"Oh, Demming wrote that she was bound to come. You can never tell what ails a woman anyhow. Probably she has a lover over here somewhere."

Herman made no reply save by an involuntary lowering of his heavy brows, and Rangely brought the conversation back to its starting-point by asking:

"But what about Nick Featherstone?"

"Oh, Nick? Well, Nick tried to kiss her yesterday, and she offered to stab him with some sort of a devilish dagger arrangement she carries about like an opera heroine."

"Featherstone is always a strong temptation to an honest man's boot,"

growled Herman out of his beard, as he sat with his head sunk upon his breast, staring into the fire.

"They had a scene that wouldn't have done discredit to a first-cla.s.s opera-bouffe company," Bently went on, laughing at the remembrance.

"Nick was fool enough to hollo to somebody in the next room, and the result was that we all came trooping in like a chorus. It was absurd enough."

And he laughed afresh.

"But the girl?" persisted Grant Herman, not removing his gaze from the fire. "How did she take it?"

"Oh, she was as calm and cold as you please. She gathered herself together and went off without any fuss."

"I wish when you are done with her, you'd send her round to me," Herman rejoined. "I want a model for a figure, and if I remember her, she'll do capitally."

He rose as he spoke, with the air of a man who intends going home.

"By the way," Fenton said to him, "isn't the Pagan night next week?

Don't you have it this month?"

"Yes; you'll get your invitations sometime or other. Good night all."

"Oh, don't break good company," Rangely remonstrated. "I have half a bottle here, and I do hate an alcoholic soliloquy."

But the movement for departure was general, and in a few moments more the members of the company were wending their individual ways homeward through the pelting rain.

III.

THE SHOT OF ACCIDENT.

Oth.e.l.lo; iv.--i.

The sun shone brightly in at the windows of a little bare studio next morning, as if to atone for the gloom of the darkness and storm of the night. The Midas touch of its rays fell upon the hair of Helen Greyson, turning its wavy locks into gold as she softly sang over her modeling.

She seemed to find in her work a joy which accorded well with the bright day. Pinned to the wall was an improved sketch of the bas-relief whose design had attracted Fenton's notice in her portfolio, while before the artist stood a copy in clay, upon which she was working with those mysterious touches which to the uninitiated are mere meaningless dabs, yet under which the figures were growing into sightliness and beauty.

Suddenly her song was interrupted by the sound of footsteps without, followed by a tap upon her door.

"Come," she called; and Grant Herman entered in response to the invitation.

He carried in his arms a large vase, about whose sides green and golden dragons coiled themselves in fantastic relief.

"Your vase came from the kiln," he said, "and I knew you would want to see it at once. It is the most successful firing they have done here."

"Oh, I am so glad," she returned, laying down her modeling tools, and approaching him eagerly. "I was sure there wouldn't be a head or a tail left by the time the poor monsters came out of the fiery furnace. What a splendid color that back is! And that golden fin is gorgeous."

"Yes, Mrs. Greyson," Herman said, "you have produced a veritable dragon's brood this time. I can almost hear them hiss."

"Do you know," she responded, smoothing the glittering shapes with half chary touches. "I should not be wholly willing to have the vase in my room at night. They might, you know, come to life and go gliding about in a ghastly way."

"I always wondered," the sculptor observed, "that Eve had the courage to talk with the serpent. Do you suppose she squealed when she saw him?"

"Oh, no, she probably divined that mischief was brewing, and that contented her."

Herman had set the vase where all its gorgeous hues were brought out by the sun, which sparkled and danced upon every spine and scale of the writhing monsters. He walked away from it to observe the effect at a greater distance.

"There is no pleasure like that of creating," he said. "Man is a G.o.d when he can look on his work and p.r.o.nounce it good."

"Which is seldom," she returned, "unless in the one instant after its completion when we still see what we intended rather than what we have made."

"It is fortunate our work cannot rise up to reproach us for the wide difference between our intents and our performances. Fancy one of my statues taking me to task because it hasn't the glory it had in my brain."

"It is on that account," Mrs. Greyson said smiling, "that I fancy Galatea must have been most uncomfortable to live with. Whenever Pygmalion found fault, she had always the retort ready: 'At least I am exactly what you chose to make me.' Poor Pygmalion!"

"It was no more true than in the case of every man that marries; we all bow down to ideals, I suppose. Except," he added with a little hesitation, "myself, of course."

The words were somewhat awkward in the hesitating accent which gave them a suggestiveness at which the faintest of flushes mounted to her cheek. She bent her observations more closely on the vase.

"It is fired so much better than the last miserable failure," observed she, going to a shelf and reaching after a dusty vase, ma.s.sive and fantastic, which had been ruined in the kiln.

"Let me help you," Herman said.

But she had already loosened the vase, which proved heavier than she expected, and it was only by darting forward, and throwing his arms about her, that the sculptor was enabled to save her from a severe blow. The vase fell crashing to the floor, breaking into heavy shards, rattling the windows and the casts upon the wall by the concussion.

An exclamation escaped him. He had drawn Mrs. Greyson backward, and for a brief instant, held her in his strong clasp. It was an accident which to mere acquaintances might mean nothing; to lovers, every thing.

Herman was for a moment pale with the fear that Helen might be injured; then the hot blood surged into his cheeks as he released his hold and stepped back, He bent over the fragments of the vase that she might not see his face, and by so doing, as he reflected afterward, he failed to perceive what was her expression. He straightened himself with an impetuous movement, and came a step nearer.

"How can you be so careless?" he demanded, almost with irritation. "It might have killed you."

"I did not remember that it was so heavy," she returned, a little pale and panting. "Do you think I was trying to pull it on my head? I am very much obliged, though. You have saved me a heavy blow at least.

There is not much left of that unlucky vase. It was always ill-starred."

"All's well that ends well," returned the sculptor, sufficiently recovering his self-control to speak lightly; "only don't run such a risk another time."

"Oh, I a.s.sure you," she replied, "I do not make my vases either to break my head or to be broken themselves. I shall take better care of this one, you may be confident."

"I was more concerned for yourself than for the vase."

"For myself it really does not so much matter."