head so that actors and audience alike
might be encouraged by seeing that he gave the patronage of his
approval.

He did not immediately connect Aurora's English with a rankling
remembered episode, but the thing was burrowing in his subconsciousness,
and an arrow of light before long pierced his brain. He reconsidered the
conclusion upon which he had rested with regard to the black crow who at
the _veglione_ had put to him an impertinent question. Could it be
that not the particular lady whom he had fixed upon in his mind, as
being fond of Landini, consequently jealous of Mrs. Hawthorne, had by it
expressed her spite, but that--? He saw in a flash a different
possibility.

When the show was over and the performers had issued from the
dressing-rooms in the clothes of saner moments, Charlie Hunt approached
Mrs. Hawthorne, who, flushed with excitement, was looking almost too
much like an American Beauty rose. He paid his compliments in a tone
tinged with irony, all the while watching her with a penetrating,
inquiring, ironical eye. But the irony was wasted. She was too
pleasantly engrossed to perceive it.

"Has anybody here seen Mr. Fane?" she asked after a time, when her
glances had vainly sought him in every corner.

Estelle told her that she had not set eyes on him the whole evening;
and, which was more conclusive, little Lily Foss said he had not been
there.

CHAPTER XV

Aurora, unable to see beyond the footlights, had never dreamed but
Gerald was among the audience. Her capers had at moments been definitely
directed at him. Discovering that he had kept away, she was not so much
hurt as puzzled.

"Who'd have thought he cared enough about it to be so mean!" she said to
herself. "Well," she said further, "let him alone. He'll come round in a
day or two."

She really expected him that same day. When he did not come, or the day
after, or the day after that, she tried to recall passage for passage
their talk on the subject of the show. She did not remember his saying
anything that amounted to giving her a choice between renouncing it or
renouncing his friendship.

Then she reviewed all she knew of him; and his present conduct, if he
were by this avoidance trying to punish her for doing what it was the
prerogative of her native independence to do, did not seem in accordance
with his known regard for the rights of others.

Aurora did not know what to think. From hour to hour she looked for a
call, a mes