that once the living flesh has turned to clay the spirit dies, ascribe to a trick of memory the vision of her dying mother that flashed before the eyes of the girl, and the whispered words: "Look after Charlie as long as he shall need you."

But those there are who know that in that momentary vision spoke in faint memory-whispers the gentle spirit-mother, who—ranking high in that vast army which, in the words of the immortal Persian,

—would guide the footsteps of her loved ones.

Thus strength came and steeled the heart of one great little woman who battled alone against love for her right to rule and shape the destiny of lives. The momentary flush receded from her face, and when her eyes again sought the man's, their glance was coldly repellent. She even forced a smile.

"Is it so amusing, then—my going?" he asked a little grimly.

"Yes, rather amusing to consider where a man would go and what he would do. A man, I mean, whose sole recommendation seems to be that he can 'lick' most anybody, and can 'drink more and stay soberer than any of the sports he travels with.'"

The dull red flooded the man's face at her words. Unconsciously he squared his shoulders and there was an unwonted dignity in his reply:

"I am well aware that my accomplishments are more in the nature of liabilities than assets. In spite of this I will make good—somewhere."

He stepped closer to the girl, and his voice grew harsh, almost rasping in its intensity. "I can beat the game. And I will beat it—now! Just to show you and your kind what a man can do—a man, I mean," he added, "'whose sole recommendation seems to be that he can lick most anybody—and can drink more and stay soberer than any of the sports he travels with.' Incidentally, I am glad to know your real opinion of me. I once believed that you were different from the others—that in you I had found a woman who possessed a real soul."

He laughed, a short, grating laugh—deep down, as though rude fingers drew a protest from raw heart-strings—a laugh that is not good to hear.

"I even thought," he went on, "that you cared for me—a little. That you were the one woman who, at the last of things, would give a man a helping hand, a little word of encouragement and hope, perhaps, instead of the final kick."

He bowed stiffly and turned toward the door. "Good-by!" he said, and the heavy portières closed behind him.

In the room the girl, white as marble, heard the click of the front door, the roar of a newly cranked motor, and the dying chug, chug of the retreating taxi.

That afternoon Charlie Manton rode alone, and when he returned, hungry as a young wolf, to be told that his sister had retired with a sick headache, he drew his own conclusions, nodding sagely over his solitary dinner.

Later, as he passed her door on the way to his room, he placed his ear at the keyhole and listened a long time to her half-muffled sobs.

"Gee!" he muttered as he passed down the hall, "they must have had an awful scrap!" He turned and quietly retraced his steps. In the library he switched on the lights and crossed to the telephone.

"There isn't any sense in that," he said, speaking to himself. "Bill loves Eth—that's a cinch. And she does love him, too, even if she won't let on.

"She wouldn't stick up in her room all day bawling her eyes out if she didn't. I'll call Bill up and tell him so, then he'll come and they'll make up. I bet he's sorry, too, by now."

At the Carmody residence he was told that Bill was not in. He received the same answer from several clubs, at each of which he left explicit instructions for Mr. Carmody to call him up at the first possible moment.

Thereafter Charlie frequented the gymnasiums and made industrious inquiry, but it was many a day before he again saw his idol. Bill Carmody was missing from his accustomed haunts, and none could tell whither he had gone.

Those were days fraught with anxiety for the boy. Ethel, to whom he was devoted, went about the house listless and preoccupied, in spite of her efforts to appear cheerful. When he attempted to reason with her she burst into tears and forbade him to mention Bill Carmody's name in her hearing as long as he lived. Whereupon the youngster retired disconsolately to his room to think things over.

"Love's a bum thing," he told himself. "If they do get married they die or get a divorce or something; and if they don't—well, Bill has prob'ly committed suicide and Eth is moping around, and most likely now she'll marry that dang St. Ledger." He made a wry face as he thought of St. Ledger.

"Runty little mollycoddle! Couldn't lick a chicken—him and his monocle. And that day the wind took his hat and rolled it through the mud, and he said: 'Oh, pshaw!' instead of damn it! Oh—slush! And I promised mother I'd take care of Eth."

He burrowed his face deep into the pillow, as, in spite of himself, tears came to his eyes.

CHAPTER IV

LOVE OR HATE

Thus a week passed, in the course of which the heart of the girl was torn by conflicting emotions. Love clashed with hate and self-pity with self-reproach. Was it true—what he had said? Had she administered the final kick to a man who was down—who, loving her—and deep down in her heart she knew that he did love her—had come to her in the extremity of his need for a word of encouragement?

Now that he was gone she realized how much he had meant to her. How, in spite of his reckless disregard of life's serious side, she loved him. Try as she would she could not forget the look of deep hurt that dulled his eyes at her words.

Had she not been justified? Had he not needed just that to bring him to a realization of his responsibilities? Had she not, at the sacrifice of her own love, spurred and strengthened his purpose to make good? Or, had she, by raising a barrier between them, removed his one incentive to great effort?

Over and over the girl pondered these things. One moment her heart cried out for his return, and the next she reiterated her undying hate for the man in whose power it was so sorely to wound her with a word.

And so she sat one evening before an open fire in the library which had been the scene of their parting. Mechanically she turned the pages of a novel, but her mind was elsewhere, and her eyes lingered upon the details of the room.

"He stood there," she mused, "and I here—and then—those awful words. And, oh! the look in his eyes that day as the portières closed between us—and he was gone. Where?"