ingly good clothes are pretty
nearly always equivalent to a sign saying, 'I've already been
discovered, thank you!' But the really big sport of existence, young
man, is to strike out somewhere and discover things for yourself!"

"Is--it?" scoffed Barton.

"It is!" asserted the Older Man. "The woman, I tell you, who fathoms
heroism in the fellow that every one else thought was a knave--she's
got something to brag about! The fellow who's shrewd enough to spy
unutterable lovableness in the woman that no man yet has ever even
remotely suspected of being lovable at all--God! It's like being Adam
with the whole world virgin!"

"Oh, that may be all right in theory," acknowledged the Younger Man,
with some reluctance. "But--"

"Now, speaking of Miss Edgarton," resumed the Older Man monotonously.

"Oh, hang Miss Edgarton!" snapped the Younger Man. "I wouldn't be seen
talking to her! She hasn't any looks! She hasn't any style! She hasn't
any--anything! Of all the hopelessly plain girls! Of all the--!"

"Now see here, my young friend," begged the Older Man blandly. "The
fellow who goes about the world judging women by the sparkle of their
eyes or the pink of their cheeks or the sheen of their hair--runs a
mighty big risk of being rated as just one of two things, a sensualist
or a fool."

"Are you trying to insult me?" demanded the Younger Man furiously.

Freakishly the Older Man twisted his thin-lipped mouth and one
glowering eyebrow into a surprisingly sudden and irresistible smile.

"Why--no," he drawled. "Under all existing circumstances I should
think I was complimenting you pretty considerably by rating you only
as a fool."

"Eh?" jumped Barton again.

"U-m-m," mused the Older Man thoughtfully. "Now believe me, Barton,
once and for all, there 's no such thing as a 'hopelessly plain
woman'! Every woman, I tell you, is beautiful concerning the thing
that she's most interested in! And a man's an everlasting dullard who
can't ferret out what that interest is and summon its illuminating
miracle into an otherwise indifferent face--"

"Is that so?" sniffed Barton.

Lazily the Older Man struggled to his feet and stretched his arms
till his bones began to crack.

"Bah! What's beauty, anyway," he complained, "except just a question
of where Nature has concentrated her supreme forces--in outgrowing
energy, which is beauty; or ingrowing energy, which is brains! Now I
like a little good looks as well as anybody," he conf