recalled her figure as being--not exactly stubby, but at
least not of marked slenderness. Yet in the distance she was indeed
all that an audience could demand. And she was honest, while Mrs.
Rosenblatt, in the Majestic Theatre at Peoria, Illinois, had trifled
airily with his faith in women and deceived him by word of mouth.

He applauded loudly at the sensational finish, when Hortense, driving
her motor car at high speed across the great bridge, ran into the draw,
that opened too late for her to slow down, and plunged to the cruel
waters far below.

Mrs. Rosenblatt would possibly have been a fool to do this herself. The
Montague girl had been insistent on that point; there were enough things
she couldn't avoid doing, and all stars very sensibly had doubles for
such scenes when distance or action permitted. At the same time, he
could never again feel the same toward her. Indeed, he would never have
felt the same even had there been no Rosenblatt. Art was art!

It was only five o'clock when he left the picture theatre, but he ate
again at the luxurious cafeteria. He ate a large steak, drank an immense
quantity of milk, and bought another box of candy on his way to the
Patterson home. Lights were on there, and he went in to face the woman
he had so long kept out of her money. She would probably greet him
coldly and tell him she was surprised at his actions.

Yet it seemed that he had been deceived in this society woman. She was
human, after all. She shook hands with him warmly and said they were
glad to see him back; he must have been out on location, and she was
glad they were not to lose him, because he was so quiet and regular and
not like some other motion-picture actors she had known.

He told her he had just put in a hard week on the Holden lot, where
things were beginning to pick up. He was glad she had missed him, and he
certainly had missed his comfortable room, because the accommodations on
the lot were not of the best. In fact, they were pretty unsatisfactory,
if you came right down to it, and he hoped they wouldn't keep him there
again. And, oh, yes--he was almost forgetting. Here was ten dollars--he
believed there were two weeks' rent now due. He passed over the money
with rather a Clifford Armytage flourish.

Mrs. Patterson accepted the bill almost protestingly. She hadn't once
thought about the rent, because she knew he was reliable, and he was to
remember that any time convenient to him would always s