ly; but his hand was
gentle, as he rested it on Arlt's shoulder.

The boy braced himself at the touch.

"We must go back," he said.

Thayer hesitated, while his thoughts worked swiftly. There would be a
certain cruelty, to his mind, in forcing Arlt to appear again before the
audience which had just cut him so mercilessly. On the other hand, it
would be the part of childish pique for him to refuse to show himself.
Nevertheless, he needed Arlt's support. He disliked to play his own
accompaniments, and he felt that, in doing so, he risked possible
disaster. The hesitation lasted only for a moment. Then his jaw
stiffened.

"It's all right, Arlt," he said briefly. "I am going to accompany
myself, this time."

As he crossed the stage, he glanced hastily from Bobby to Bobby's
cousin. Bobby was glowering at the audience and grumbling into Sally's
ear. Four rows in front of them, Beatrix sat silent at Lorimer's side.
The color had left her face again, and her eyes drooped heavily. It was
as if, in watching Arlt's overthrow, her old prescience of impending
disaster had come back upon her in fourfold measure, heightened by the
intensity of her exhilaration of a few moments before. When a quiet
woman is stirred from her usual poise, the pendulum of her nerves swings
in a long arc. The Dvorak dance had not deepened Sally's color; the
Damrosch song had not caused her to draw her white ostrich boa more
closely about her throat.

Thayer struck a vigorous major chord or two; then, with a sudden memory
of the dry glitter in Arlt's eyes, he modulated thoughtfully. His own
eyes rested again upon Beatrix during the few notes of the introduction,
and his mind went swiftly back to the day when he had sung the same
little song in her parlor. Half absently, his eyes were still upon her
face, as he came again to the closing words,--

"_I kiss each bead, and strive at last to learn
To kiss the cross, sweetheart, to kiss the cross._"

Unconsciously, uncontrollably, his eyes held hers, and he could see the
two great drops gather there, as she listened, her lips parted with her
deep, swift breathing. Then their eyes dropped apart, and the color
rushed into her cheeks while, with a sudden, impulsive gesture, she
slipped her hand into Lorimer's arm and pressed it until she felt the
returning, reassuring pressure.

Lorimer looked down at her with a smile.

"Spooky again, dear girl?" he asked, under cover of the applause which
had