They were standing before the door of the ladies’ entrance to the hotel by this time, and the young man lifted his hat gravely.

“Your wish shall certainly be respected,” he said with courtesy, “yet that does not necessarily mean that our friendship is to end here.”

Her face became transfigured by a sudden smile, and she impulsively extended her hand.

“Assuredly not, if you can withstand my vagaries.  I have never made friends easily, and am the greater surprised at my unceremonious frankness with you.  Yet that only makes it harder to yield up a friendship when once formed.  Do you intend, then, to remain with the company?  I have no choice, but you have the whole world.”

“Yet, my intense devotion to the art of the Thespian holds me captive.”

Their eyes met smilingly, and the next instant the door closed quietly between them.

Winston turned aside and entered the gloomy hotel office, feeling mentally unsettled, undetermined in regard to his future conduct.  Miss Norvell had proven frankly intimate, delightfully cordial, yet overshadowing it all there remained unquestionably a certain constraint about both words and actions which continued to perplex and tantalize.  She had something in her past life to conceal; she did not even pretend to deceive him in this regard, but rather held him off with deliberate coolness.  The very manner in which this had been accomplished merely served to stimulate his eagerness to penetrate the mystery of her reserve, and caused him to consider her henceforth as altogether differing from other girls.  She had become a problem, an enigma, which he would try to solve; and her peculiar nature, baffling, changeable, full of puzzling moods, served to fascinate his imagination, to invite his dreaming.  A strange thrill swept him when he caught a fleeting glimpse of white skirt and well-turned ankle as she ran swiftly up the steep staircase, yet, almost at the same instant, he returned to earth with a sudden shock, facing Mooney, when the latter turned slowly away from the window and sneeringly confronted him.  The mottled face was unpleasantly twisted, a half-smoked cigar tilted between his lips.  An instant the half-angry eyes of the two men met.

“Must have made a conquest, from all appearances,” ventured the leading man with a knowing wink.  “Not so damned hard to catch on with, is she, when the right man tries it?”

There was a swift, passionate blow, a crash among the overturned chairs, and Mooney, dazed and trembling, gazed up from the floor at the rigid, erect figure towering threateningly above him, with squared shoulders and clenched fists.

“Utter another word like that, you cur,” said Winston, sternly, “and I ’ll break your head.  Don’t you dare doubt that I ’ll keep my word.”

For a breathless moment he stood there, glowering down at the shrinking wretch on the floor.  Then, his face, still set and white with passion, he turned contemptuously away.  Mooney, cursing cowardly behind his teeth, watched him ascend the stairs, but the younger man never so much as glanced below.