me enamored with noise; it is quite possible."

"I have lived in London. I thought it was going to be hard to break
away, but it wasn't."

They lighted cigars, and Bennington took up the photograph again.

"A lovely face," was his comment.

"With a heart and a mind even more lovely," supplemented Warrington.
"She is one of the most brilliant women I have ever met, and what is
more, humorous and good-humored. My word for it, she may have equals,
but she has no superiors on this side of the ocean."

Bennington looked up sharply.

"Nothing serious?" he asked gently.

"Serious? No. We are capital friends, but nothing more. There's been
too much comradeship to admit anything like sentimentality. Ah, boy,
you should see her act!"

"I have. I saw her in London last season. She was playing your War of
Women. She appeared to me enchanting. But about these actresses ..."

"I know, I know," interrupted Warrington. "Some of them are bad, but
some of them are the noblest creatures God ever put on earth; and
yonder is one of them. I remember. Often we were both in debt; plays
went wrong; sometimes I helped her out, sometimes she returned the
favor. We were more like two men. Without her help I shouldn't be
where I am to-day. I always read the scenario of a play to her first;
and often we've worked together half a night on one scene. I shall
miss her."

"What! Is she going away?"

"After a fashion. She has retired from the stage."

"Do you believe she means it?" asked Bennington. "You know how
changeable actresses' moods are."

"I think Miss Challoner will never act again. She has always been an
enigma to the majority of the show people. Never any trumpets,
jewelry, petty squabbles, lime-lights, and silks; she never read
criticisms, save those I sent her. Managers had to knock on her
dressing-room door. Oh, I do not say that she is an absolute paragon,
but I do say that she is a good woman, of high ideals, loyal,
generous, frank, and honest. And I have often wondered why the devil I
couldn't fall in love with her myself," moodily.

Bennington was silent for a moment. Finally he said: "How does it feel
to be famous, to have plays produced simultaneously in New York and
London?"

"After the first success there is never anything but hard work. A
failure once in a while acts like a tonic. And sometimes we get an
anonymous letter that refreshes us--a real admirer, who writes from
the heart and doesn't fish for a letter