Mr. Blynn----"

"Bite it off, Mame," ordered the boy. "Walk in, miss."

Susan, deeply colored from sympathy with the humiliated actress
and from nervousness in those forbidding and ominous
surroundings, entered the private office. The boy closed the
door behind her. The pen scratched on. Presently the man said:

"Well, my dear, what's your name?"

With the last word, the face lifted and Susan saw a seamed and
pitted skin, small pale blue eyes showing the white, or rather
the bloodshot yellow all round the iris, a heavy mouth and jaw,
thick lips; the lower lip protruded and was decorated with a
blue-black spot like a blood boil, as if to indicate where the
incessant cigar usually rested. At first glance into Susan's
sweet, young face the small eyes sparkled and danced, traveled
on to the curves of her form.

"Do sit down, my dear," said he in a grotesquely wheedling
voice. She took the chair close to him as it was the only one in
the little room.

"What can I do for you? My, how fresh and pretty you are!"

"Mr. Burlingham----" began Susan.

"Oh--you're the girl Bob was talking about." He smiled and
nodded at her. "No wonder he kept you out of sight." He
inventoried her charms again with his sensual, confident glance.
"Bob certainly has got good taste."

"He's in the hospital," said Susan desperately. "So I've come to
get a place if you can find me one."

"Hospital? I'm sorry to hear that." And Mr. Blynn's tones had
that accent of deep sympathy which get a man or woman without
further evidence credit for being "kind-hearted whatever else he is."

"Yes, he's very ill--with typhoid," said the girl. "I must do
something right away to help him."

"That's fine--fine," said Mr. Blynn in the same effective tone.
"I see you're as sweet as you are pretty. Yes--that's
fine--fine!" And the moisture was in the little eyes. "Well, I
think I can do something for you. I _must_ do something for you.
Had much experience?--Professional, I mean."

Mr. Blynn laughed at his, to Susan, mysterious joke. Susan
smiled faintly in polite response. He rubbed his hands and
smacked his lips, the small eyes dancing. The moisture had vanished.

"Oh, yes, I can place you, if you can do anything at all," he
went on. "I'd 'a' done it long ago, if Bob had let me see you.
But he was too foxy. He ought to be ashamed of himself, standing
in the way of your getting on, just out of jealousy. Sing or
dance--or both?"

"I