toward
her, she was sure. "When do--do you--try me?" she asked.

"Tomorrow night, at Bethlehem--a bum little town for us. We'll
stay there a couple of days. I want you to get used to
appearing." He nodded at her encouragingly. "You've got stuff in
you, real stuff. Don't you doubt it. Get self-confidence--conceit,
if you please. Nobody arrives anywhere without it. You want to
feel that you can do what you want to do. A fool's conceit is
that he's it already. A sensible man's conceit is that he can be
it, if he'll only work hard and in the right way. See?"

"I--I think I do," said the girl. "I'm not sure."

Burlingham smoked his cigar in silence. When he spoke, it was
with eyes carefully averted. "There's another subject the spirit
moves me to talk to you about. That's the one Miss Connemora
opened up with you yesterday." As Susan moved uneasily, "Now,
don't get scared. I'm not letting the woman business bother me
much nowadays. All I think of is how to get on my feet again. I
want to have a theater on Broadway before the old black-flagger
overtakes my craft and makes me walk the plank and jump out into
the Big Guess. So you needn't think I'm going to worry you. I'm not."

"Oh, I didn't think----"

"You ought to have, though," interrupted he. "A man like me is
a rare exception. I'm a rare exception to my ordinary self, to
be quite honest. It'll be best for you always to assume that every
man you run across is looking for just one thing. You know what?"

Susan, the flush gone from her cheeks, nodded.

"I suppose Connemora has put you wise. But there are some things
even she don't know about that subject. Now, I want you to
listen to your grandfather. Remember what he says. And think it
over until you understand it."

"I will," said Susan.

"In the life you've come out of, virtue in a woman's everything.
She's got to be virtuous, or at least to have the reputation of
it--or she's nothing. You understand that?"

"Yes," said Susan. "I understand that--now."

"Very well. Now in the life you're going into, virtue in a woman
is nothing--no more than it is in a man anywhere. The woman who
makes a career becomes like the man who makes a career. How is
it with a man? Some are virtuous, others are not. But no man
lets virtue bother him and nobody bothers about his virtue.
That's the way it is with a woman who cuts loose from the
conventional life of society and home and all that. S