ose admiration and
shy swift friendship he was losing. His vanity refused to accept this
at first. She was a little piqued at him because of the growing intimacy
with Valencia. That was all. Why, it had been only a month or two ago
that her gaze had been warm for him, that her playful irony had mocked
sweetly his ambition for service to the community. Their spirits had
touched in comradeship. Almost he had caught in her eyes the look they
would hold for only one man on earth. The best in him had responded to
the call. But now he did not often meet her at The Brakes. When he did a
cool little nod and an indifferent word sufficed for him. How much this
hurt only James himself knew.

One of the visible signs of his increasing prosperity was a motor car,
in which he might frequently be seen driving with the daughter of Joe
Powers, to the gratification of its owner and the envy of Verden. The
cool indifference with which Mrs. Van Tyle ignored the city's social
elite had aroused bitter criticism. Since she did not care a rap for
this her escapades were frankly indiscreet. James could not really
afford a machine, but he justified it on the ground that it was an
investment. A man who appears to be prosperous becomes prosperous. A
good front is a part of the bluff of twentieth century success. He did
not follow his argument so far as to admit that the purchase of the
car was an item in the expenses of a campaign by which he meant to make
capital out of a woman's favor to him, even though his imagination toyed
with the possibilities it might offer to build a sure foundation of
fortune.

"You should go to New York," she told him once after he had sketched,
with the touch of eloquence so native to him, a plan for a line of
steamers between Verden and the Orient.

"To be submerged in the huddle of humanity. No, thank you."

"But the opportunities are so much greater there for a man of ability."

"Oh, ability!" he derided. "New York is loaded to the water line with
ability in garrets living on crusts. To win out there a man must have
a pull, or he must have the instinct for making money breed, for taking
what other men earn."

She studied him, a good-looking, alert American, sheet-armored in the
twentieth century polish of selfishness, with an inordinate appetite for
success. Certainly he looked every inch a winner.

"I believe you could do it. You're not too scrupulous to look out for
yourself." Her daring impudence mocked h