opical twilight. The little mulatto, Babe, who seems to have Carlyle's implicit confidence, took full command of the situation. Mr. Farnam's valet and t

ing the name Narcissus from the bow, and substituting the name Hula Hula, an

ven-thirty, Carlyle rejoined Ardita, and, sinking back into his sette

ct of towering self-confidence erected on a slight foundation-just under the surface of each of his

rom her unquestioned charm. Though she was nineteen she gave the effect of a high-spirited precocious child, and in the present glow of her youth and beauty all the men and women she had known were but driftwood on the ripp

he contrary her instinct told her that this man was somehow completely pregnable and quite defenseless. When Ardita defied convention-and of late it had

d her as the prospect of a matineé might affect a ten-year-old child. She had implic

yacht and spread an avenue of glittering mail in her swift path. From time to time there was the bright flare of a match as one of them lighted a cigarette, but except for the low under-tone of the throbbin

ke the sile

've always wanted to be ri

ta y

be you," she

But you do seem to possess a

wouldn't c

our pa

it's my one redeemiug feature. I'm not

, I

e a coward. I'm neither." She paused for a moment, and eagerness crept into her tone

nically. "Going to wr

e to me by the moonligh

ld sliced chicken, salad, artichokes and strawberry jam from the plentiful larder below, Carlyle began to talk, hesitatingly at first, but ea

ldren-but there were inevitably a dozen pickaninnies streaming in his trail, passionate admirers whom he kept in tow by the vividness of his imagination and th

oys hum through. Before he was thirteen he was picking up a living teasing ragtime out of a battered violin in little cafés round Nashville. Eight years later the ragtime craze hit the country, and he took six darkies on the Orpheum circuit. Five of them were boys he had grown up with; the other was the little mulat

s life gibbering round a stage with a lot of black men. His act was good of its kind-three trombones, three saxaphones, and Carlyle's flute-and it was his own peculia

e wanted to separate from his sextet and go on as a regular pianist, they laughed at him and told him he was cra

aytime. After all, he was merely playing to r?le of the eternal monkey, a sort of sublimated chorus man. He was sick of the very smell of the theatre, of powder and rouge and the chatter of the greenroom, and the patronizing approval of the bo

rather contemptible; in short he wanted all those things which he was beginning to lump under the general head of aristocracy, an aristocracy which it seemed almost any money could buy except money made as he was

try better as a band leader-so he spent the war entertaining celebrities behind the line with a headquarters band. It was not so bad-except that when the infantry came limp

m the war the old routine started. We had an offer from a syn

looked at him expectantl

e of that enjoyment if I shared it with anyone else. I want to hang on to those few breathless, heroic mo

d together on the deck and their voices rose together in a haunting melody that

do

d

take me do

d

d

y to-mor

my say

my say

plaintive humming and it seemed as if minute by minute the brightness and the great silence were increasing until he could almost hear the midnight toilet of the

Beauty has got to be astonishing, astounding-it's got to bur

her, but sh

t you, Anita-I

er. She had been sound