An extraordinary change took place upon the surface of Florence Atwater:  all superciliousness and derision of the world vanished; her eyes opened wide, and into them came a look at once far-away and intently fixed.  Also, a frown of concentration appeared upon her brow, and her lips moved silently, but with rapidity, as if she repeated to herself something of almost tragic import.  Florence had recently read a newspaper account of the earlier struggles of a now successful actress:  As a girl, this determined genius went about the streets repeating the lines of various roles to herself—­constantly rehearsing, in fact, upon the public thoroughfares, so carried away was she by her intended profession and so set upon becoming famous.  This was what Florence was doing now, except that she rehearsed no role in particular, and the words formed by her lips were neither sequential nor consequential, being, in fact, the following:  “Oh, the darkness ... never, never, never! ... you couldn’t ... he wouldn’t ...  Ah, mother! ...  Where the river swings so slowly ...  Ah, no!” Nevertheless, she was doing all she could for the elderly stranger, and as they came closer, encountered, and passed on, she had the definite impression that he did indeed take her to be a struggling young actress who would some day be famous—­and then he might see her on a night of triumph and recognize her as the girl he had passed on the street, that day, so long ago!  But by this time, the episode was concluded; the footsteps of him for whom she was performing had become inaudible behind her, and she began to forget him; which was as well, since he went out of her life then, and the two never met again.  The struggling young actress disappeared, and the previous superiority was resumed.  It became elaborately emphasized as a boy of her own age emerged from the “side yard” of a house at the next corner and came into her view.

The boy caught sight of Florence in plenty of time to observe this emphasis, which was all too obviously produced by her sensations at sight of himself; and, after staring at her for a moment, he allowed his own expression to become one of painful fatigue.  Then he slowly swung about, as if to return into that side-yard obscurity whence he had come; making clear by this pantomime that he reciprocally found the sight of her insufferable.  In truth, he did; for he was not only her neighbour but her first-cousin as well, and a short month older, though taller than she—­tall beyond his years, taller than need be, in fact, and still in knickerbockers.  However, his parents may not have been mistaken in the matter, for it was plain that he looked as well in knickerbockers as he could have looked in anything.  He had no visible beauty, though it was possible to hope for him that by the time he reached manhood he would be more tightly put together than he seemed at present; and indeed he himself appeared to have some consciousness of insecurity in the fastenings of his members, for