other ambition than to
muddle round the golf links a few strokes better than his partner."

"And you?" she asked.

"It is success I seek," he answered. "Women, as a rule, do not
understand. You, for instance, Beatrice, are too sentimental. I am very
practical. It is money that I want. I want money because money means
success."

"And afterwards?" she whispered.

He was attending to her no longer. They were turning now into the broad
thoroughfare at the bottom of the lane, at the end of which a tram-car
was waiting. He scribbled a few, final notes into his pocket-book.

"To-morrow," he exclaimed, with the joy of battle in his tone,
"to-morrow the fight begins in earnest!"

Beatrice passed her hand through his arm.

"Not only for you, dear friend, but for me," she said. "For you? What do
you mean?" he asked quickly.

"I have been trying to tell you all day," she continued, "but you have
been too engrossed. Yesterday afternoon I went to see Mr. Grier at the
Atlas Theatre. I had my voice tried, and to-morrow night I am going to
take a small part in the new musical comedy."

Tavernake stared at her in something like consternation. His ideas as
to the stage and all that belonged to it were of a primitive order. Mrs.
Fitzgerald was perhaps as near as possible to his idea of the type. He
glanced incredulously at Beatrice--slim, quietly dressed, yet with the
unmistakable, to him mysterious, distinction of breeding.

"You an actress!" he exclaimed.

She laughed softly.

"Dear Leonard," she said, "this is going to be a part of your education.
To-morrow night you shall come to the theatre and wait for me at the
stage-door."

CHAPTER XI. A BEWILDERING OFFER

Elizabeth stood with her hands behind her back, leaning slightly against
the writing-table. The professor, with his broad-brimmed hat clinched
in his fingers, walked restlessly up and down the little room. The
discussion had not been altogether a pleasant one. Elizabeth was
composed but serious, her father nervous and excited.

"You are mad, Elizabeth!" he declared. "Is it that you do not
understand, or will not? I tell you that we must go."

She shrugged her shoulders.

"Where would you drag me to?" she asked. "We certainly can't go back to
New York."

He turned fiercely upon her.

"Whose fault is it that we can't?" he demanded. "If it weren't for you
and your confounded schemes, I could be walking down Broadway next week.
God's own city it is,