Paul would have approached her, but a mere motion
of her fine eyebrows warned him off. He ate little, but he drank a good
deal of wine, and was gay and moody by turns as he was driven home. And
far into the night in his own room he walked up and down and made verses
and raved them in whispers to himself, because Darco slept in the next
apartment, and was not at all the man to be wisely awakened by the voice
of Love's young dream. He drew his curtains apart and opened his window
on the scented night, and took the moon and stars into his confidence,
and the kisses bit softly down into his heart like fire.

Other scenes there were in which the cunning damsel betrayed Paul into
the belief that he was an ennobling and lofty influence in her life. She
was rigid in her choice of topics for conversation, but she ornamented
her speech now and then with an almost masculine embroidery, and once
she caught Paul looking at her with a shocked and wounded air.

'I caught your look,' she said, as soon as she could speak to him alone.
'I know what it meant, and, oh! you made me hate myself. There isn't
any real harm in it--I mean, it isn't wicked--but it isn't refined or
womanly, and I'll 'never do it again--never, never, never, for my dear
little Paul's sake. And Paul shall have a kiss for teaching Claudia a
lesson. Naughty Claudia!'

And again one day at rehearsal Miss Belmont ordered a brandy-and-soda,
and Paul's face clouded; and Claudia was penitent, and Paul got more
kisses for helping naughty Claudia to forget these man-like habits.

The boy's infatuation chimed in with a growing liking for the stage, and
he volunteered to work there with so much ardour that Darco was newly
pleased with him, and gave him ample opportunity. So he saw more and
more of Claudia, and made some progress in his new craft, and the
foolish game of love went on, until it brought about a crisis.

It was three o'clock on Friday afternoon, and Paul was at the theatre,
seated in the manager's room, counting and putting into envelopes the
weekly salaries of the company. He had just consigned the two crispest
and cleanest of his small stock of five-pound notes and the brightest
half-sovereign to an envelope bearing the name of Miss Claudia Belmont,
when the lady herself tapped at the door and entered.

'I wanted to see you alone, Paul dear,' she said, 'and so I came over
early. I have a piece of news for you. It is very sad news for me, but I
am afraid you