had carried credentials to the
Bedient throne, to the very crown-cabinet of his empire, the fine and
enduring spirit in her brilliant eyes.

They met in the studio on the business basis. It was a gray day, one of
those soft, misty, growing days. She was a trifle taller than he had
thought. Something of the world-habit was about her, or world-wear, a
professionalism that work had taught her, and a bit of humor now and
then. The studio was filled with pictures, many studies of her own,
bits of Paris and Florence, many flowers and heads. There was one door
which opened into a little white room. The door was only partly open,
and it was shut altogether presently. Bedient had only looked _within_
it once, but reverently. Besides, there was a screen which covered an
arcanum, from which tea and cakes and sandwiches came on occasion. An
upright piano, some shelves of books, an old-fashioned mantle and
fire-place; and the rest--pictures and yellow-brown hangings and
lounges. He wondered if anyone ever saw Beth's pictures so deeply as
he.... She was in her blouse. The gray light subdued the richness of
her hair, but made her pallor more luminous. She was very swift and
still in her own house.

A chair was placed for him, and Beth went back to her stool under the
light. Occasionally she asked him to look at certain pictures in her
room, studying him as he turned. She told him of adorable springtimes
in Florence; how once she had asked a beautiful Italian peasant boy to
help her with an easel, and some other matters, up a long flight of
marble steps, and he had answered, with drowsy gentleness, "Please ask
another boy, Signorina. I have dined to-day."... And Bedient watched,
when her head was bowed over the board upon her knee. Her hair, so
wonderful now in the shadows, made amazing promises for sunlit days.
Uncommon energy was in his heart, and a buoyant activity of mind that
formed, one after another, ideals for her happiness.

"Yesterday at this time," she said finally, "Vina Nettleton was here.
She spoke of your great help in her work----"

"Her studio was thrilling to me.... Altogether, getting back to New
York has been my greatest experience."

"You have been away very long?"

"So long that I don't remember leaving, nor anything about it, except
the boats and whistles, the elevated railways and the Park, and certain
strains of music. I remember seeing the animals, and the hall of that
house----"

"Where the light fri