, but to Channing the story had
been oddly distasteful. "Faugh! What a woman! And yet I'll swear she's a
lady," he said, with an odd thought of introducing Mrs. Kildare to his
rigid family circle in the role of mother-in-law.

"Of course she is! A great lady, of a type we're not familiar with,
that's all. A relic of feudalism. I give you fair warning--don't monkey
with the buzz-saw!"

"Nonsense!" Channing flushed. "Who's monkeying with buzz-saws? You're
rather crude, you know."

"So is she. Don't you make any mistake about that! The Kildare is no
parlor product. A woman who's led the life she has," drawled Farwell,
"would be quite capable of protecting her children, even at the point of
a pistol, I fancy."

The author gave a short, angry laugh. "You're incurably dramatic, Morty!
You will carry your stage effects into real life. What do you think I'm
up to, anyway? You don't suppose I mean that pretty child any harm?"

Farwell rolled protesting eyes toward heaven. "The very suggestion
shocks me," he murmured. "But I have noticed that only the juice of the
orange interests you, old man. The rest of it you leave on your plate,
luxurious chap that you are!..."

His warning had its effect. There were no more stolen drives about the
country in Farwell's automobiles, much to Jacqueline's disappointment;
and once more Channing called in state at Storm, where he was received
cordially by Mrs. Kildare, and took very little notice of demure
Jacqueline in the background. So little, indeed, that Kate afterwards
felt it necessary to apologize for him.

"You're too young for Mr. Channing, Jacky dear. What a pity Jemima was
not here to talk to him! He's just the sort of man for her," she said.

Whereat Jacqueline's dimples became riotous, and she kept silence with
difficulty.

Channing's new caution, however, did not carry him to the length of
giving up his daily visits to the Ruin. He needed the girl too much. His
belonged to the class of creative brain that works only under the
stimulus of emotion. Channing was fond of saying that he took his
material red-hot out of life itself, and his novels represented a series
of personal experiences, psychological and otherwise, which perhaps
accounted for their marked success with a certain public.

Channing was not without genius. He had to a great degree the poet's
sensitiveness to all things exquisite, and added to that he had a gift
of facile expression. Subtleties of style, tha