During the past two hours since he had breakfasted, he had watched the telephone as though it were a live thing—as though it were her lips which might speak to him at any moment He felt that she was there in the room with him, obstinately keeping silent.

She had told him not to disturb her till eleven, but he had persuaded himself that he would hear from her long before that—at nine, perhaps; at ten, at latest. She had tried to appear offhand in arranging the appointment because another man had been present He pretended to think it rather decent of her to have let the chap down so lightly.

During every minute of the last two hours, he had been expecting to hear the shrill tinkle of her summons. As he bent above his writing his heart was in his throat He kept glancing up, telling himself that his sixth sense had warned him that her voice was already asking its way across the wires. Though previous premonitions had proved unwarranted, he was confident that his latest was truly psychic.

Surely a girl who knew that she was loved wouldn’t sleep away the freshness of a blue September morning! Curiosity, if nothing better, would rouse her. It didn’t often happen that a man came three thousand miles to do his courting. She’d kept him waiting so long. If she felt one-tenth part of his impatience——

He finished his letter to his mother. It was all about his voyage and the interviews of yesterday. He ought to tell her more—but how, without telling her too much?

He scrawled a postscript, “By the way, yesterday I met Vashti”; then sealed the envelope. By the time an inquiry could be returned, he would know everything. He would know for certain whether Desire loved him. He pulled out his watch. A few minutes past ten! To keep his nerves quiet he made a pretense at working. He would outline the first of his series of articles.

But his thoughts wandered. There was no room in his mind for anything save her. She possessed him. The birdlike inflexions of her voice piped in his memory; he could hear her laughter, the murmur of her footsteps, the rustle of her dress. The subtle fragrance of her presence was all about him. In the silence of his brain she pleaded with him, taunted him, explained her omissions of consideration. “You don’t know what things have done to me—don’t know what things have done to me.”

It was useless; he gave up his attempt. All he had accomplished was to fill a page with sketches of her face. Here she was as he had seen her last night, fashionably attired, with her hair like a crown of bronze upon her forehead. And here as the Guinevere of that bewildering drive, mystic as the dawn in a web of shadows. And here as the coaxing, elusive sprite, who had scribbled her heart upon the dusty panes of childhood.

Would he ever be able to work again, ever be able to pursue any ambition or any dream in which she did not share?

He rose restlessly and fumbled for his watch. A minute to eleven! He stepped across to the telephone. While the boy at the switchboard was getting his number, he tapped with his foot, consumed with impatience.

“Madame Jodrell’s apartment?—I want to speak to Miss Desire.—Oh, no, I’m sure she’s not sleeping. You’re mistaken.” He laughed nervously. “This is Mr. Gurney. She asked me to ring her up at eleven.”

Silence. A long wait. “She’ll speak to you, sir.” The clicking of a new connection. He heard the receiver taken down at the other end and a curious sound which, after puzzling over, he decided must be the running of bathwater.

“Are you there?”

He listened.

“Is that you, Desire?”

No answer.

Then she gave herself away. Across the wire came to him a stifled yawn, followed by a bubbling little laugh.

“Yes, it’s Desire. What a lot of time you’re wasting. A whole minute! Time enough to decide the destiny of nations. And weren’t you punctual!—Can you come at once! Certainly not. Can’t you guess where I am? I shan’t be ready till twelve.—Oh, well, if you don’t mind waiting, I’ll expect you.”

He had intended to say more, but she rang off.

Streets were gilded with sunlight The sky was a smooth shell-like blue, without a cloud. It seemed much more distant than any sky he had seen in London. Over London the sky broods companionably; from London streets, even at their merriest the hint of melancholy is never absent But here, in New York, he was conscious of an invigorating reckless valor, a magnificent and lonely daring. It was every man for himself. There was no friendship between the city and the heavens; as ladders of stone were set up higher against the blue, the heavens receded in challenge.

There was a tang of autumn in the air. Leaves on trees began to have a brittle look. Everything shone: trolley-lines, windows, the slender height of sky-scrapers. It was a wide day—just the day for adventures.

As he passed further uptown, he noticed that people walked more leisurely; men’s faces grew rarer. He had a glimpse of the Park, a green valley of coolness between the quarried, sun-dazzled crags of the metropolis. Presently he turned off to the left, down one of those tunnels hewn between apartment-houses and sacred to the morning promenades of yapping dogs—proud little useless dogs like Twinkles, led on leashes by lately-risen mistresses. Then, in a flash, he saw the Hudson, going from one great quietness to another, sweeping down to the ocean full-bosomed and maternal from its sanctuary in the hills.

The elevator-boy seemed to have been warned of his coming; when he gave his name, he was taken up without suspicious preliminaries.

“Miss Desire hasn’t finished dressing yet,” the maid told, him. “If you’ll wait in here, she’ll be with you presently.”

He was shown into the room in which Vashti had played to him. He hadn’t taken much notice of it on his previous visit Now, as he tiptoed about he saw that it was expressive of its occupants’ personalities. It had a gay, delicate, insubstantial air. It didn’t look lived in. Everything could be packed up within an hour. It wasn’t a home; it was what Vashti had called a “perch.”

The furniture was slight and dainty, as though there for appearance rather than for use. The sofa by the window seemed the only piece meant to be sat on. On the table a dwarf Japanese garden was growing. Beside it lay a copy of Wisdom and Destiny, opened and turned face down. The books within sight were few, for the most part plays and the latest fiction. They were strewn about with a calculated carelessness. On the walls was a water-color of the Grand Canal and another of the Bay of Naples. The rest of the pictures were elaborate photos of actresses, with spidery signatures scrawled across them. One face predominated: the face of a beautiful woman, with a vague smile upon her childish, self-indulgent mouth and a soft mass of hair swathed about her head. She was taken in a variety of poses, but always with the same vague smile and always with her face stooping, as though she were trying to hypnotize the onlooker. One might have supposed that this was the den of a man who was in love with her. Scratched hurriedly in the corner of each of her portraits, prefaced by some extravagant sentiment, was the name “Fluffy.”

On the piano stood the photo of the only man in the collection, signed “To my dearest Girl.”

Teddy paused before it. He recognized the man who had brought Desire home last night—the man who had kept her from him. “To my dearest Girl.” He read and re-read it. Was that the secret of her indifference—that she was in love already? But wouldn’t Vashti have warned him? He stared his defiance. The more inaccessible she became to him, the more he felt the need of her. Something of the valor and bright hardness of the day had entered into his soul. He was like those tall buildings, climbing more recklessly into the blue every time the sky receded from them. He didn’t care who claimed her. He was glad that he would have to fight. She was his by the divine right of the dreamer, and had been his for years. At whatever sacrifice he would win her. Inconsistently, the more difficult she became to him, the more certain he grew of success.

“Hulloa, King Arthur! Getting impatient? I’ll soon be> with you.”

He stepped to the door and looked out into the passage. “Impatient! Of course I’m impatient. Where are you?”

Her laugh floated back. “Where you’re not allowed to come. You can’t complain; I told you I wouldn’t be dressed till twelve.”

“It’s nearer one by now.”

“Is it? But you’ve nothing to do. If you hunt about, you’ll find some cigarettes. Make yourself happy.”

He had hoped she would continue the conversation; but her voice grew secret as she whispered to her maid. He heard cupboards and drawers being opened and shut, a snatch of song, and, every now and then, the infectious gayety of her laughter.

He came back into the room and smiled at the photo on the piano. “She mayn’t be in love with me yet, but she’s certainly not in love with you,” he thought. Then he stood gazing at his unresponsive rival, wondering how much he could tell.

He was still intent upon the portrait when she danced across the threshold, swinging her gloves.

“Taking a look at Tom? Be careful; you’ll make him jealous.” She slipped her small hand into his. “I can’t tell you how good it is to see you.”

“D’you mean that—that you’re really glad?”

Her eyes sparkled with mischief, but she said demurely: “Why shouldn’t I mean it? I’m always glad to see my friends.—And now, don’t you think you’ve held my hand long enough? See how lonely it looks, just as if it were asking me to put on its glove.”

She tripped over to the window and gazed out. “Isn’t it glorious?—And I feel so happy—so full of life, so young.” Her back was towards him; she felt him drawing nearer. “I ought to tell you about my hands before we know each other better. They have names. The right one is Miss Self-Reliance, and the left Miss Independence. They’re both of them very ambitious and—” she swung round, lowering her eyes—“and they don’t like being held.” He glanced at the photo on the piano. “Did no one ever hold them?”

“Hardly any one, truth and honest” She finished the last button and winked at him solemnly. “Here have I been ready since eleven, sending you cables and whole gardens of flowers.” She burst out laughing: “I’m glad you don’t drizzle. Come on, I’m hungry for the sun.”

As they shot down in the elevator he asked her: “Drizzle! That’s a new word. What do you mean by it?”

“You’ll know soon enough.” She nodded. “Sooner or later all men do it. Tom drizzles most awfully. He drizzled last night, when I didn’t want him to come up because I thought you’d be in the apartment.”

“Then you did think that? You hadn’t forgot............