"Do you suppose I'll have stage fright?"
"I think you've got it already."
"What do you mean, got it already?"
"You're afraid of life, and that's the same thing."
In a burst of nervous excitement, Finch whispered, hoarsely: "What do you think? I kissed Ada Leigh in this room to-night!"
"The deuce you did! No wonder you feel unreal. Did she like it?"
"I think so. We were reflected in the strangest way in the window. Our selves, only more beautiful."
"H'm." Renny regarded him with genial amusement. "Are you sure she didn't ask for it?"
"Of course I am." He reddened, but he still leaned over Renny's chair in a confidential attitude.
"Well, it's an experience for you. She's a pretty girl." Finch breathed hard. "Don't sprawl over me that way, snuffling in my face. Have you a cold?"
"Oh no." He straightened himself again, abashed.
Leigh's voice called from outside.
"Coming, Arthur!" Finch hastened out to his friend. . . .
Renny sat puffing at his cigarette, the glow of amusement still brightening his eyes. Young Finch making love! And it seemed like yesterday when he had turned Finch across his knee and warmed his seat. And now he was getting to be a man, poor devil!
He looked about him. An unreal room. Not a bit like the drawing-room at Jalna. Nothing homelike about it, with all these little pictures speckled over the walls, all the delicate furnishings, the fragile ornaments. But it suited the two pretty women. Odd, mysterious women, attractive, yet uncomfortable.
He rose as Ada Leigh, her face flowerlike above a white fur wrap, entered the room.
"Mother will be down in a moment," she said, stroking the fur of her deep collar.
Renny observed her hand. "Yes? Will you take this chair?"
"No, thanks, it's not worth while sitting down. We
