sighed softly. Hard felt an
unreasonable desire, almost an angry desire to take her in his arms. It
was a feeling unlike him, usually so moderate in his emotions.

"Clara," he said, softly, "were you thinking of him when you sighed?"

Clara started. "Him!" she echoed, helplessly.

"Yes, Dick Conrad."

"Not exactly, Henry. I was thinking of that terrible trip we took through
the mountains--yes, I was in a way thinking of Dick."

"You were very happy together, weren't you? You were awfully in love with
him, I mean. I'm not being impertinent, am I, Clara? You know I don't
intend to be."

"No, Henry, I understand. I don't believe I'm the kind of woman who falls
in love--at least, in the way most people mean. There's nothing very
violent about me except once in a while when I get to singing something
which takes hold of me pretty hard.

"Richard and I had a rather exciting little love affair, then after a
while we both began to realize that we weren't very romantic--in regard to
people. He was passionately devoted to adventure of every kind, and I had
a way of putting my best into music. I didn't feel heart-broken when I
found out that we really weren't anything more than good friends and
neither did he.

"I'd cheerfully give all I've got to bring Dick back; I get lonesome for
him--awfully. And yet, that isn't exactly the sort of thing that the
average person means by 'love,' is it?"

"It would have made me very happy once to know that you cared that much
for me," answered Hard, bitterly.

"I did. I always did, Henry. Only we were--so near, so much a part of each
other--like cousins. I called it friendship instead of love," cried Clara,
warmly.

"What difference does it make what you call it? Two people like to be
together, seem to fit into one another's lives, isn't that love?"

Clara smiled. "It's not the kind of love that Polly Street will give the
man she marries," she said. "You know that as well as I. And it's not a
matter of years, it's temperament. An actress told me once that when it
came to a question of comparison between her married life and her stage
life, she could say instantly that it was her stage life that had meant
the most to her. She was happily married, too. I'm a bit like her. I can
get more downright exaltation over my music when it goes right than I ever
got out of any love affair. I think my talent is for friendship rather
than for love."

"Clara," Hard's voice shook, "I tell you, yo