beth's mind
like a burden, and by degrees she found herself giving the play place
of honour in her thoughts over and above her own little ventures. With
this stupendous thing hanging in the balance, it seemed almost wicked
of her to devote a moment to wondering whether the editor of an evening
paper, who had half promised to give her the entrancing post of Adviser
to the Lovelorn on his journal, would fulfil that half-promise.

At an early stage in their friendship the young man had told her the
plot of the piece; and if he had not unfortunately forgotten several
important episodes and had to leap back to them across a gulf of one or
two acts, and if he had referred to his characters by name instead of
by such descriptions as 'the fellow who's in love with the girl--not
what's-his-name but the other chap'--she would no doubt have got that
mental half-Nelson on it which is such a help towards the proper
understanding of a four-act comedy. As it was, his precis had left her
a little vague; but she said it was perfectly splendid, and he said did
she really think so. And she said yes, she did, and they were both
happy.

Rehearsals seemed to prey on his spirits a good deal. He attended them
with the pathetic regularity of the young dramatist, but they appeared
to bring him little balm. Elizabeth generally found him steeped in
gloom, and then she would postpone the recital, to which she had been
looking forward, of whatever little triumph she might have happened to
win, and devote herself to the task of cheering him up. If women were
wonderful in no other way, they would be wonderful for their genius for
listening to shop instead of talking it.

Elizabeth was feeling more than a little proud of the way in which her
judgement of this young man was being justified. Life in Bohemian New
York had left her decidedly wary of strange young men, not formally
introduced; her faith in human nature had had to undergo much
straining. Wolves in sheep's clothing were common objects of the
wayside in her unprotected life; and perhaps her chief reason for
appreciating this friendship was the feeling of safety which it gave
her.

Their relations, she told herself, were so splendidly unsentimental.
There was no need for that silent defensiveness which had come to seem
almost an inevitable accompaniment to dealings with the opposite sex.
James Boyd, she felt, she could trust; and it was wonderful how
soothing the reflexion was.

And that