REAL LIFE 
 
BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 
 THE REAL ADVENTURE 
 THE PAINTED SCENE 
 THE THOROUGHBRED 
 
 AN AMERICAN FAMILY 
 MARY WOLLASTON 
 
"We'll have to have some more of those nuts." 
 
 See page 196 
 
REAL LIFE 
 
 Into Which Miss Leda Swan of Hollywood 
 Makes an Adventwroibs Excursion 
 
 By 
 HENRY KITCHELL WEBSTER 
 
 Illustrated by 
 EVERETT SHINN 
 
 im 
 
 INDIANAPOLIS 
 
 THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY 
 
 PUBLISHERS 
 
Copyright 1921 
 The Metropolitan Publications, Inc 
 
 Copyright 1 921 
 The Bobbs-Merrill Company 
 
 It! 
 
 Printed in the Vnited States of America 
 
 PRESS OF 
 
 BRAUNWORTH & CO. 
 
 BOOK MANUFACTURERS 
 
 BROOKLYN, N. V. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 I The Golden Arrow . . 
 
 II Parenthesis . . - . ^ 
 
 III The Flight of the Princess 
 
 IV The Brown Taxi . . . 
 
 V Trapped ...--. ^ 
 VI The Yacht 
 
 VII The Inquisitors . ^ . ^ 
 
 VIII The Pebble that Started the 
 
 IX The Fog-Bell . . . u 
 
 X Fate of the Mutineer . . 
 XI Progress of the Avalanche 
 
 XII Into the Primitive ,. » . 
 
 XIII The Dune-Bug .... 
 
 XIV Revelation .„...,- 
 XV The Cottage ..... 
 
 XVI The Vampire 
 
 XVII Out of the Looking-Glass 
 
 XVIII The Fifth Reel , 
 
 XIX The Fire-Escape w . . u 
 
 XX The Princess Skids - ,. . 
 XXI The Return of the Princess 
 
 ^:47249 
 
REAL LIFE 
 
REAL LIFE 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE GOLX)EN ARROW 
 
 THE PRINCESS through a timeless instant 
 gazed entranced at the most beautiful young 
 man she had ever seen since she first began seeing 
 young men, as such, at all ; a matter of half a dozen 
 years perhaps. For the Princess was barely twenty. 
 He was not looking at her. His gaze was all 
 abroad, expressive of an adventurousness some- 
 what timid and a confusion half enjoyed over the 
 bedlam of sound and movement that enveloped him. 
 It was a look that detached him utterly from his sur- 
 roundings. Propelled, feathered by his extraordin- 
 ary beauty, it flew like an arrow straight to the 
 golden heart of the Princess. It was the first shaft 
 that had ever found that mark. She fell in love, she 
 was afterward to decide, then. 
 
 II 
 
12 REAL LIFE 
 
 Granted another mere shred of time for reflec- 
 tion she wcuid have reahzed this upon the spot. But 
 almost simultaneously another arrow, and this a 
 lethal one, pierced her consciousness. 
 
 The beautiful young man had in all probability 
 but a few seconds more to live! This was the 
 unanimous conviction of the horror-struck by-stand- 
 ers, who, according to their individual tempera- 
 ments, screamed at him or merely stared. 
 
 He stood between two towering buildings in the 
 mouth of an alley out of which — and wanting 
 nearly the whole width of it — was backing a jugger- 
 naut of a motor truck. Its note of warning, 
 perfunctorily and continuously uttered, a thin, com- 
 plaining note ludicrously disproportionate to its 
 monstrous bulk, was engulfed in the pandemonium 
 of rush-hour downtown traffic, the shrieking brakes 
 of an elevated train coming into its station half a 
 block away, the thuttering of a hundred motor cars 
 . converging upon the entrance to Orchestra Hall 
 around the corner, where the world's greatest violin- 
 ist had just finished a recital, the shrill of police- 
 men's whistles, the shouts, frantic now, of "Look 
 out!" 
 
 The beautiful young man seemed trying to look 
 
THE GOLDEN ARROW 13 
 
 out, but in what direction he should look he did not 
 know, and in another three breaths one of those 
 great double-treaded driving wheels was going to 
 mangle the life out of him. 
 
 With an expertness summoned from her forgot- 
 ten past by the agony of need, the Princess acted. 
 She sprang upon the young man — a diving tackle 
 brilliantly timed and executed. They went down 
 together. They slid as one mass in the thin coating 
 of slime which a passing shower had surfaced the 
 alley with, and wedged against the farther curb. 
 The great double-treaded wheel went by, missing 
 them by a hand's breadth. 
 
 The next few minutes had for her the quality 
 of one of those restless dreams wherein one does 
 ludicrous things in the deadliest frantic earnest; 
 packs useless and untransportable objects into a dis- 
 proportionate trunk for a preposterous railway 
 journey, is obliged to sally forth, because the time 
 is so short, clad in nothing but a night-dress and 
 two left gloves, looks vainly for a taxi in the 
 crowded staring street and catches, faute de mieux, 
 a passing hearse — that sort of dream. 
 
 She who had been but a moment ago the Prin- 
 cess, dignified, exquisitely clad, the target of sud- 
 
14 REAU LIFE 
 
 denly illuminated glances of awed recognition, was 
 choking now in a violet cloud of partly burned gaso- 
 line vapor, deafened by the clash of furiously idle 
 machinery, struggling to extricate herself from a 
 mass of which she seemed to have become an indis- 
 soluble part, though the other half of it was 
 struggling too, as blindly as she, toward the accom- 
 plishment of the same purpose. 
 
 She was, in a general sort of way, on top of 
 him, but for some nightmare reason it seemed impos- 
 sible for her to rise. Her arm, she presently real- 
 ized, was between him and the asphalt. She could 
 feel cold mud all the way up to her elbow, along with 
 the gritty remains of her platinum wrist watch. 
 Also it was as if something tied her legs. Her 
 skirt, a plaited thing, must be under him too. 
 
 "Roll over," she commanded. "Roll off my 
 hand — no, the other way." 
 
 This produced a convulsive activity on his part 
 which eventually liberated her. They rose simul- 
 taneously and bumped their heads against the over- 
 hanging floor of the motor van (it was like, she 
 reflected — horribly like a scene in a Mack Sennett 
 comedy, only without a camera. But suppose — 
 good God! — there was one after all!), and scram- 
 
, I J ', , ' , 
 
He dropped back limp against the cushion 
 
 See page 4S 
 
THE GOLDEN ARROW 15 
 
 bled out to confront an already densely formed ring 
 of excited faces. 
 
 There was a spectacled, button-nosed young man 
 with a deep voice and an authoritative manner who 
 seemed to perceive in the crisis a chance to do some- 
 thing tremendous. And in another instant there 
 was an oil-streaked person in a cap, the driver of 
 the truck, who, as his first words made evident, 
 regarded himself as the aggrieved party to the 
 affair, whatever its outcome. These two were the 
 only individualities. The rest of the crowd were 
 mere mites in the cheese: their sole property was 
 that of occupying space. 
 
 The spectacled young man disagreed with the 
 truck-driver's views, and made bold, in a bluntly 
 expostulatory manner, to say so. He was cut short 
 by an inquiry as to whose (qualified by three inten- 
 sives) business this was anyway, and a contingent 
 observation upon the painful consequences of med- 
 dling. There was enough prospect, in a word, of a 
 street fight to divert momentarily the attention of 
 the swarming maggots from the pair that had just 
 missed annihilation- 
 Coming along in a hurry from the boulevard 
 comer, where he had left the traffic to take care 
 
i6 REAL LIFE 
 
 of itself, was a policeman. There remained a hand- 
 ful of precious seconds before he could arrive, and 
 the heart of the Princess gave a flutter of hope. 
 Much nearer than the policeman, right here at the 
 curb, stood a yellow taxi, its door open, its just- 
 discharged passenger standing beside the chauf- 
 feur's seat, his money in his hand, arrested in the 
 act of paying his fare by the ei"uption of this emo- 
 tional Mount Vesuvius in the mouth of the alley. 
 Once more the Princess acted with that electrical 
 blue-spark sort of decision which no merely inert 
 obstacle can stand against. She pierced the crowd 
 like a lance and leaped into the taxi ; and as she had 
 her beautiful young man firmly by the hand when 
 she did so, he came stumbling in after her. The 
 chauffeur, not at all the sort to be dazed by sudden 
 events, lowered his flag, slammed the door after 
 them and inquired, "Where to?'' 
 
 "Anywhere," cried the Princess, "out of this!" 
 The taxi, on the strength of a good hot motor, 
 started on second, leaped into high as it passed the 
 policeman, and, taking advantage of his absence 
 from the post of authority on the comer, omitted 
 the obligatory pause. It skidded smartly around 
 into the boulevard and headed south. 
 
THE GOLDEN ARROW 17 
 
 Another taxi, much more pretentious — a seal- 
 brown affair with a coat-of-arms painted on the 
 door panels — which had been waiting a door or two 
 away in front of a Httle bookshop, and idle except 
 for the tick of its meter, gave a convulsive start just 
 then and moved off as if in pursuit. But it missed 
 the opportune moment at the corner and had to wait 
 for a condensation in the stream of traffic to go by. 
 
 The crowd about the mouth of the alley was 
 thicker than ever, despite the sudden disappearance 
 of, as it were, the corpus delicti, when the police- 
 man arrived. 
 
 More people were talking. The truck-driver 
 was in the minority, the more deeply aggrieved for 
 having none to share his views. The button-nosed 
 young man in spectacles had squatted down and 
 gone under the truck, to emerge again, as the police- 
 man arrived, with one hand in the side pocket of 
 his coat. Clutched in the fingers of that hidden 
 hand was a gold mesh bag, lumpy with various puta- 
 tive treasures, about which he said nothing what- 
 ever to the policeman. 
 
 But the young man was not a thief. There was 
 nothing sordid about his reticence ; there was noth- 
 ing at all in his heart at that moment but a flame of 
 
i8 REAL LIFE 
 
 pure romance. Despite the streaks of mud upon 
 her face and her g"enerally disheveled and disreput- 
 able air, which made her so different an object 
 from any pictured presentation he had ever seen o£ 
 her, he had recognized the Princess. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 PARENTHESIS 
 
 AND in order that you may recognize her too 
 (since as a conscientious reporter the last 
 thing I would do would be to fabricate or unneces- 
 sarily to prolong any mystery about this episode) 
 I hasten to perform an introduction. 
 
 The Princess was none other than Leda Swan. 
 Or, to put it as succinctly as possible, she was not 
 Mary Pickford — not quite; not, as it were, Sirius, 
 but the next brightest star in the kinematographic 
 firmament 
 
 Permit me to warn you, if you intend to follow 
 this narrative of her adventure, to treat the name of 
 affection by which in private life she was always 
 addressed and referred to (I don't suppose she had 
 ever been called Leda. She could remember when 
 her directors and other of her colleagues spoke of 
 her as "the Kid," and, buried deeper still, a day 
 when she had been "little Maggie"), to treat, in 
 
 19 
 
20 REAL LIFE 
 
 short, "Princess" as a serious and almost a scientific 
 designation. 
 
 If the number of persons in the world who 
 recognize one's face and name and take a passion- 
 ately romantic interest in the details of one's life be 
 a fair criterion of celebrity, then Leda Swan was 
 one of the most celebrated persons alive. 
 
 Many historical palaces are less palatial than the 
 great stone house with its terraces, fountains 
 (electric fountains, by George!), monumental lions, 
 formal gardens and lordly overlook upon the teem- 
 ing activities of Hollywood, where the Princess 
 lived in state. 
 
 The legal documents in whose consummation 
 she had just been playing a passive but indispens- 
 able part, signing her name with a fine splutter of 
 ink on whatever dotted line her mother's indomit- 
 able finger pointed to, guaranteed her an income of 
 two hundred and forty thousand dollars a year, and 
 there was a reasonable presumption that her own 
 interest in the company would produce twice as 
 much again. She had an earning power, in a word, 
 of thousands of dollars a day, just for having her 
 picture taken! If that isn't regal I don't know 
 what is. 
 
PARENTHESIS 21 
 
 Her daily largesse in the way of signed photo^ 
 graphs alone kept one industrious young penman 
 busy six days a week the year around. He could 
 write "Yours affectionately," or "Devotedly" or 
 "Ever Leda Swan" so much more convincingly than 
 the Princess herself that the authenticity of her few 
 genuine autographs is likely to be seriously ques- 
 tioned by future collectors. 
 
 Another sector of Leda Swan's personality had 
 been assigned to a young woman — formerly asso- 
 ciate editor of a woman's magazine — ^who wrote the 
 weekly letter of naive reminiscences and prattling 
 comment on current morality which made its weekly 
 appearance in the newspapers of practically every 
 city in the United States. 
 
 Leda Swan was, in short, like all royalty, a 
 widely ramified institution rather than a mere 
 person. 
 
 An edifice like that does not erect itself fortui- 
 tously — one searches for the hand of an architect; 
 and in this case the architect was not far to seek. 
 One cast an awed glance at the majestic, even im- 
 perial, lineaments of Ma Swan and cried out, if 
 one's classical education ran to that, "Eureka!" 
 There couldn't be a doubt of it. But if you were 
 
22 REAL LIFE 
 
 given an opportunity to pursue your acquaintance 
 with the Princess's mamma this merely negative 
 absence of doubt grew to an overwhelming convic- 
 tion that Ma was the steam in the cylinders, the 
 unflagging propeller and the unremitting hand upon 
 the wheel of the institution the public worshiped as 
 Leda Swan. 
 
 From the day when she had first offered for 
 inspection the tiny golden-curly headed child she 
 held so tightly by the hand and made her first insat- 
 iable bargain, to the day, just passed, in New York, 
 when in a fitting atmosphere of solemnity, amid a 
 crowd of eminent and solemn counselors — one of 
 them a former Secretary of State — Leda Swan, In- 
 corporated, was brought into existence, Ma had 
 never flagged, never relented and had very seldom 
 made a mistake. 
 
 It had not been all easy sailing either. After a 
 year or two of playing baby parts the child in a 
 sudden unprecedented manner had begim to grow 
 — became almost at a bound hopelessly too tall to 
 toddle. 
 
 To a domitable soul this would have looked like 
 the end, for in movie literature the child as such 
 does not exist. Girl children are often called for in 
 
PARENTHESIS 23 
 
 the first few hundred feet of a film, to be sure, but 
 only as a necessary prelude to their budding out 
 into delicious young objects of romance whom the 
 hero can clasp to his heart just before the final 
 fadeout And these childish appearances are invari- 
 ably played by the ingenues themselves. It is only 
 a case for ringlets and a pinafore. 
 
 So Ma, with her stringy young progeny, tasted 
 the bitterness of extra work, dragging about from 
 one studio lot to another on the chance of their 
 needing a ragamuffin boy or a fat old woman to 
 make one of a crowd. 
 
 But the girl went on growing, not only lineally. 
 As her muscles began to overtake her bones she 
 developed into a first-class tomboy : she learned to 
 swim, to ride, to throw cartwheels. She was com- 
 pletely fearless, and she was preternaturally quick 
 both to apprehend and to do; so almost before Ma 
 Swan had time to foresee it and plan her actions 
 accordingly, she found herself in possession again 
 of a personality, affectionately known to directors 
 as "the Kid." 
 
 Those were the great days of what are known 
 as "westerns," drama replete with chaps, revolvers, 
 lariats, greasers and cattle-rustlers, reckless young 
 
24 REAL LIFE 
 
 bandits whose cruelty and cynicism melt away at a 
 sweet young girl's caress and reveal the heart of 
 gold beneath. 
 
 When it came to being abducted, gagged and 
 bound across a horse, after a wildcat fight with the 
 "heavy," flinging herself off the horse, rolling 
 down a canyon, writhing out of her bonds, stealing 
 another horse, sliding down a precipice, swimming 
 a river, tearing off her red shirt to flag a train and 
 bringing up help in the nick of time to prevent the 
 hero from being hanged by mistake, there was sim- 
 ply no one in it, back in those days, with the Kid. 
 She kept her hair permanently bobbed and played 
 either sex with equal ease. 
 
 But during all that period, while the world was 
 getting so convincing a presentment of the unguard- 
 ed child of nature, running wild among the mining- 
 camps and ranges of the West, there was no location 
 too distant, no road too rough for Ma to go along 
 too. In every pause for breath between the dance- 
 hall orgies, pursuits, lynchings, hair-breadth es- 
 capes, leaps for life and so on, Ma was ready to 
 spring to her post as sentry with a big cloak to keep 
 off the chill, a bottle of milk, and a basilisk eye for 
 the transfixation of the trespasser. 
 
PARENTHESIS 25 
 
 And then, just as the Kid's easy supremacy in 
 this field was budding out and getting ready to 
 flower into fame, Ma Swan put down her immov- 
 able foot upon it. She said, riding back to town 
 from the location where the girl had just finished 
 her part in a picture by jumping off a fifteen-foot 
 bank into an automobile passing in the road below, 
 'That's the last western lead we're going to play." 
 
 And it was so. Directors raged, made glitter- 
 ing promises, but they imagined a vain thing. The 
 Kid ceased to exist like the flame of a blown-out 
 candle. The Princess was to take her place. 
 
 Ma was right about it, of course. The star in 
 any western film must always be a man. Then, Ma 
 surmised, on all the rough stuff, and the stunt 
 drama generally, the sun of public favor, though 
 still warm, was beginning to shine aslant; it was 
 not going to last forever. The trail, the shanty, the 
 cow-pony and the long blue-barreled Colt were 
 already giving way to the boulevard, the limousine, 
 the Long Island country house, French frocks. 
 Palm Beach, the venomous little pearl-handled 
 revolver snatched from a sable muff: in a word, to 
 class. Well, Class was going to be her girl's first 
 name. 
 
26 REAL LIFE 
 
 It is quite possible that that last jump off the 
 fifteen-foot bank into a moving car — and it was a 
 real jump; there was no fake about it! — had a lot 
 to do with Ma's decision. It was a hair-raising 
 thing to watch, for if it had been timed a little less 
 than perfectly it could have produced a bad smash ; 
 a broken ankle, for example, which, failing to knit 
 quite true, might be perpetuated in a slight limp. 
 And then where would one be? One could not go 
 on taking chances like that forever. And when it 
 was a possibly priceless possession like the Princess, 
 the chances had been taken quite long enough. 
 There had been out there on the roadside a few 
 sweating seconds when Ma had wondered whether 
 she had not taken one chance too many. 
 
 I have spoken of the girl's extraordinary quick- 
 ness. She exhibited it now, for she put on the new 
 thing like a cloak. It was in her very first picture 
 after that that her new director with a faint flavor 
 of derision nicknamed her "Princess." Ma fastened 
 upon it instantly, and never, so far as anyone knew, 
 addressed her daughter in any other way afterward. 
 The girl was then just under sixteen years old. 
 
 I have no desire to trespass upon the field of her 
 official biographer, the young woman referred to 
 
PARENTHESIS 27 
 
 three or four paragraphs back who turns out the 
 weekly syndicated letter and fills out the column 
 with answers to correspondents. Whether you read 
 that column or not you are unavoidably in posses- 
 sion of the picture it presents. You know all about 
 Leda Swan's gratitude to the dear public that has 
 been so wonderfully sweet to her. You know the 
 deep sense of obligation she feels never to betray 
 the public's trust by appearing in a picture that isn't 
 perfectly sweet and wholesome. You know how 
 strongly she feels about the sanctity of marriage 
 and the family tie ; how one ought to confide every- 
 thing to one's mother, because one could never have 
 a better friend. You know all about Leda Swan's 
 charity to the unfortunate, the good cheer she dis- 
 penses to the discouraged, how perfectly democratic 
 and human she is, despite her vast wealth and fame, 
 even to serv^ants — of whom she has of course an 
 enormous retinue. You know about her bubbling 
 sense of humor and what amusement she derives 
 from the bushels of absurd proposals of marriage 
 which she receives daily in the mail, and yet how 
 careful she is never to wound the feelings of any 
 real admirer, however humble. You know — and 
 this is what you are never allowed to forget on the 
 
28 REAL LIFE 
 
 screen or off — her simple, unspoiled, girlish 
 simplicity. 
 
 You cannot possibly have missed the letter 
 which appears ten or a dozen times a year, answer- 
 ing an inquiry whether really and truly she isn't 
 married and has never fallen in love. 
 
 No, my dear, not yet. I am still waiting for the 
 absolutely right man to come along. I think I know; 
 a little what he will be like. I am not sure that he 
 will be handsome — not in the ordinary sense of the 
 word — though of course he will look handsome to 
 me. But he will be brave and true and utterly sin- 
 cere. He will be a hundred per cent. American. I 
 think he will have fought for his country, at least 
 in his heart. A.nd then he must be the one who was 
 meant for me. I think it is a frightful mistake not 
 to wait until you are absolutely sure of that, don't 
 you? Or to be so impatient just to get married that 
 one takes the first man who comes along. I have 
 had to say "No" a great many times of course and 
 it has often been very hard to do. Of course, wait- 
 ing isn't so hard for me because I am blessed with 
 such a wonderful mother. We are — well — every- 
 thing to each other. Just pals, you know; the best 
 pair of pals that ever lived, I think, though I hope 
 there are lots of other girls who think that about 
 their mothers too. Some people have said that the 
 reason I cannot fall in love with anybody in par- 
 ticular is because I love all the world so much. 
 Well, I do love it and everybody in it. All the mil- 
 lions and millions of people who go to see my pic- 
 tures and come away loving me just a little. But 
 
PARENTHESIS 29 
 
 some day I believe the right man will come along, 
 and then you will know all about it. 
 
 You will agree, I think, that it would be gilding 
 the lily to attempt to add anything to that ; and for 
 a while the Princess felt that way about it herself. 
 The letter had been making occasional appearances 
 for perhaps a year before it was ever brought to 
 her attention, and when she first read it, it was so 
 beautiful that it made her cry. For months after 
 that experience the Leda Swan column had no more 
 enraptured reader than Leda Swan herself. 
 
 It was a queer sort of mirror-gazing, and it 
 remained delightful until from somewhere, at the 
 instigation of some unseen, lurking serpent in the 
 garden, the misgiving arose — how shall I put it? — 
 as to which image was the mirrored one and which 
 the real. The two images moved together, laughed, 
 sighed, had their hair brushed. But on which side 
 of the mirror were all these appropriate motions 
 initiated? Was the mirrored Leda Swan who was 
 always so pretty and so nice, so gay and so sweet, 
 whose thoughts and impulses as well as acts were 
 so infallibly such as fitted her to be the ideal of 
 unspoiled young girlhood for all the world — was 
 that image, mirrored so persistently on the screen, 
 
30 REAL LIFE 
 
 in the column, even in the great tripartite looking- 
 glass above the dressing-table in her own chamber, 
 herself? Or was there somewhere, inarticulate and 
 ignored, another self she never, in any mirror, saw 
 at all? 
 
 Consciousness, the philosophers tell us — at least 
 some of them do, I'm sure, since it is exactly the sort 
 of thing some philosopher would say — conscious- 
 ness is just a matter of frustration. So long as you 
 get what you want by the mere instinctive gesture 
 that accompanies wanting it, you are conscious 
 neither of what it was you wanted nor of how you 
 got it. Unless you encounter a little roughness or 
 resistance somewhere, a refractory object that says 
 simply "No" to your intention, you can float along 
 indefinitely in a fleece-lined trance. 
 
 Thanks to Ma's marvelous engineering the 
 Princess had been sliding along in her well-lubri- 
 cated ways with hardly more opportunity for self- 
 conscious thought than a reciprocating member of 
 a steam engine. When a director had to be quar- 
 reled with Ma did it privately. All the Princess 
 was aware of was the disappearance into nothing- 
 ness of the actor she didn't like or the remodeling of 
 a part which she had felt to be unsympathetic. 
 
PARENTHESIS 31 
 
 When it came to contact with outsiders, indirectly 
 through the representatives of the press, or, more 
 rarely, through a purely social function when 
 especially favored persons in a highly nervous state 
 were permitted to pay their homage, to clasp the 
 Princess's hand and hear their name pronounced to 
 her, and, sitting on the edges of their chairs, to tell 
 her how wonderful she was (so that afterward they 
 could boast, "I met her once, you know! She's 
 really awfully nice — just as simple and unaffected 
 as can be!"). Ma was always there to, as it were, 
 dress the window, prompting her to say this, 
 reminding her of that, quoting what Senator or 
 Judge or General So-and-So had written to her 
 about her last picture. 
 
 As for her entourage, they were, with a single 
 exception, selected for their diplomatic and lubricat- 
 ing qualities. The exception was, it may be con- 
 ceded, one of Ma's mistakes. 
 
 Yet he was invaluable, and the qualities which 
 might have made him dangerous seemed pretty well 
 overlaid by the humilities of a broken spirit which 
 failure had imposed upon him. He had at one 
 time belonged, no doubt, to that superior class of 
 persons, whom Ma could not abide, who knew too 
 
32 REAL LIFE 
 
 much; who contrived to imply even in the simplest 
 of their attitudes and judgments a sneer; who read 
 incomprehensible books, yet professed themselves 
 utterly unable to account for Harold Bell Wright; 
 who listened to impossible music with pleasure, but 
 writhed at "The Rosary" and "Somewhere a Voice 
 Is Calling;" who, to sum up their damnation in a 
 single phrase, thought they were smart. 
 
 Walter Patrick, as Ma was resentfully aware, 
 had once belonged to this class. He had been sort 
 of a critic or editor on an unreadable highbrow 
 weekly; he had written, she thought, a book. His 
 inability to make a living at these pursuits had 
 drawn him into the fringes of the motion-picture 
 world, but he had a way of producing every now 
 and then a real idea. It was he, for example, who 
 had invented for Ma's half-fledged duckling of a 
 daughter the inspired name Leda, which had four 
 letters just as Swan had and could be seen even 
 then, with the eye of faith, gleaming wonderfully 
 in electric lights. He hadn't any precisely desig- 
 nated duties, but he hung about on the lot when 
 the Princess was working and occasionally confided 
 to Ma (never to anyone else) a suggestion. When 
 the continuity for a new picture was put into Ma's 
 
PARENTHESIS 33 
 
 hands she always turned it over to him to read and 
 listened noncommittally when he told her what he 
 thought of it. He turned up with extraordinarily 
 precise information about the necessary local color 
 for some of the Princess's pictures. He had an 
 uncanny talent for finding" stories in the unlikeliest 
 places, and for giving" the twist to an unworkable 
 story that made it go. 
 
 He represented, you might say, Ma's private 
 stock of intelligence, and as he never put it at the 
 disposal of anyone else, never tried to capitalize any 
 of his ideas into credit for himself, he filled what 
 otherwise would have been an aching want. 
 
 In his relations with the Princess herself there 
 was never anything that even momentarily caught 
 Ma's eye or awakened the faintest misgiving. He 
 was rather shy with her, friendly enough of course, 
 but uncommunicative. It was always to Ma that he 
 talked when the three of them were together, and 
 he never made the mistake, which had cost many a 
 good man his job, of trying to slip any private lit- 
 tle asides into the Princess's ear. And he was, as 
 a matter of fact, perfectly unaware that he was the 
 serpent which led the Princess to the apple tree. 
 There were no wiles about it at all. 
 
34 REAL LIFE 
 
 But what she first perceived about this very 
 humble member of the household — this word is used 
 in the sense in which it is employed by royalty — 
 was that he did not regard her as everybody else 
 did, literally did not look at her the way they did. 
 If everybody else was silk to her he was a bath 
 towel; and if he hadn't been a bath towel she would 
 not have become aware that everyone else was silk. 
 
 Don't think that he was rude to her. There was 
 never anything in his bearing that she could have 
 complained about to Ma. Indeed there was some- 
 thing kind about him that there wasn't about the 
 others. 
 
 Well, perhaps that was just it. How could one 
 be kind to a princess unless, for some perplexing 
 reason, she didn't look to one like a princess at all? 
 He wasn't laughing at her, was he ? Of course not ; 
 how could he ? How could anyone laugh at her, let 
 alone a shy, shabby, self-confessed failure like him? 
 Or did he feel sorry for her? The supposition was 
 still more ridiculous. Why, wasn't she just about 
 the gladdest, gayest and most highly favored mortal 
 in the world ? One had only to read the column to 
 be sure of that. Was there a girl in the whole 
 United States who wouldn't change places with 
 
PARENTHESIS 35 
 
 Leda Swan if she could? Well, she, the Princess, 
 was Leda Swan herself. 
 
 But was she? 
 
 That was the first bite of the apple. It turned 
 her a little giddy ; and from that day began the day- 
 dream of the Princess ; a vague and various sort of 
 dream at first which acquired definition only slowly. 
 But the germ of it was always a secret unknown per- 
 son who was not Leda Swan; a princess perhaps, 
 but unacclaimed as such, who went about unknown 
 and disregarded; an orphan like Sara Crewe or 
 Pollyanna. 
 
 Only her dream didn't end, like Pollyanna's or 
 Sara Crewe's, with a rich elderly gentleman devot- 
 ing himself to her. Her dream ended with a prince, 
 who was not to discover that she was a princess 
 until he had told her that he loved her. And even 
 that ending she was in no hurry to come to; it 
 wasn't the best part of her dream. The best part 
 of her dream was the adventures, the light-hearted, 
 irresponsible adventures when she herself forgot 
 that she was Leda Swan. 
 
 Of course, before it could begin the greatest 
 adventure of all must be brought off — the escape 
 somehow from Ma; the emergence all by herself, 
 
36 REAL LIFE 
 
 unchaperoned, unlimouslned, just in an ordinary- 
 hired taxi or perhaps even afoot, into the dimly sur- 
 mised world where common people lived. 
 
 And then, effortlessly, all by itself, the thing 
 came off. The new contract had just been signed — 
 the contract all the newspapers were ringing with. 
 The new super-de-luxe million-dollar production 
 with which Leda Swan, Incorporated, was to inaug- 
 urate its heliacal career was yawning in Hollywood 
 for the physical presence of Leda Swan herself. 
 Transportation, including a private car, had been 
 engaged across the continent and the bulletin given 
 out to the Associated Press ; city editors in Chicago, 
 where the run was to be broken in favor of a 
 night's sleep, had already assigned to reporters the 
 job of meeting the train. And then — on that very 
 morning Ma found that she couldn't get out of bed ! 
 "Nothing but lumbago," the hastily summoned staff 
 of physicians informed her, but a lumbago so 
 intense as to be absolutely paralyzing. 
 
 At noon they told the Princess that it had been 
 decided she was to cross the continent without her 
 mother. That wonderful woman's place at her side 
 was to be taken by a newly engaged social secre- 
 tary. It is appalling to think of the agonies Ma 
 
PARENTHESIS 37 
 
 must have suffered before /she assented to any such 
 arrangement. 
 
 The Princess bade her mother a tearful farewell 
 (it certainly made a touching scene as reported in 
 the afternoon papers, and I see no sufficient reason 
 for tearing the veil) and found herself a little later 
 leaving that inseparable lady behind at a smooth, 
 persistent forty miles an hour. In an abstraction 
 which her new chaperon found it impossible to 
 break (by dinner-time she had begun to think the 
 girl was really an idiot) she sat gazing out of the 
 drawing-room window at the slipping, rotating 
 landscape of up-state New York, contemplating this 
 miraculous deliverance with a suffocating joy 
 hardly to be distinguished from terror. She was 
 alone at last. It was a qualified solitude to be sure, 
 with a chaperon, a courier-secretary and a maid, 
 but Ma's absence created a void no mere numbers 
 could fill. 
 
 The Princess was alone, " and the refrain the 
 rails sang to her all that night was "Now or never!" 
 The resolution she had come to next morning when 
 she rolled up her shade, packed her pillows and 
 gazed out upon the fields of Indiana was "Now!" 
 This very day, in the city of Chicago, the great 
 
38 REAL LIFE 
 
 deed shoiild be done. She would go somewhere, 
 she would do something, all by herself! 
 
 She tried a few experiments on Miss Smith, 
 expressed two or three hastily invented preferences 
 and found to her delight that they had the validity 
 of orders. But she submitted tractably to the elab- 
 orate routine of installation in the Chicago hotel; 
 and she saw the reporters at two, as had been 
 arranged by telegraph from New York. 
 
 "Don't you think. Miss Swan," her chaperon 
 said when they had gone, "that you had better rest 
 awhile? I am afraid you're a little excited." 
 
 The Princess looked at her watch. It was just 
 half-past two. 
 
 "I'm going to lie down," she said, "until five 
 o'clock. You said you wanted to do some shopping 
 here in Chicago. I think you might as well go now. 
 My maid can look after me if I want anything." 
 
 She held her breath until Miss Smith assented 
 to this program. 
 
 "Oh, you needn't wait," she added, through a 
 yawn. "I have already rung for Barton." Bar- 
 ton was her maid. 
 
 It was a breathless moment, for Barton had 
 already been dismissed for the afternoon. Ma 
 
PARENTHESIS 39 
 
 would never have stirred a step until she had seen 
 the maid come in and accept the responsibility of 
 sentry duty. This wasn't distrust — it was just Ma's 
 perfected technique. 
 
 Miss Smith was, I think, vaguely aware that 
 the situation wasn't watertight. Ten minutes later, 
 after an excursion to her own room for her hat and 
 coat and a shopping-list, she knocked at the 
 Princess's chamber door, and, in response to a sleepy 
 invitation, entered to find her charge in bed and 
 covered to the chin. This satisfied her and she 
 went away. 
 
 Before the elevator door had clashed behind her 
 the Princess was out of bed, putting on her shoes. 
 She was trembling a little with excitement, but this 
 did not cause her to fumble even the unfamiliar 
 processes of a maidless toilet. In a shorter time 
 than Miss Smith just now had needed for the accom- 
 plishment of a good deal less, she was dressed, 
 hatted, veiled, ready for her adventure. 
 
 There was a flight down the corridor to the 
 bronze doors whose position she had carefully 
 marked when she entered the hotel; the agonized 
 wait for a descending car; a moment of unbetrayed 
 panic while she braved the publicity of the white 
 
40 REAL LIFE 
 
 marble lobby and slipped past the liveried doorman 
 without daring a glance to determine whether he 
 had seen her or not. She had a wild apprehension 
 that if he did see her he would reach out a long 
 arm and drag her back. 
 
 And then with a thrilled intoxication she real- 
 ized that she had escaped. She was walking down 
 the street alone. The world, busy with its multitu- 
 dinous affairs, went on as if nothing had happened. 
 Men, women, youths of both sexes, singly, in pairs, 
 in little groups of three or four, overtook her, 
 passed her, turned out for her, lingered before show 
 windows and went on again exactly as if she had 
 been merely one of them. Why, she was one of 
 them — ^just an unregarded unit in the throng! 
 
 Well, there you are. You know now all the 
 essential facts, I think, that led to the flight of the 
 Princess. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THE FLIGHT OF THE PRINCESS 
 
 IT WAS hanging by the sheerest thread, as the taxi 
 trundled down the boulevard, whether the Prin- 
 cess would not direct it to her hotel, only a few 
 squares away, and thus truncate her adventure just 
 when it had so miraculously well begun. Even an 
 adverse gesture by a traffic policeman at any of the 
 crossings would have had a determining influence. 
 
 She was — it cannot be denied — frightened, as no 
 one could help being when an incredible daydream 
 took the guise, all at once, of literal fact. Ten min- 
 utes ago, rather tired of her pedestrian adventure 
 among the common people in the downtown streets, 
 the bloom of novelty already rubbed off it, she had 
 been upon the point of beginning to smile at that 
 dream as an infantile illusion, of heaving an adult 
 world-weary sigh over her lost youth. The phrase 
 "Too late!" had hovered upon her lips. And here, 
 
 41 
 
42 REAL LIFE 
 
 beyond the wildest of her dreams, was the actuality. 
 The most beautiful man she had ever seen, the most 
 utterly different from all the rest of the species — 
 the one with whom she had, she suspected, fallen in 
 love at first sight — owed his life to her and was now 
 eloping with her in a taxi. It was not likely that 
 they were pursued, and yet she had distinctly the 
 sensation of it. 
 
 Exactly balancing her fright was a most deli- 
 cious curiosity as to what he would do ; or rather, as 
 to how he would do the only possible thing. He had 
 fallen in love with her, no doubt — that was unescap- 
 able, wasn't it, in the circumstances ? But would he 
 attempt to hide the fact under a cloak of mere grati- 
 tude ? How would he be affected by the realization 
 that the person he loved and owed his life to was as 
 remotely unattainable to him as the stars? What 
 coidd a man do or say whose life had just been saved 
 by Leda Swan ? 
 
 What carried the Princess past her hotel and so 
 fairly committed her to the adventure was the fact 
 that for a matter of minutes he did nothing at all, 
 but sat huddled down in his corner like one in a 
 trance. She wondered if anything could be the mat- 
 ter with him, if the shock of his narrow escape from 
 
THE FLIGHT OF THE PRINCESS 43 
 
 death had perhaps destroyed his memory. This, 
 according to the only Hterature she knew, was an 
 almost commonplace accident. 
 
 The next move, by all the accepted rules of the 
 game, was with him, but if he did not know who or 
 where he was he could not be held accountable to the 
 rules. 
 
 She stole a glance at him and saw him preoccu- 
 pied apparently with his own hands, flexing the 
 fingers and the wrists, gripping his forearms in an 
 exploratory manner. Once her attention was drawn 
 to them those hands fascinated her: she had never 
 seen a pair like them. They were not beautiful by 
 the standard she had always applied to hands, not 
 the conventional oval with pointed fingers; the fin- 
 gers were long, but they seemed actually to broaden 
 out at the tips. She observed that they were exquis- 
 itely cared for and that somehow they had avoided 
 the mud altogether. This made her own feel grubby 
 and she hid them under the folds of her skirt. 
 
 "Did you get hurt anywhere when I knocked you 
 down?" she asked. 
 
 "It is a miracle," he said slowly. "I think I am 
 not hurt at all." 
 
144 REAL LIFE 
 
 Why, he was a foreigner! His speech, though 
 not exactly broken, made this fact unmistakable. 
 She might have known it from his looks for that 
 matter, because, beautiful as he was, he did not, 
 somehow, in the least resemble Bryant Washburn. 
 
 She was for an instant dismayed. A foreigner 
 couldn't be a hero, could he ? Weren't they always 
 dangerous mercenary deceivers? Should a girl 
 listen to their wiles, their romantic but insincere 
 protestations, did she not always bitterly regret it? 
 Wasn't her plight desperate indeed, unless some 
 honest, homespun American boy like Charles Ray 
 happened to come to her rescue ? 
 
 Yet it must be there were differences, even 
 among foreigners. Had he been running true to 
 form this boy, minutes ago, would have been on 
 his knees on the floor of the taxi, one hand on his 
 heart, the other reaching for hers to press a kiss 
 upon the back of it 
 
 But he — he didn't seem to care even whether she 
 had been hurt or not. The only concern he had 
 shown up to now was an ability to move those queer, 
 beautiful hands of his. A hot resentment burned in 
 her next words. 
 
THE FLIGHT OF THE PRINCESS 45 
 
 "Oh, well, of course if you aren't hurt that's all 
 that matters !" 
 
 He did not, she thought, instantly perceive the 
 satirical sense of that, not even with the heavily- 
 stressed "you" to point it out to him. Then she saw 
 that his hands were trembling and that a slow, deep 
 flush was beginning to suffuse his face. She felt an 
 answering warmth color her own cheeks as he 
 answered : 
 
 "I think you have save my life at the great risk 
 of your own. But I am still unbelieving with sur- 
 prise. It all happen so very quick — out of nowhere. 
 You move so sure, so exactly right — not like a 
 woman — while I am all distract. But I think be- 
 cause you come to help, that great engine might have 
 killed you as well as me." 
 
 "Oh, that was nothing," said the Princess, 
 hastily because she found she was trembling now, 
 especially about the lips. She essayed a laugh. 
 "That used to be my regular stuff," she concluded. 
 
 He repeated "regular stuff" just as an echo; 
 then, satisfied that he knew what it meant, dissented 
 vigorously. "No — no, that was not regular stuff. 
 That was heroique!" 
 
 At that the Princess was appalled by the discov- 
 
46 REAL LIFE 
 
 ery that she was going to cry ; she did not know why, 
 but she couldn't help it There was something so 
 beautiful about the dignity with which he had 
 answered her taunt; there was something beautiful 
 about his funny speech that, all by itself, made a 
 lump come in her throat — ^made her feel small and 
 utterly forlorn. 
 
 "You weep!" he cried in a tone of acute distress. 
 "You think I am ingratel You, too, think I am 
 nothing but a machine ; but that is where they make 
 their mistake. Is that what make you cry, because 
 you think I do not care?" 
 
 The Princess pressed her lips together and tried 
 to hold her breath, but it only made the next sob all 
 the worse. The tears were trickling down her face, 
 and she felt vaguely about her for the mesh bag that 
 had her handkerchief in it. Failing to find it she 
 instinctively brought her left arm around so that its 
 •leeve might serve. 
 
 But it was that arm of hers that had been be- 
 tween him and the pavement, and its torn, mud- 
 saturated sleeve could not answer even a need as dire 
 as that of the Princess. The childlike gesture, how- 
 ever, disclosed a state of things of which she had not 
 been aware, and horrifying to him. There was 
 
THE FLIGHT OF THE PRINCESS 47 
 
 blood as well as mud-streaks on the forearm — glass 
 cuts from the smashed crystal of her watch, which in 
 a deplorable state of ruin dangled from her wrist. 
 
 With an inarticulate outcry he gazed at that 
 ensanguined spectacle as one might gaze at the field 
 of a yesterday's battle ; then he whipped out a large 
 white handkerchief. 
 
 "It is terrible that you are so wounded," he said. 
 "But we are taking you home quickly? You live 
 not far?" 
 
 "I live in California," she sobbed, the mere mo- 
 mentum of her weeping not yet l^ing quite spent. 
 But that sounded so ridiculous that she laughed at 
 the same time. 
 
 "California !" he gasped. "A hospital then ! Do 
 you know where one is ? Ah, he will know !" and he 
 leaned forward, intent on hailing the chauffeur. 
 
 But she grasped him with muscular decision and 
 hauled him back on to the seat. 
 
 "Don't be foolish!" she commanded. "A 
 hospital for two or three little scratches like that! 
 My goodness! Wouldn't I have just lived in one 
 once if we paid any attention to such things?" 
 
 "But you were in great pain," he argued. "You 
 were crying." 
 
j^ REAL LIFE 
 
 "I was not," she contradicted. "Anyway, it 
 wasn't about that. Really and truly this isn't any- 
 thing at all." 
 
 She did love, though, having him so concerned 
 about her, and did not retire the arm into the back- 
 ground again. She busied herself instead, and 
 called on him to help, at getting the handkerchief 
 wrapped around into a sort of bandage. 
 
 The scratches, insignificant as they were, did 
 bleed freely, and it wasn't more than a minute before 
 the red stain showed through. He turned suddenly 
 away from her, dropped back limp against the 
 cushion, pulled out another handkerchief and laid it 
 on her knee. Looking around into his face she saw 
 that he had gone almost as white as the linen itself — 
 had indeed fainted. She cried out to the chauffeur 
 to stop, but just as the squeal of the brake echoed 
 her cry she saw at the curb, fifty yards farther on, 
 a little glazed-tile drinking-fountain. 
 
 "Run on to that," she said. "I want some 
 water." 
 
 By training as well as by nature she was extra- 
 ordinarily quick. One does not spend one's life 
 before a camera without mastering a high economy 
 of movement. She stepped down from the running- 
 
THE FLIGHT OF THE PRINCESS 49 
 
 board of the taxi before it stopped, and was in her 
 place again with the saturated handkerchief in less 
 time than it takes a sprinter to run a hundred yards. 
 But even those few seconds sufficed to recover the 
 boy from his fainting fit. She found him sitting up, 
 gazing with an expression of bewilderment at a 
 brown taxi, with a coat-of-arms on the panel, which 
 had just slid past them and was waiting at the cross- 
 ing for the traffic policeman's signal to go ahead. 
 He started when she asked him what the matter was, 
 and pressed his hands to his eyes. 
 
 "I thought I saw a face," he said ; "one I did not 
 wish to see." 
 
 The Princess quivered. "A man or a woman ?" 
 she asked him. 
 
 "A man," he told her simply, adding, "I do not 
 know any women except my aunt and my many 
 rousins." 
 
 "Is he in that brown taxi ?" 
 
 He shook his head. "I do not think so. I think 
 I dreamed him." 
 
 The Princess nodded. "You just fainted, you 
 know," she said. "That's why I got out and wet 
 this handkerchief. You don't want it now on your 
 forehead or anything, do you ?" 
 
50 REAL LIFE 
 
 The traffic signal sounded just then and the 
 Princess noted that the brown taxi jumped off as if 
 its fare were in a hurry. But there was nothing 
 unusual about that. 
 
 As they, too, slid forward the Princess turned 
 sideways for a look in the mirror. She laughed at 
 the mud-streaks on her face. 
 
 "I guess a sort of wash wouldn't do me any 
 harm," she remarked; "get off some of this street 
 makeup. If I only had something dry to wipe off 
 with afterward." 
 
 Instantly he produced another handkerchief. 
 This was the third, all perfectly fresh. Was he 
 stuffed with them ? They were the very finest qual- 
 ity of linen, she noted. It was on her tongue to ask 
 him some jocular question about the number of them 
 that he carried, but she found herself rather surpris- 
 ingly afraid to. There was a new sensation for the 
 Princess, if you like! Instead of laughing at him 
 she put an added touch of ceremony into her thanks 
 and then straightforwardly set about putting her- 
 self to rights. She took off her hat, rubbed the mud 
 from her face and hands, rearranged her hair a lit- 
 tle, contrived to pin up the torn sleeve, resumed her 
 hat, settling it at its normal angle once more (it 
 
THE FLIGHT OF THE PRINCESS 51 
 
 luckily had not been damaged), and sank back beside 
 him again with a sigh of comfort. 
 
 *'Do I look more respectable now ?" she asked. 
 
 She had a little more definitely than necessary 
 turned her back upon him while she was making her 
 toilet, with the idea of dramatizing her reappearance. 
 It was in her mind that he had actually failed to 
 recognize her. 
 
 What she had jocularly spoken of as her street 
 makeup might well enough have constituted a dis- 
 guise to anyone as badly shaken as this boy had been 
 by his experience. Now that he had had time to get 
 himself together again, and she once more looked 
 like herself, things could begin to happen between 
 them as she had expected them to from the begin- 
 ning. And to give matters a good decisive start in 
 that direction she had, for a gambit, invited his 
 attention to her restored appearance. 
 
 She felt him looking at her just as intensely as 
 she could have hoped. She felt the blood coming 
 up to her cheeks ; she held her breath. 
 
 "I do not know if you are beautiful," he said. 
 "Perhaps not. But I do not care. I have seen many, 
 many beautiful women. They have embrace me. 
 They have kiss my hands. But they have been noth- 
 
52 REAL LIFE 
 
 ing to me. I do not like. I wish them kept away. 
 But you are different. You have saved my life. 
 I do not wish to say 'Thank you' and go away, be- 
 cause you are kind. You are my friend. So I do not 
 care how you look. Beautiful or not, I do not care." 
 
 He had looked away from her before he began to 
 speak or he never would have gone as far as that, 
 for the Princess had turned upon him a stare of 
 blank astonishment, salted presently with the mis- 
 giving that he was making game of her — that she 
 was being; in a word, kidded. 
 
 But the perfect simplicity of that amazing speech 
 was unmistakable. He meant exactly what he said. 
 He was telling the truth. Who was he ? Who in the 
 wide world could he be — who could sit beside Leda 
 Swan for a quarter of an hour in a taxi and not rec- 
 ognize her, who did not know nor care whether she 
 was beautiful or not! 
 
 The Princess struggled back to consciousness 
 again like one emerging from a wave of ether. She 
 remarked just by way of recovering her mental bal- 
 ance that the brown taxi ahead seemed to be hesitat- 
 ing whether to swing over to the left for Drexel and 
 Grand boulevards or to go straight on south. It 
 chose the latter course and their own followed it. 
 
THE FLIGHT OF THE PRINCESS 53 
 
 "Do you care which way we go ?" she asked. 
 
 *T will go where you go," he said. 
 
 "It doesn't make any difference to me." She 
 was still making conversation, a little desperately. 
 "I only wanted him to drive away quick out of the 
 crowd." 
 
 "How did you know," he asked, "that I wanted 
 to get away quick out of the crowd ?" 
 
 "Did you? — I didn't know it. I wanted to get 
 away myself." 
 
 "But you must wish to go somewhere," he per- 
 sisted. "And where, is the thing I wish to know, so 
 that when this is finished it shall not be the end." 
 
 The Princess steadied herself with a long breath 
 like one preparing to detonate a mine. Then she 
 said very simply, "You will never have any trouble 
 finding me. I am Leda Swan," 
 
 He repeated the magic syllables slowly like one 
 exploring them — tentatively, not quite sure that he 
 had got them right. 
 
 "It is a beautiful name," he went on, "but I am 
 not sure that I will remember it. Will you write it 
 in my little book ?" 
 
 The world of the Princess reeled. Here was a 
 man who had never even heard of her ! 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE BROWN TAXI 
 
 ^^'IV^HO," she asked when she had recovered the 
 W faculty of speech, of which his astounding 
 ignorance had bereft her, " — who are you ?" 
 
 Her first impression was that he was as amazed 
 over her ignorance as she had been at his. He stared 
 at her for a minute with dilated, almost frightened 
 eyes ; then he looked away, out the window ahead. 
 Deliberately he took off his hat and laid it on the 
 seat beside him and with a gesture evidently habitual 
 tossed his head and ran his fingers back through his 
 hair. It was incredibly beautiful hair, long, thick, 
 fine, wavy and almost black, but it had arrived at 
 that color through the deepening shades of red so 
 that where the light caught it it showed a gleam of 
 copper. It made his beauty, she felt, almost too 
 poignant to be true or endurable. Involuntarily she 
 gasped at it and he looked around at her again. 
 "Who are you ?" she repeated. 
 
 54 
 
THE BROWN TAXI 55 
 
 His eyes brightened with tears and once more he 
 turned away, his gaze coming idly to rest upon the 
 brown taxicab which they seemed permanently to 
 have fallen in behind. 
 
 "It did not matter to you who I was when you 
 save me from being killed," he said, "nor when you 
 took me away so quick from that crowd, nor when 
 you stop for cold water to put on my forehead when 
 I was fainting. You did those things because you 
 were kind — brave and kind. Never," he said in a 
 tone so matter-of-fact that it carried conviction, 
 "never has anyone been kind to me until — until Leda 
 Swan. You see, I have remember the name. It will 
 not need that you write it in my little book." 
 
 "The people I like," she said, "don't call me that. 
 They call me Princess." 
 
 "May I call you Princess ?" 
 
 She nodded. "But you have not told me your 
 name yet," she said. 
 
 "My name," he said pronouncing the syllables 
 very carefully, "is Bill Lawrence." 
 
 The color flamed into the Princess's cheeks — 
 the red flag of anger, of outrage, that, after all his 
 professions of friendship and trust, he should try to 
 Impose upon her with an impudent lie like this! 
 
56 REAL LIFE 
 
 Bill Lawrence! When he couldn't even pronounce 
 it properly ! Bill ! 
 
 He had been lying to her straight along from the 
 beginning most likely. Why, of course he had! 
 Hadn't he said one minute that he knew no women 
 except his aunt and cousins, and told her the next 
 about the beauties who had kissed his hands despite 
 his wish that they be kept away from him? He 
 might have been a prince to talk like that — a real 
 prince with a throne and a sceptre. A prince named 
 Bill Lawrence! He couldn't have expected to im- 
 pose upon her with that ! He was laughing at her — 
 had been laughing at her all the while ! 
 
 No, he hadn't. That was a conclusion to which 
 the Princess, hurt as she was by his lack of faith in 
 her, couldn't force her mind. She had seen, just 
 now, tears in his eyes. She realized with dismay 
 that in another minute they would come back into 
 her own unless something happened. But some- 
 thing, at precisely that moment, did. 
 
 The first two or three events were noted by the 
 Princess merely because she was trying to distract 
 her attention and thus head off her tears. It was 
 not indeed until her companion's outcry that she 
 woke to the importance of current events. The 
 
THE BROWN TAXI 57 
 
 brown taxi was nothing to her when she began look- 
 ing at it, but since it was slowing down as if it 
 meant to stop right out there in the middle of the 
 boulevard it was as well worth looking at as any- 
 thing else. Their own, of course, was pulling out 
 to the left to pass it, and as they came alongside she 
 perceived that another yellow, precisely like their 
 own and perhaps a hundred yards ahead, seemed to 
 have something to do with the indecisive actions of 
 the brown one. 
 
 All it had performed was the eminently natural 
 maneuver of responding to a hail from the sidewalk, 
 swinging smartly around in a semicircle and pulling 
 up to the northbound curb; but this act seemed to 
 cause an immense perturbation in the brown taxi. 
 The chauffeur was leaning back to talk over a 
 shrugged shoulder to his passenger. The passenger, 
 on the extreme edge of his seat and leaning forward 
 as far as he could stretch, was pointing, gesticulat- 
 ing, shouting in a cold fury, as if that other yellow 
 cab had just caused him an intolerable disappoint- 
 ment. 
 
 He looked, the Princess thought, like an anar- 
 chist, a Russian spy, a blackhand agent. His bushy 
 black hair and mustachios, beetling brows, beady, 
 
58 REAL LIFE 
 
 protuberant eyes and dead white, unwholesome skin 
 comprised the invariable makeup of persons of that 
 unpleasant character. He was a foreigner, too, for 
 what he was shouting at the chauffeur as they came 
 up into ear-shot didn't even pretend to be English. 
 It made the Princess feel as if she were out on loca- 
 tion, taking a picture, and she had even felt the 
 worried flash "Is the camera getting all this ?" when 
 she was brought back to actuality by the cry of ter- 
 ror from the boy at her elbow. 
 
 This happened exactly as they were pulling 
 alongside. What the boy started and cried out at 
 was not the sight of the foreign spy in the brown 
 cab — for he wasn't looking that way — but the sound 
 of his voice. It was as instantaneous and automatic 
 as if someone had run a needle into him, and as part 
 of the same impulse he whipped around in his seat 
 and encountered the stare, which his cry had at- 
 tracted, of the man in the brown taxi. 
 
 The scream — it is hardly an exaggeration to call 
 it that — produced one more automatic result. Both 
 chauffeurs heard it and came down instantly with 
 both feet on clutch and brake pedals, and the two 
 taxis side by side came checking to the quickest pos- 
 sible stop. 
 
THE BROWN TAXI 59 
 
 The boy after the merest instant cowered back 
 into his corner out of range of the spy's insupport- 
 able stare. 
 
 The spy with a wide feUne smile flung open the 
 door of his taxi and stepped down into the road, 
 although the momentum of neither car was as yet 
 quite checked, and he staggered as he met the 
 pavement. . 
 
 "Drive on!" shrilled the Princess. It is aston- 
 ishing how quick she was. She had darted forward 
 in almost the same instant that the boy had shrunk 
 back, and her cry reached the chauffeur's ears just 
 as the spy's foot took the asphalt. Her chauffeur 
 was almost as quick as she. He had given her a 
 taste of this quality before, and really did not need 
 her successive injunction, "Beat it out of here !" 
 
 The yellow cab jumped ahead in second, slid into 
 high and was pelting away down the boulevard 
 under all the gas it could breathe by the time the 
 Princess had finished speaking. She folded down 
 one of the extra seats and so posted was able to keep 
 a good lookout aft and be on easy communicative 
 terms with the chauffeur at the same time. 
 
 The maneuver, she saw, couldn't have worked 
 better if they had planned it. The spy had been com- 
 
6o REAL LIFE 
 
 pletely deceived by the gfood faith of the yellow cab's 
 intention to stop. It had taken him several precious 
 seconds to make up his mind to the fact that they 
 really meant to run away from him. Even his own 
 cab had run past him ten paces or so, and it needed 
 a few seconds more for him to run after it and 
 scramble in. And every one of those seconds was 
 taking the yellow cab forty feet farther away. 
 
 "Coming after us, is he?" inquired the chauffeur. 
 
 "I think so," said the Princess. "Oh, yes, he is, 
 he is ! Can't you go any faster ?" 
 
 "You want to lose him, do you ? Sure, I can go 
 faster if you're anxious to get pinched. How far 
 behind is he now ?" 
 
 "About a hundred and fifty or two hundred 
 yards," she told him. Then, with a new efferves^ 
 cence of excitement that almost bubbled into a laugh, 
 "Do you suppose he will begin to shoot?" 
 
 She wouldn't by that time have been a bit sur- 
 prised if he had. But this was evidently a startling 
 consideration for the chauffeur. 
 
 "Holy cats!" he cried. "Is it as bad as that?" 
 But it was evident that the color of his cab did not 
 enter into his composition. 
 
 "One of them foreign guys couldn't hit anything 
 
THE BROWN TAXI 6i 
 
 at that distance if he did begin to shoot," he assured 
 her in a tone of encouragement. "If I can keep this 
 lead until we get into the park I can lose him easy- 
 enough. Tell me if he begins to creep up." 
 
 "He isn't gaining now, I don't think," said the 
 Princess a little dubiously. 
 
 "He'll never catch us," said the chauffeur, "don't 
 you worry. We can leave that guy like he was 
 standing still. He has been chasing us all the way 
 from Adams Street. I seen him there by the curb 
 as we started up. He comes past us, see, when you 
 stop for water, and picks up another yellow on 
 ahead. If you'd put me wise that he was after us 
 we could have left him cold. I didn't know anything 
 about it until we comes up right alongside. But I 
 didn't waste any time, I'll say, after you screeched." 
 
 "I'll say you didn't!" answered the Princess. 
 
 "Where are you running away to?" the chauf- 
 feur inquired. "Crown Point?" 
 
 The Princess didn't know what Crown Point 
 was. 
 
 "Oh, it's a place in Indiana," he informed her, 
 "where people go to get married mostly." 
 
 She blushed, "We aren't running away to get 
 married," she said, and then looked quickly at the 
 
62 REAL LIFE 
 
 boy to see if he had heard, conscious of an irrational 
 throb of hope that he had. 
 
 But he had not. He was just emerging from the 
 daze of terror into which the baleful gaze of the man 
 in the brown taxi had plunged him. She gave him 
 an encouraging smile. 
 
 "We are going to get away all right," she said. 
 
 "Is he — " the boy asked, "is he coming after us 
 now ?" 
 
 She nodded. "But he isn't going to catch us," 
 she said. "We will lose him in a few minutes so 
 that he will never find himself 1" 
 
 "I will not be taken !" the boy cried. "I will not 
 go back with him! Never! I will let him kill me 
 first!" 
 
 The Princess quivered. There was an emotional 
 intensity in the words that was altogether new to 
 her, that she had never seen even simulated. The 
 fact that his resolution was the flower of extreme 
 terror made it only the more appealing to her. 
 
 Up to now, through the entire adventure, she 
 had carried a sense which one is sometimes aware of 
 in dreams, that she could dismiss the whole thing 
 with no more decisive an action than a mere shake 
 of the head ; a sense that it was all happening, some- 
 
THE BROWN TAXI 63 
 
 how, with her permission. But this cry of the heart 
 swept that away altogether. She took, psychically, 
 what amounted to a dive off a springboard into un- 
 known waters. 
 
 She resumed, for the moment, her seat beside 
 the boy — only close to him now — laid one arm across 
 his shoulders and with the other hand possessed her- 
 self of one of his. It was cold with excitement, but 
 the strength with which it returned her grip aston- 
 ished her. Her own was more than a match for 
 most of the hands she encountered, but she had never 
 felt anything like this. It was like the clutch of a 
 drowning man. 
 
 "Listen," she said. "He isn't going to get you. 
 I'm going to see you through — if I have to take you 
 all the way to Hollywood with me." 
 
 "What is Hollywood ?" he asked. 
 
 She stared, and, to get her vocal organs to work- 
 ing again, swallowed once or twice. "It's where I 
 live," she told him. "And if anybody thinks they 
 can start anything rough out there with a friend of 
 mine, I'd like to see them try it." 
 
 She wasn't thinking about Ma when she made 
 that statement. She was destined for a while (but 
 not forever) to forget Ma's very existence. Lear- 
 
64 REAL LIFE 
 
 ing that Napoleonic lady out o£ account, the Prin- 
 cess's writ would have run, right enough. She could 
 have guaranteed immunity to the Crown Prince 
 himself. 
 
 The confident security of her promise carried 
 over at once to the boy. She felt him relax under 
 her arm, into it, indeed, so that she for a moment 
 supported the whole weight of his body. Then he 
 raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. 
 
 Respectful, reverent even, as the gesture unmis- 
 takably was, it startled and at the same time enor- 
 mously thrilled the Princess. Except imder the eye 
 of the camera (and also Ma) she had never come 
 within sighting distance of getting her hand kissed 
 before. With an excellent appearance of compos- 
 ure, however, she recovered her hand, and with an 
 injunction to sit low so that he should not be visible 
 through the back window, returned, as it were, to 
 the bridge. 
 
 "You'll have to go faster," she warned her 
 chauffeur, crisply. "He's creeping up." 
 
 His answer was to snap the cah around to the 
 left upon a cross-street that had street-car tracks on 
 it, dodge around a truck and turn to the right again 
 at the next corner, "No use trying to make a 
 
THE BROWN TAXI 65 
 
 straight getaway from them big brownies," he ex- 
 plained. "They've got more power, and geared 
 higher too. Look around now and see if he turns 
 after us." 
 
 "Yes, here he comes!" she cried (she couldn't 
 help enjoying this). "You'd better turn again." 
 
 "You leave that to me," he admonished her. 
 "This part of town is right where I live. I'll drop 
 him now quick enough !" 
 
 But as the streets were uniformly wide and 
 straight, and their intersections horribly far apart, 
 the strategic advantages of familiarity were not 
 easily apparent. Any mind capable of comprehend- 
 ing a gridiron would be in possession of all the possi- 
 bilities. It was simply necessary to get far enough 
 ahead to turn two successive corners without being 
 sighted, and this, it seemed, was what they couldn't 
 do. The chauffeur after a while, with a shake of the 
 head, conceded as much. 
 
 "You can't let her out when you have to keep 
 turning all the while," he said. "We'll have to get 
 into Jackson Park, like I said. — I'll tell you what 
 you'd better do, though — you'd better pay me now, 
 a mile or so beyond what the meter says, to make 
 
66 REAL LIFE 
 
 sure. Then if you get a chance to drop out, I can 
 beat it away empty." 
 
 Wide-eyed with sudden blank despair, the Prin- 
 cess gazed at his set profile. There was something 
 firm about it, ruthless. She knew that what little 
 money she had was in her mesh bag. And the bag 
 was not in the taxi ; she had lost it under that motor 
 truck. 
 
 "You see," she began, against a strong premo- 
 nition that he wouldn't, "I've lost my purse. But — ► 
 but you know who I am, don't you? — Oh, don't 
 stop! You wouldn't do that! Another minute or 
 two while we talk can't matter. Don't you know 
 who I am?" 
 
 He stepped on the accelerator again, but his 
 words checked her cry of gratitude. "I'll keep going 
 as far as the Hyde Park police station," he said. 
 *Tt's no use, lady. I know who you'll say you are, 
 all right. A friend of mine drove Douglas Fair- 
 banks around town all one afternoon, and loaned 
 him three dollars, too, and read in the paper that 
 night that Doug was in Europe." 
 
 "If you'd read today's papers, yxju'd know that 
 Leda Swan was in town 1" the Princess protested, on 
 the edge of tears. 
 
THE BROWN TAXI 67 
 
 "You've been reading the papers, all right," com- 
 mented the chauffeur. He was so pleased with this 
 retort that it made him feel better-natured. "Of 
 course there's a chance that you're really her," he 
 admitted, "but it don't look good enough to me to 
 bank on." He added, as he turned the next corner, 
 "Ain't your friend got any money, either?" 
 
 The Princess hadn't thought of that, but it 
 seemed to her, as she relayed the question to the boy 
 who had told her his name was Bill Lawrence, a 
 much more forlorn chance than the one the chauf- 
 feur had refused to take. Bill had been so utterly 
 resourceless up to now that it seemed impossible that 
 he should provide so real a help as this. 
 
 But to her amazement, his face lighted eagerly as 
 he caught her import. "Money!" he cried. "That 
 is nothing. I have much." 
 
 With both hands, simultaneously, from both his 
 trousers pockets he began disgorging masses of bills. 
 The Princess uttered a faint shriek. 
 
 "Drive on!" she shouted with an ecstatic wave 
 of the arm toward the chauffeur. "We've got more 
 money than you'll want." 
 
 Then she turned back to the boy. "Put it up," 
 she commanded. "Give me the smallest thing you've 
 
68 REAL LIFE 
 
 got and put the rest out of sight. You — you haven't 
 been robbing a bank or anything, have you ?" 
 
 Selection seemed beyond him; he held out two 
 brimming hands. The Princess hastily took a 
 twenty — it was the smallest thing she saw ; most of 
 them were hundreds — and repeated more vehe- 
 mently her injunction to put the rest back in his 
 pockets. The sight of so much real money made her 
 head swim. 
 
 ("And she with an earning power of over three 
 thousand dollars a day ?" do I hear you ask, incred- 
 ulous ? Ah, the three thousand a day was the affair 
 of Leda Swan, and, more especially, of Ma Swan. 
 It was a matter of safety-deposit boxes, of stiff docu- 
 ments, of uncomprehending signatures upon dotted 
 lines. The Princess, personally, lived upon a pin- 
 money allowance — perfectly inelastic, too — of fif- 
 teen dollars a month; and she seldom had a chance 
 to spend all that!)' 
 
 "How much — " she asked in a tone of awe, 
 *'how much have you got there ?" 
 
 "I do not know," he told her. "I took what he 
 had in his hands and came away. It should be 
 enough, you think?" 
 
 "It's enough for anything I can think of!" 
 
THE BROWN TAXI 69 
 
 gasped the Princess. And then irresistibly the 
 question burst from her, "Does it really belong to 
 you?" 
 
 He answered with the utmost vehemence. "It 
 belong altogether to me; to no one else! Every 
 penny of this, and much, much more. But if this 
 that I have is enough, they may keep the rest. I 
 care nothing for that." 
 
 "All the same," observed the Princess dubiously, 
 "it doesn't do to throw money away. I wish we had 
 something smaller than a twenty to give this taxi- 
 driver." 
 
 She handed the bill out the window to the chauf- 
 feur. "Now are you satisfied?" she asked. 
 
 "Sure!" he said. It was not possible to score 
 over this young man. "I knew you was all right, all 
 the time." He tucked the bill in one of his pockets 
 and then allowed his manner to convey the impres- 
 sion that he was now, for the first time, about to 
 devote his entire attention to the successful consum- 
 mation of their flight. Indeed he said, "You don't 
 have to worry any more. I'll get you away now all 
 right." But his next remark was less encouraging. 
 **That twenty," he observed, "will take you a whole 
 lot further than my gas will." 
 
70 REAL LIFE 
 
 The Princess was beginning uneasily to perceive 
 a lack of cohesiveness about the mental processes of 
 their ally and to wonder whether he was really equal 
 to his task or not; but there was no present possi- 
 bility of swapping him for a better. They were just 
 getting into the park, anyhow, and it was easy to see 
 that the curving, forking drives, well masked with 
 shrubbery, offered better opportunities than the long 
 straight streets for keeping out of view of the chase. 
 The only difficulty was that there was no way of 
 knowing whether they had actually given the brown 
 taxi the slip or not. It might by now be pursuing 
 its mazy ways in an entirely different part of the 
 park; or it might be a bare hundred yards behind 
 them ready to come pouncing down upon them the 
 instant they stopped. She was upon the point of 
 indicating this danger to him when he, evidently 
 inspired with an idea, took command. 
 
 "Duck down in the bottom of the cab, both of 
 you," he ordered. "Sit on the floor so you won't 
 show. I'm going to try something." 
 
 He sounded, saying that, just like a picture di- 
 rector who has thought of something good. The 
 Princess obeyed him automatically, and the boy, in- 
 capable of resistance, followed her example. They 
 
THE BROWN TAXI 71 
 
 huddled down, tight and close, both a little tremu- 
 lous, breathing quick. 
 
 Well, it was a good device, you know, even 
 though the strictly limited intelligence of that chauf- 
 feur was the parent of it. He shot smartly to the 
 right around the three-way fork about the base of 
 the colossal gilt-bronze statue of the Republic, 
 stopped in reverse (spinning off about four dollars' 
 worth of tire fabric), backed, to the left, up the 
 bridge approach, shoved up his flag and came rolling 
 down the incline, to the right again, the perfect lei- 
 surely image of an empty taxi that had recently dis- 
 charged its passengers at the bathing pavilion 
 beyond the bridge — all this just as their brown pur- 
 suer came flying around the curve. It passed them 
 with a rush, taking the grade with the roar of an 
 opened muffler cutout, topped the crest of the bridge 
 and disappeared down the other side. 
 
 Instantly the yellow cab stopped. "Now hop it !" 
 the chauffeur cried, flinging open the door. "The 
 boy that drove that other car was wise to me all 
 right, and they'll be back in a minute. I'll beat it 
 like I had you with me and lead 'em back to town. 
 Good luck!" And, as he pulled away: "See you 
 later, Miss Swan!" 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 TRAPPED 
 
 "r^OR a moment after the disappearance of the yel- 
 ■*■ low cab the pair of fugitives stood on the 
 sward at the roadside looking at each other. The 
 boy's face, the Princess observed, while it had re- 
 tained the pallor probably natural to it, had come to 
 life again. His eyes shone, exultant, straight into 
 hers. 
 
 "You have save me twice within this hour," he 
 said ; "first from the motor truck and next from my 
 uncle. They are much alike, my uncle and that 
 motor truck, and you have foil them both." 
 
 "Was that your uncle?" the Princess gasped. 
 "The man who was chasing us?" 
 
 He nodded and laughed. "Let us forget him. 
 He is chasing now what you call the wild goose." 
 
 His sudden gaiety touched her heart, but car- 
 ried no conviction to her mind. One could not hope 
 
 72 
 
TRAPPED 73 
 
 to get rid of a wicked uncle as easily as that. Their 
 chauffeur's giiess that the driver of the brown taxi 
 had penetrated their ruse was probably correct. In 
 that case there was no time to lose. This boy would 
 be recognizable as far as one could see him. His 
 dress alone — black velour hat, morning coat, 
 striped trousers, patent-leather shoes (how in the 
 world came he to be dressed in such a fashion on a 
 warm spring day, anyhow?) — made him, out here 
 in the park, almost as conspicuous as the great mon- 
 ument near whose base they stood. She hated the 
 thought of alarming him again, but there was no 
 help for it. 
 
 "I guess we'd better hide somewhere," she said, 
 *'until we're sure he isn't coming back this way." 
 
 There came into his face at that just the look it 
 had worn when she had cast her first glance at him, 
 there in the mouth of the alley: the look of half- 
 frightened expectancy which one sees in a child's 
 face at the outset of a promising, untried game. He 
 took her hand. 
 
 "Let us hide then," he said. 
 
 The Princess made no effort to get her hand 
 away, though the effect of the contact was to pre- 
 ■\'ent her even from thinking where they might go. 
 
74 REAL LIFE 
 
 So they stood for a moment casting about rather 
 blankly. Then they heard an approaching motor 
 car come pounding up the farther bridge incline; 
 in another instant it would be over the crest. A 
 startled glance flashed from eye to eye and they 
 plunged into the thicket behind them. They had 
 just time to turn and crouch — the movement of the 
 branches was hardly stilled — ^when Indeed the brown 
 taxi appeared on the crest, sped past them without 
 checking and went out of sight with the curve cf 
 the drive. 
 
 The boy, with a sigh of relief, instantly relaxed 
 into an easier posture and his hand once more 
 sought that of the Princess. 
 
 "But didn't you see," she insisted in a sharp 
 whisper (she had yielded him her hand though; 
 somehow she couldn't help doing that!), "didn't you 
 see that the taxi was empty? That means your 
 uncle has got out to look for you — unless," she 
 added with a laugh, "he was sitting on the floor 
 like we were." 
 
 "No," the boy said soberly. "He would not do 
 that. He is too respectable. You are right; he is 
 got out to look for me." 
 
 But he made no movement in the direction of 
 
TRAPPED 75 
 
 further flight. Perhaps he was as completely in the 
 thrall of that hand-clasp as the Princess herself. 
 For another long moment they remained huddled 
 together, motionless, silent. It was the Princess 
 who drew away. 
 
 "Well," she demanded, "what are we going to 
 do? We can't stay here like this!" 
 
 "Why not?" he asked. "I do not think he 
 would see us here. These branches are very thick." 
 
 "Well, we can't anyway!" she told him with a 
 touch of asperity. "It says on that board over there 
 that people aren't allowed in the shrubbery. If a 
 policeman came along he'd see us all right !" 
 
 Like a very faint momentary echo out of another 
 existence the consideration occurred to her of the 
 effect of a newspaper story announcing that Leda 
 Swan had been arrested in the park for hiding in 
 the shrubbery. 
 
 "What do you say we do?" she asked. "You 
 don't want to be arrested by a policeman, do you?" 
 
 "No," he said. "That would be very bad 
 because then my uncle would come and take me 
 away. I will be obedient to you. Whatever you 
 tell me I will do." 
 
yd, REAL LIFE 
 
 "But can't you think of anything?" she cried. 
 
 "No," he said, so simply that he provoked from 
 her an exasperated laugh. 
 
 "Well, then," she said, "you've got to let me 
 think for a minute." 
 
 He had reached for her hand again, but this 
 time the Princess denied it him. That was really 
 why she had said he must let her think. She sat 
 down on the ground and firmly embraced her knees. 
 
 What they should have done, it was plain 
 enough to her now, was to flee the moment the 
 brown taxi had passed them, in the direction it had 
 taken. The wicked uncle could have been counted 
 upon to take two or three minutes anyhow for satis- 
 fying himself that his nephew wasn't hiding in the 
 immediate vicinity of the other end of the bridge. 
 But those irrecoverable minutes were now spent, and 
 the pair in the thicket could not emerge with any 
 security of not meeting him face to face in the open. 
 
 She turned to the boy, about to speak, but 
 checked herself before she had made a sound. He 
 was sitting quite close and very still, his face a lit- 
 tle averted so that she could see nothing of it beyond 
 the line from cheekbone to chin. He was being 
 good, like a child one has taken to church and told 
 
TRAPPED 'j'j 
 
 he must be quiet. The Princess wanted to laugh, 
 but she was afraid if she did she would cry instead. 
 
 She looked away again and steadied herself with 
 a long breath. "How bad would it be if your uncle 
 did catch you?" she asked. "You took that money 
 away from him, I suppose. Would he have you put 
 in prison?" 
 
 "From him!" the boy cried. "No! I did not 
 know he was here until I saw his face looking at 
 me." 
 
 "Then who was it you took the money from?" 
 
 "I don't know. I had never seen him before. 
 He brought it to me and I took it, — It was my 
 money," he added. 
 
 "Well, what can your uncle do to you then, if 
 you haven't done anything wrong?" the Princess 
 insisted on being informed. "He can't kill you; he 
 can't hurt you ; he can't put you in prison — can he ?" 
 
 "He has keep me in prison all my life," the boy 
 said deliberately. "Ever since I can remember. In 
 a — what you call — treadmill. And now you have 
 help me run away. I will not go back to that tread- 
 mill — alive !" 
 
 "But why does he want to keep you in a tread- 
 mill ? Why is he after you now ?" 
 
78 REAL LIFE 
 
 "He want me because I make him great — big — 
 rich. Without me he is — nothing! Now he have 
 ask too much. He have cook the goose that lay the 
 gold eggs. I begin to run off and you help me. 
 You will take me to the place you say, where you 
 can keep them all away from me." 
 
 "Hollywood, do you mean? But, silly, that's 
 away out in California!" 
 
 He flashed around upon her, a stricken look in 
 his eyes. "Then you did not mean it?" he de- 
 manded. "You were making fun?" 
 
 "Oh, don't look like that!" she cried. "Of 
 course I wasn't making fun! Only it's thousands 
 of miles to Hollywood." 
 
 "I do not care," he asserted, "if it is at the end 
 of the world — so much the better." 
 
 It was not, the Princess tried to remind herself, 
 a question of the end of the world, just now, but of 
 Jackson Park; of the man who was beating the 
 bushes over there across the bridge looking for 
 them; of instant decisions and activities. Yet, 
 despite herself, all these considerations seemed as 
 unreal as singing reproduced by a phonograph. All 
 she could think of was the one thing she wanted to 
 do now, and presently with a gasp of surrender she 
 
TRAPPED 79 
 
 did it — reached out her hand and rested it upon the 
 boy's shoulder. Instantly he took it in his and laid 
 his cheek against it. The Princess felt as if she 
 were dissolving, somehow. 
 
 "You make me your friend," the boy said; 
 "that is the only thing that matters." 
 
 "And yet," she argued, with difficulty because 
 she felt her teeth trying to chatter, "and yet, you 
 don't reall/ trust me. You did not tell me your 
 real name when I asked." 
 
 "It is my real name," he insisted, but without 
 looking around at her this time. "I will tell you 
 how that is. My name is very hard to say, so 
 when I am in New York and I meet a lady who talk 
 my language I ask her what my name would be in 
 American. I am to be American and I wish an 
 American name. So she translate my name into 
 American and tell me it is Bill Lawrence. That is 
 an American name, is it not?" 
 
 "I see," mused the Princess. "Yes, that's plain 
 United States all right But," she went on, "you 
 have not told me who you are, or — or — anything. 
 You are keeping a secret from me." 
 
 He kissed her hand and instantly relinquished 
 it. 
 
8o REAL LIFE 
 
 "Yes," he admitted, "I keep a secret, if you per- 
 mit. Not because I do not trust, nor to try if you 
 are willing to trust me, but because it is sweet to 
 me that you should be my friend not knowing — for 
 a little while. But if you ask me to tell, then I will 
 tell you everything." 
 
 Once more she experienced a moment of par- 
 alyzing incredulity, just as during the first few 
 hundred yards of their ride in the t^xi, whether 
 anything that ran as close to her daydreams as this 
 could be true. A mysterious identity that she was 
 asked, for a while, not to seek to discover, was the 
 last ineffable touch he needed to make her romance 
 complete. 
 
 She might wonder and dream about it; she 
 couldn't help doing that. Mightn't he be a real 
 prince or even a young king — shaken off his throne 
 by the war or some of these revolutions they were 
 having everj'where? He wasn't the Prince of 
 Wales, she was sure of that — she'd seen him. But 
 there must be plenty more in other countries. Who 
 would the wicked uncle be, in that case? The 
 usurper of the crown, perhaps? No; that wasn't 
 likely. He wouldn't be pursuing the rightful heir; 
 certainly not in person. Perhaps he was a baffled 
 
. TRAPPED 8i 
 
 guardian trying- to drag his nephew back to the 
 throne which the boy's democratic nature had led 
 him to renounce. Or perhaps — she gasped at this; 
 this almost must'l^e true! — perhaps they wanted to 
 make him marry someone he didn't love, for rea- 
 sons of state; some princess from a neighboring 
 country — horribly plain of course. That might have 
 been what he meant by the treadmill. They always 
 spoke of it like that, didn't they? 
 
 One thing the Princess was determined about: 
 She wouldn't pry. No machinations, however plaus- 
 ible, should betray her into distrust, into setting 
 traps, into asking questions — even hinting at them. 
 That was the way lots of heroines got into trouble, 
 all but wrecked the whole romance. They would 
 promise, just as she was about to do, to trust 
 through everything, to wait the hero's own good 
 time for the electric revelation, and then somebody 
 trumped up a malignant lie or a set of compromis- 
 ing appearances and they lost their nerve and began 
 insisting upon explanations just at the moment, 
 most likely, when the hero found it most impossible 
 to explain anything. The Princess wouldn't do 
 that, she promised herself, whatever happened. 
 
 All this time he had been waiting; taking, it 
 
S2 REAL LIFE 
 
 appeared, her long silence for indecision, for he 
 turned to her now with an appealing look, "It is 
 not a bad secret that I am asking you to let me 
 keep," he said. 
 
 "Oh, it wasn't that!" she cried. "I wasn't tak- 
 ing all that time to decide. I do trust you. You 
 needn't tell me anything, ever — until you want to." 
 
 Their faces were very close together and their 
 €yes held fast. Nothing but a kiss could cap a 
 declaration like that. They took it, with a gasp 
 apiece, and then, very red and scared, moved hur- 
 riedly apart. 
 
 "I'll tell you what I think we'd better do," the 
 Princess said, in an intensely matter-of-fact tone. 
 *'l think you'd better stay here for a few minutes 
 'while I go scouting across the bridge to see whether 
 your uncle is coming or not. If he isn't we can 
 just go away and take a street car or something." 
 
 He did not answer, and she saw when she 
 glanced around at him that he was looking rather 
 .sad over her proposal. So she added, dropping her 
 young-ladylike manner, "That's a good plan, isn't 
 it. Bill?" She laughed at the mere sound of that 
 and won a smile from him. 
 
TRAPPED 83 
 
 "I like that— Bill," he told her. "But I do not 
 like that you should go away." 
 
 "But we can't go on just sitting here on the 
 ground," she protested, "like the Babes in the 
 Woods!" 
 
 "And let the robins cover us with leaves," he 
 added. 
 
 She checked a tendency to dissolve once more 
 by getting brusquely to her feet. "It wouldn't be 
 a robin with us," she said. "It would be a sparrow 
 cop, and he wouldn't cover us with leaves, either!" 
 
 That joke went over his head, but she did not 
 linger to explain it. 
 
 "Sit perfectly still," she instructed him. "I 
 won't be gone five minutes." 
 
 As you may have inferred from her suggestion 
 of the possibility of their taking a street car, the 
 Princess had completely forgotten, in her concen- 
 tration upon Bill Lawrence and his affairs, that she 
 was Leda Swan. She picked her way out of the 
 thicket and set out at a brisk walk up the bridge 
 incline, aware of herself as nothing but an incon- 
 spicuous scout possessed of the capital advantage 
 that the wicked uncle, even if she encountered him. 
 
84 REAL LIFE 
 
 would not, in any likelihood, recognize her. She 
 noted with complete indifference the approach of a 
 group of four or five young girls on their way 
 home from the bathing pavilion, and was for an 
 instant merely puzzled by the sensation her appear- 
 ance caused among them. They had started, 
 stopped and stared at her in a perfectly ingenuous 
 astonishment with the most complete and instan- 
 taneous accord. 
 
 *'It is, I tell you ! It is Leda Swan !" 
 "Well, but look at her, I tell you!" 
 *'She must have been in an accident." 
 "Well, it's her anyway." 
 
 All that quite audibly, though in a confusion of 
 excited voices, came to the ears of the Princess. 
 And as she walked on with what appearance of com- 
 posure she could assume over an emotion that was 
 mounting to panic, she was aware that they were 
 slowly and perhaps a little doubtfully following. 
 Another group farther along, whom she must ap- 
 proach, already had stopped and were staring, too. 
 The whole vast open space — it looked vast to her at 
 least — in front of the pavilion was dotted with peo- 
 ple all of whom would start and stare and more or 
 less come crowding up after their first glimpse of 
 
TRAPPED 85 
 
 her. Had there been any cover at hand she would 
 have bolted for it like a frightened rabbit. 
 
 The only shelter of any sort in sight was the 
 pavilion itself, and she headed toward it, walking as 
 rapidly as she could without conveying an appear- 
 ance of haste. It took all her self-control to keep 
 from breaking into a run. 
 
 The panic receded a little, however, as she 
 walked along. Nobody actually followed her very 
 far. Certainly they were not coagulating around 
 her in a mob, and by the time she had attained the 
 qualified haven of the great central corridor and 
 dropped down limp upon one of its benches she was 
 sufficiently in possession of herself once more to 
 remember Bill — Bill, who was patiently and anx- 
 iously awaiting her return to their hiding-place in 
 the shrubbery. What was she going to do about 
 him? She did not even then entertain so much as 
 a momentary idea of abandoning him. But she did 
 realize the complete impracticability of her earlier 
 program; and she wanted, intensely and poignantly 
 she wanted, to recover, for his benefit as well as 
 for her own, her hedges, her pedestal, her place. 
 
 A battery of telephone booths across the corri- 
 dor caught her eye. That was the thing to do, of 
 
86 REAL LIFE 
 
 course : call up the hotel and have them send down 
 a car for her with Miss Smith or someone in it ; pick 
 up the boy; take him back to the hotel; smuggle 
 him into her suite somehow; keep him out of sight 
 more or less and take him, as one of her staff, on 
 the limited with her tomorrow night. Without 
 bothering to work out the details any farther she 
 briskly crossed the corridor and entered the nearest 
 booth. 
 
 What checked her was the sight of a row of coin 
 slots across the top of the instrument and the reali- 
 zation that she had no money at all, not even the 
 humble nickel that it required to attract the opera- 
 or's attention. She felt herself going rather limp 
 again and leaned back against the partition wall. 
 
 And then a voice galvanized her into instant 
 alertness once more. It was the foreign-sounding 
 voice she had last heard expostulating with the 
 chauffeur of the brown taxi; the wicked uncle's 
 voice, beyond the slightest possibility of doubt. He 
 was talking English now, laboriously and very loud. 
 
 "Yes. I am in a place call Jackson Park. I fol- 
 low the boy here where he run away with a girl in 
 a taxi. They have dismiss the taxi here at the park. 
 
TRAPPED 87 
 
 so I have hope to find him. But if he have no 
 money he must come back ....*' 
 
 There was a minute of silence in the next booth 
 and then a screech, followed by a torrent of bar- 
 barous syllables that would no doubt have got his 
 connection cut off in any country where they were 
 intelligible; then English again in a cold agony of 
 earnestness. 
 
 "Attend now you and perform what I tell you. 
 This is not for the police. The police means the 
 newspapers, and it must not be known that he have 
 run off. Go to a private agency and pay them well. 
 Have them watch all hotels and all railway stations. 
 Three thousand dollars! God in Heaven! With 
 that he can go halfway round the world. Under- 
 stand now! If he get out of this city I will break 
 you .... Yah ! I do not care whose fault it is. And 
 understand this also . " 
 
 The Princess waited to hear no more. With a 
 gasp, she burst out of her telephone booth and sped 
 down the corridor. She had forgotten her panic, 
 her plans, the impulse that had sent her into that 
 booth to summon her own faithful retainers to her 
 side again — forgotten everything but the need of 
 the boy who was waiting (she could fairly see the 
 
88 REAL LIFE 
 
 look in his face), crouched back there in the shrub- 
 bery, for her return. His need of her now, what- 
 ever it had been before, was a hundred-fold greater, 
 ringed as he was, by his uncle's order, by spies. She 
 did not know how she was going to help him. 
 Somehow, she must ; she was the only friend he had. 
 At the head of the great stone flight of steps 
 she paused, just momentarily. The broad open 
 space which, when she had crossed it so short a 
 time ago, had seemed literally sprouting with 
 humanity, looked now, to her startled eye, utterly 
 empty except for the one figure at gaze in the mid- 
 dle of it. 
 
 Bill, of course! He hadn't been able to wait 
 any longer and had come fairly into the lion's jaws 
 to find her! His uncle, when he had finished tele- 
 phoning — any instant now — would come out to the 
 head of that same flight of steps and look around. 
 And recognize his prey? Of course; he couldn't 
 help doing it! There was no one in an expanse of 
 acres whom she could see but Bill. 
 
 She bounded down the steps and fairly flew 
 
 toward him. She had never run so fast in her life. 
 
 And she thought as fast as she ran. If any of 
 
 the bystanders were to perceive that the situation 
 
TRAPPED 89 
 
 was serious they would try to take a hand in it, and 
 the moment it would need for explanations — even 
 to the boy himself — would be enough to serve the 
 uncle's nefarious purpose. 
 
 The need for acting tuned her up. She ran as 
 if it were all a lark, like a child let out of school for 
 recess. She spared breath enough for a laugh. 
 When Bill saw her she waved him a challenge to 
 race to the head of a winding path that led through 
 the shrubbery. 
 
 He caught the main idea, all right, but he either 
 misread the direction she indicated or thought it 
 didn't matter, for he started running, without wait- 
 ing for her to come up with him, straight down the 
 main southbound drive that leads between the two 
 basins of the lagoon — in full view from the pavilion 
 steps, that meant, for another hundred yards or so. 
 
 To anyone but herself, she realized, he must 
 look perfectly ridiculous, the way he ran, and 
 dressed as he was, and for a moment their appall- 
 ing resemblance to a low comedy film all but sapped 
 her courage. But she went desperately on, and, as 
 luckily he couldn't run very fast, she presently over- 
 took him. By that time, though, there was no place 
 to hide or to turn off. Their road went straight on 
 
90 REAL LIFE 
 
 over another bridge and curved to the left. Here 
 they paused for the breath they both needed. Uncle 
 v;^as not, at all events, immediately upon their heels. 
 
 "He's after us/' she panted, "so we'll have to 
 hide again. He v^^as in there telephoning and I 
 heard what he said. That's why I had you run. 
 Come on. Have you got your breath yet?" 
 
 He hadn't, enough even to answer with. 
 Princes, she supposed, never had to run a step in 
 their lives. She took him firmly by the arm and 
 went on, walking, though, as fast as she could make 
 him go. 
 
 There was a fork farther along, the main drive 
 swinging south again and a winding and apparently 
 little-traveled road curving north to the left. The 
 Princess was no topographer, and the mistake she 
 made was natural enough. She chose the left-hand 
 road and thereby went in, with poor confiding Bill, 
 through the neck of a bottle. They were on a nar- 
 row peninsula between the outer basin and the big 
 lake, A relic of the World's Fair, the reproduction 
 of La Rabida Convent, stands at the end of it. The 
 caravels used to be moored beside it. Between it 
 and the pavilion is the unbridged lagoon outlet into 
 
TRAPPED 91 
 
 the lake. The Princess had to swallow a sob as she 
 and Bill stood looking down into it. 
 
 *T don't suppose you can swim," she forlornly 
 said, but did not wait for his inevitable answer. 
 "We've got to try to get back, if there's time." 
 
 But through an opening in the trees, as they 
 retraced their steps, they caught a glimpse of Uncle, 
 already crossing the bridge. They were trapped — 
 "like rats!" the Princess reflected. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE YACHT 
 
 BUT, this, you know, simply wasn't possible. All 
 her experience of life barred it. There was no 
 such thing as catching a hero and a heroine — really 
 catching them like rats in a trap; parting them for- 
 ever; putting the hero, squirming, back upon his 
 throne and making him marry a homely princess 
 like one of Cinderella's sisters. It could not hap- 
 pen. The wicked uncle might gloatingly think the 
 trap fairly sprung upon his victims, but there always 
 was a way out. One of the pair, the hero or heroine 
 as it happened, simply had to find that way. Of 
 course, in this case it was up to her; a failure now 
 would cast a doubt upon the very integrity of her 
 calling. 
 
 Bill, still breathless and pretty tired, did venture 
 rather forlornly a suggestion that they revert to 
 their status as babes in the woods behind some clump 
 of bushes and hope that Uncle wouldn't be able to 
 
 92 
 
THE YACHT 93 
 
 find them. But she, standing very still, with eyes 
 half shut and a knot between her brows, accorded 
 this plan no more than a curt shake of the head and 
 a relenting pat upon his shoulder. But she went on 
 thinking aloud. 
 
 "He knows he's got us, doesn't he, because the 
 only way out is along that Httle road. Well, either 
 he'll search this place inch by inch or else, if he 
 isn't in too much of a hurry, he'll sit down himself 
 behind a bush back there in the narrowest place and 
 wait. He doesn't know we've seen him following 
 us, so I guess that's what he'll do — wait a while, 
 anyway until somebody comes along that he can ask 
 to help him find us. What we've got to have is a 
 place to hide where they can't find us. — H you 
 could only swim !" she added. 
 
 The thing that kept plaguing her was this possi- 
 bility of an escape by water. Also, she was pos- 
 sessed by the conviction that the next three or four 
 minutes were the decisive ones. She caught Bill by 
 the arm and led him down the heavily wooded bank 
 on the lagoon side. 
 
 The whole surface of the lagoon was dotted 
 thickly with yachts ; all sorts of yachts, big and little 
 — sloops, mackinaws, yawls, a schooner or two, doz- 
 
94 REAL LIFE 
 
 ens of little snub-nosed cats — all lying at moorings 
 with neatly furled sails, deserted. There was not a 
 human being in sight, not even on the verandas of 
 the houseboat yacht club, well out from land at the 
 end of a long gangway. There were a score or more 
 of dinghies all made fast to a low wharf leading out 
 from one of those verandas ; but the only access to 
 them was by the gangway, and the crossing of this 
 gangway involved taking a longer chance than any- 
 thing but desperation would have driven her to. 
 
 There was, though, right here beneath her eye 
 one little pot-bellied boat pulled up on the beach. 
 There wasn't an oar or a paddle, not even a float- 
 board, in it ; but even so, it was the most promising- 
 looking vehicle of escape in sight. It was beached 
 bows on, and did not look very heavy. 
 
 "Bill," she said, swiftly and tensely, "we're 
 going to get into that little boat. I think we can get 
 to one of those yachts in it. Your uncle may be 
 where he can see us, but we've got to take a chance 
 on that. Only we mustn't waste a second, so we 
 must know exactly what we're going to do. We'll 
 both grab hold of the boat and push it out into the 
 water until the stern's afloat. Then you get in and 
 sit down in the stern — that's the broad end of it, you 
 
THE YACHT 95 
 
 know. I'll push off the rest of the way and try to 
 get it going fast enough so that it'll drift over to that 
 big sloop, see, that has 'Sally' painted on it. That 
 looks big enough to hide in." 
 
 She had been occupied, while making this expla- 
 nation, in getting rid of her skirt by the process of 
 tucking the hem of it, by handfuls, into her girdle. 
 She meant to wade out as far as she could, and she 
 never could make a clean spring over the bows — 
 couldn't get over at all without checking their way 
 altogether — with a great wet thing like that drag- 
 ging around her feet 
 
 Looking up now at Bill to learn whether he com- 
 prehended the plan, she saw that he had gone white 
 again, staring down at the water and at that little 
 boat just as he had over the blood upon her arm. He 
 probably had never been in a boat in his life except 
 the liner that had brought him across the ocean. 
 
 "I will do it!" he said between his teeth. "I 
 will drown rather than go back to my uncle!" 
 
 "Oh, don't be a baby!" she cried with a sudden 
 spurt of temper. "Nobody's going to drown." 
 
 Then as she saw the tears spring into his eyes 
 she all but dissolved again. How could she have 
 been so cruel to him! It wasn't his fault, was it, 
 
96 REAL LIFE 
 
 that princes were brought up in cotton wool like 
 that? Nothing but the implacable necessity for 
 haste would have prevented her from catching him 
 in her arms and comforting him, telling him not to 
 mind that she had been a beast. 
 
 All she had time for was the briefest "I didn't 
 mean that. Come on now — down the bank in one 
 jump and grab the boat." 
 
 She was so much quicker than he and it was so 
 much lighter than she had expected that she had 
 it afloat before he had time to lay his hands upon 
 the gunwale. 
 
 "Jump in !" she cried. "Grab hold of my shoul- 
 der. I've got the lx)at." 
 
 For there had been a second when the act of step- 
 ping ankle-deep in water with one foot and 
 entrusting the other to the insecurity of the bow 
 thwart had been beyond him altogether. But he 
 obeyed her with a scramble and a flop, barking his 
 shins, she feared, on the midship thwart as he went 
 aft, and tumbled into the stern sheets in a heap. 
 Once he was down, anyhow, in the bottom of the 
 boat it did not matter. She shoved off with a run, 
 wading until she was knee-deep, and then with a 
 good clean spring came aboard. 
 
THE YACHT 97 
 
 The dinghy, she joyfully perceived, had way 
 enough on to take it out to the sloop. The direction 
 of her push, however, had not been perfectly calcu- 
 lated, and, instead of sliding along under thf^ stern 
 as she had hoped to, she was able only by a long 
 reach to clutch the side farther forward almost 
 abreast of the mast, where the freeboard was much 
 higher. To her agility this meant nothing; painter 
 in hand she went up over the side like a cat, intent 
 on leading the dinghy aft to where poor Bill could 
 step aboard more comfortably. 
 
 I suppose an irresistible panic must have over- 
 whelmed Bill when he found himself alone in the 
 boat. The end of the painter in her hand meant 
 nothing to him. The Princess had not had her back 
 to him more than three seconds, but when from the 
 sloop's deck she turned and faced him once more she 
 saw him frantically trying to climb up on the near 
 gunwale. She had only time to fling herself down 
 on her stomach and clutch one of his hands as he, 
 having kicked the dinghy out from under him, went 
 into the water. Even in that extremity, though, he 
 didn't cry out. 
 
 Strong as she was, she was not equal to the dead 
 weight involved in getting him aboard at that point, 
 
98 REAL LIFE 
 
 so she worked her way aft with him, dragging him 
 through the water, of course, to the stem. 
 
 Even there it wasn't easy. However, it was, af- 
 ter a struggle, accompHshed and presently he lay, 
 wan and wet, shivering, spent (for what he had 
 faced, you see, for two or three minutes had been 
 the apparent certainty of a horrible death), in the 
 bottom of the cockpit. 
 
 She looked around for the dinghy, which his 
 last convulsive kick had thrust clear of the sloop's 
 side, and saw that the breeze was carr}ang it back 
 almost to the point where it had been beached. That 
 was one bit of good luck, anyway. She dropped 
 down in the cockpit beside the boy, glad of a minute 
 in which to get back her own breath. 
 
 Purely strategic considerations would have de- 
 cided her against trying to improve their situation 
 just now, but to wait for dark — though it would still 
 be a good while coming — right here as they were. 
 But a look at Bill made it clear that this wouldn't do. 
 He was in a state approaching collapse; he looked 
 like people who were going to die — gray-faced, blue- 
 lipped. The indicated treatment according to mo- 
 tion-picture therapeutics would have been, she was 
 aware, to cradle his head in her lap and stroke his 
 
THE YACHT 99 
 
 brow. But she was profoundly skeptical of any 
 benefits resulting from it in this case. 
 
 Up to the arm-pits he was soaking wet with the 
 persistent never-drying wetness that results from 
 having been in the water in heavy wool clothes. He 
 must get out of those clothes somehow ; he must be 
 made dry and warm. Otherwise, most likely, he 
 would take pneumonia and die. Even returning 
 him to his uncle would be, she felt, a preferable alter- 
 native to that. But she was not ready to admit that 
 it was the only one. The sloop was a cruiser ; in the 
 forward end of the cockpit was a transom leading 
 down, she felt sure, into a cabin which might well 
 enough contain all sorts of helpful possibilities. 
 But the transom was secured with a good stout hasp 
 and a padlock. 
 
 They had once used a craft like this in a picture, 
 so its anatomy was not altogether unfamiliar to her. 
 She stuck her head up and looked forward to see if 
 there weren't another hatch somewhere. There was 
 a round thing eighteen inches in diameter or so, pro- 
 jecting through the deck like the cover of a very big 
 baking-powder tin, which might be what she wanted. 
 It, too, was probably locked, but she could at least go 
 and see. It meant taking another chance, to be sure, 
 
lOO REAL LIFE 
 
 of attracting' attention, but there was no avoiding 
 that if Bill were to be put under cover. 
 
 She fortified her resolution with a last look at 
 him, told him with a leave-taking caress that she'd 
 be back in a minute and crept forward along the 
 offshore side of the boom to the hatch cover. It 
 seemed perfectly immovable when first she tugged at 
 it, but this she found was due to a simple bayonet 
 catch in the side, so she rotated it a degree or two, 
 worried it off and swung herself down into the 
 forehold. 
 
 It was a cavernous place containing nothing ap- 
 parently but rolled-up or folded sails. In a moment, 
 however, she discovered to her delight that the green 
 curtain just abaft the mast was all that separated 
 this compartment from the cabin. 
 
 And here indeed was treasure : two wide bunks, 
 one of them with a stack of blankets upon it; for- 
 ward of these, starboard and port respectively, a 
 toilet and a galley, the latter actually containing food 
 — a biscuit-tin, some cans of pork and beans. She 
 did not take time for a further inventory. Abaft the 
 bunks were two clothes lockers — unlocked, thank 
 goodness! — with clothes in them — white cotton 
 
THE YACHT loi 
 
 trousers, oilskins, a sweater or two-and^a aiis'.:eife- 
 neous heap of canvas sneakers. 
 
 At this point in her researches she heard Bill call- 
 ing- in a scared voice, "Princess !" 
 
 She rushed forward and saw him peering tragic- 
 ally down the hatch. 
 
 "It's all right !" she called to him. "It's simply 
 great! Why, we can live here as long as we hke! 
 — Come on down!" she added, perceiving that 
 though he wanted to obey he hadn't the slightest 
 idea how to set about doing it. "Oh, just stick your 
 feet through and drop. I'll catch you." 
 
 And this she did pretty successfully, though he 
 came down upon her like a bag of cement, and half 
 led, half dragged him into the cabin. He was all in 
 and no mistake. She sat him down on one of the 
 bunks, got him out of his coat and waistcoat, undid 
 his cravat and collar and then knelt at his feet and 
 took off his shoes. 
 
 She perfoi-med all of these services quite simply 
 and all but unconsciously. Yet there came to her 
 mind's ear as she wrestled with the wet leather but- 
 ton-holes, faintly and phonographically, a voice that 
 exclaimed in tones of horror, "Leda Swan, what are 
 
I02 REAL LIFE 
 
 xou doing!" The only effect it had was to touch 
 her Hps with a smile. 
 
 Having rummaged a long-sleeved jersey, a pair 
 of white cotton trousers and some thick wool socks 
 out of the locker, she told him firmly to take off 
 every stitch of his wet clothes and put on these. 
 "And call me as soon as you finish," she concluded. 
 
 He asked, looking desperate again, where she 
 was going. 
 
 "Just around behind that curtain," she told him. 
 "Only wait ! I guess I might as well get dry too." 
 
 The resources of the locker were not by any 
 means exhausted, but when it came to trousers she 
 found her only choice was between a small pair that 
 might not be such a bad fit, but were horribly dirty, 
 and a quite presentably clean pair which were in 
 girth enormously too big. She hesitated an instant, 
 but fastidiousness conquered vanity and she chose 
 the latter. She took a blouse and the smallest pair 
 of sneakers and retired with them to the forehold. 
 
 She had completed her change before he did. It 
 was not as radical as his, of course ; only a question 
 of getting out of her skirt, coat and blouse and tak- 
 ing off her wet shoes and stockings. The waist- 
 band of the trousers was almost big enough to wrap 
 
THE YACHT 103 
 
 around her twice, so she was able to fasten it with 
 her own girdle. She rolled back the wristbands of 
 the middy blouse so that they wouldn't interfere 
 with her hands and turned the trousers legs well 
 above her ankles, flexed her arms luxuriously, 
 stretched her bare toes, released from the unpleas- 
 ant confinement of wet shoes and stockings, and 
 with a grimace put on the sneakers; then she sat 
 down on one of the great rolls of canvas to await 
 the boy's call, ready, she felt, for anything. 
 
 Yet she was not ready for the shock that 
 awaited her on the other side of the flimsy green 
 curtain when Bill spoke, in a perfectly natural 
 voice, and asked her to come in. She pulled aside 
 the curtain, uttered a faint shriek and stood staring, 
 about equally horrified and incredulous, at the fig- 
 ure sitting upon the bunk. Because it was not Bill ; 
 though at the same time, and even more horribly, it 
 was. But the beautiful image of romance was gone 
 and a cruel, staring travesty sat in its place. 
 
 You may as well be told the truth in plain words, 
 I suppose: Bill had taken off his hair. It lay upon 
 his hat on the bunk beside him. The only covering 
 now upon his hard round head was a stubble per- 
 haps three weeks old. 
 
104 REAL LIFE 
 
 He had started at her outcry and glanced about 
 in alarm to find the cause of it; then he looked up 
 inquiringly into her face. 
 
 "It was nothing," she said in a half-suffocated 
 voice. "Only — only you look so different!" 
 
 He smiled. "You are surprise when I take off 
 my wig. You did not know it was a wig, maybe? 
 They make it very carefully so that no one shall 
 know." 
 
 He took it up and regarded it with a quite im- 
 personal admiration, then tossed it aside and ran 
 his fingers over his poor bare scalp. It was the 
 same gesture she had noted in the taxicab, but so 
 different in effect that she almost cried out again. 
 
 She was aware, though she desperately kept her 
 eyes away from his face, that he was searching hers 
 with a newly troubled intensity. 
 
 "You do not like me without my hair?" he 
 asked. 
 
 She tried to laugh it off. "I'll get used to it, I 
 giiess," she told him, and then since he was fairly 
 shuddering with cold she resolutely set about wrap- 
 ping him in the blankets, shaking them out one at a 
 time and tucking them in around him until she had 
 made a mound of him. But she felt when she had 
 
TTTE YACHT 105 
 
 fiiiislK''! ili.ii '.lie (MiiMii'i iippMii I hrit wistful gaze 
 
 (if III, .iii\ l.irMi I'cii ,111 ( ,1 II ,(■ \lic ".il liricil 11|) :ill 
 
 hi'. ( lolhc .. 
 
 "I'll fill- iliciii ill Iicic ;iii<l spread thcjii uiit to 
 di-y," 111-   ii'l, ni.MM'M-'l .1 <.iiiicra smile for him 
 
 and |h >ll('(| I Iir< III!' h I Ik' I III I .Mil'.. 
 
 I'll! 'lie lliiii;; llniii (|m\\ii in unc h^.i]) and hciV 
 
 self in aiioilicr ii|ii.ii iIm- '..lil., .md, so far as it 
 
 Conid lie dniic iMiicIc h, lit lie! (Il 'Ml Tl \\:i.n'l 
 fair! Il \'.i ii'i ciidiii .il lie ! Il w.i. a IrirU iiIImI\ 
 <»nl ra;M'< HI', ,11 h I di | in .il ilr l h.il I' .il( ii'id |)1a vd ii| h m 
 
 licl'! Il w.r .1 li(li.i\.d, .1 l.iidi ( |( '.I I I )\ III- :.lhM|.,, 
 
 she doul)i.d ii lM'd.-\ci I. ... ',(•!• from. 
 
 It wasii'i. iliMii..|i, I'.iii iii.ii Im- was angry with 
 even ill tin's iii.i iiK.mcnt of tragic disillusionment. 
 Somehow you cmihhi't l.c angry with Bill. Tt 
 wasn't his fmdi, li<- ii||. . rd, that he hadn't anv 
 hair. Only why need lie li.iv< unm a wig; so Im mii 
 fill ili.ii she, expert as s!i<- w.r. in ilic niysl<'ii("i of 
 
 in.il.ciip, 'Jm.iiM Iiavc fallfii in I.^m- willi il ;' W li\' .1 
 v\ 1;: .ii .ill, for lli.ii iii.iiicr? 
 
 SIh- Ii.kI I" :m.|iiii hlin of Calculation so far as 
 il'. rile. I ii|,. .11 11. I V.A-. (Mncrrncd. He'd taken it 
 (d'l jM I a:-, biu»pl> aiiU iiiim.ii . ioimly as he'd taken 
 oil ill. hat. There wa:. :-'>nird.ing, when you 
 
io6 REAL LIFE 
 
 stopped to think — well — princely about a simplicity 
 like that. It fitted in with the way he had spoken 
 of beautiful women who had kissed his hands — 
 though he did not like it and wanted them kept 
 away. But why should a prince great enough to 
 be as indifferent as all that, wear a wig, even if his 
 own hair were nothing much to look at? 
 
 The Princess caught her breath and sat up and 
 her eyes came alight again. Romance, though it 
 had sustained a nasty jolt, showed signs of recover- 
 ing consciousness. A disguise! — so that he could 
 escape his kingdom and the horrible girl they wanted 
 to marry him to ! She wondered what his own hair 
 had been like. 
 
 She had to sustain another revulsion, another 
 quite horrible sinking of the heart, as the picture of 
 his round head projecting out of that mound of 
 blankets formed itself again in her mind. It wasn't 
 the sort of a trial that a heroine's constancy could 
 fairly be subjected to. It was cruel and unusual, 
 a flagrant violation of the constitutional laws of 
 romance. But she drew a long breath of resolution 
 and promised herself to be game through every- 
 thing. She'd never really contemplated anything 
 else, not even in those first black moments. The 
 
THE YACHT 107 
 
 picture of herself climbing out through that forward 
 hatch, swimming ashore and leaving him to fare as 
 best he could had never been anything but a panicky 
 flash of nightmare. 
 
 She got up briskly and went to work wringing 
 what water she could out of his saturated clothes 
 and spreading them out to dry upon the sails. The 
 money in his trousers pockets worried her, so she 
 took it out, straightened and counted it. It came 
 to exactly two thousand nine hundred and eighty 
 dollars — the three thousand dollars his uncle had 
 screamed about over the telephone, minus the 
 twenty they had given the taxi-driver. Not know- 
 ing quite what to do with it she tucked it into the 
 pocket of her own trousers. 
 
 Then, shutting her eyes for a minute and stiff- 
 ening her face for the sight she must encounter, she 
 went back into the cabin and looked at Bill. He 
 was asleep, poor dear, and wasn't somehow, like 
 that, a revolting object at all. An unexpected wave 
 of tenderness for him took possession of her. She 
 might have been a mother looking down at her first 
 baby in its crib. They haven't any hair either as a 
 matter of fact, and are seldom anything wonderful 
 for a critical eye to look at. 
 
io8 REAL LIFE 
 
 She sat down very carefully on the edge of the 
 bunk beside him. He looked so helpless, so com- 
 pletely at the mercy of her care ! She wanted, quite 
 imperatively, to touch his face with her fingers, to 
 stroke his forehead; and before she could summon 
 any adequate resistance to this impulse she found 
 herself doing it. After a minute his eyes came 
 open and he looked up at her with a childlike, sleepy 
 smile, and she caught her breath with a scared lit- 
 tle sob as she realized that she loved this cropped 
 head better, more poignantly, than the lost beauty 
 of those romantic tresses. 
 
 "What's your real hair like, Bill, when it grows 
 out?" 
 
 "You have seen," he said. "That is my real 
 hair in the wig. When they shave it off my uncle 
 he save it very carefully and have it made just like, 
 so that no one shall know. And," he added, "no 
 one does know in all the world except you and 
 Yakov." . 
 
 "Who," the Princess asked, "is Yakov?" 
 
 "My valet," he told her. "He is take care of 
 me since when I am, oh, just a little boy. As soon 
 as I can remember." 
 
 There were a hundred questions she wanted to 
 
THE YACHT 109 
 
 ask. Foremost among them, why they had shaved 
 his head; and if his uncle knew about it all the 
 while, what good .... But she held them all back 
 staunchly. She wouldn't pry! 
 
 "If you like," he said, *T will keep my hair 
 short like this. I have more comfort so and more 
 fun. Will you permit that I shall do that?" 
 
 "Well," she said noncommittally, "we'll see. It 
 will be a great big help, though, getting you away 
 from the detectives. I am sure nobody would know 
 you like this. It's the most wonderful disguise I 
 ever saw." 
 
 Then with a sudden gleam of excitement — 
 "Why, it's a disguise for both of us!" she cried. 
 "Wait." 
 
 She shook down her own hair, folded it back 
 over the top of her head and put on the wig. A 
 small shaving-mirror was screwed into the galley 
 door, and with the aid of this she got it tolerably 
 well adjusted. 
 
 "Look at me now!" she cried triumphantly. 
 "Won't I pass for a boy, too ? That's how we'll get 
 away together; in sailors' clothes. We'll wait here 
 until it's dark and I'll swim ashore for a boat — one 
 of those boats with oars in it that's tied to the wharf 
 
no REAL LIFE 
 
 over there. I'll come back in it for you and row 
 you round under the bridge into the other pond so 
 that even if your uncle hasn't got tired of waiting 
 we'll get away from him. And to-morrow night 
 we'll take the train." 
 
 It was a plan, she realized, that still wanted a 
 good deal of- filling in. But Bill seemed unaware of 
 any fatal gaps in it, and this for the moment was 
 enough for her. 
 
 "Are you hungry?" she asked. "I can get sup- 
 per, you know, whenever you like. It must be six 
 o'clock." 
 
 "I do not feel hungry," he told her; "only 
 happy." 
 
 She wanted to kiss him for that, but she 
 forbore. 
 
 "Happiness," she remarked, assuming an in- 
 tensely practical air, "won't take the place of food, 
 not with the sort of night we've got ahead of us. 
 So I guess I'd better go and open a can of beans." 
 
 But she put off doing it. There really wasn't 
 any hurry, she supposed. He had extracted one 
 arm from the blankets and had slipped his hand in 
 between her two. It was funny how limp it made 
 her all over, just that simple passive contact. She 
 
THE YACHT iii 
 
 felt as if she couldn't get up if she tried. Yet she 
 supposed she could. 
 
 Three or four minutes later, like a released 
 spring, she did. The thing that brought her to her 
 feet, keyed once more to the highest pitch of alert- 
 ness, was the sound of oars and voices, both near at 
 hand and coming nearer. 
 
 Before the boy, following her change of mood, 
 could get out of his blankets and upon his feet they 
 felt the bump of a dinghy against the sloop's side 
 and realized that the owners of the voices were com- 
 ing aboard. 
 
 "Through the curtain, quick!" whispered the 
 Princess. 
 
 She started him off in that direction with a good 
 vigorous push and herself set about, in the few sec- 
 onds she had, restoring the cabin to its pristine 
 appearance, softly shutting the locker doors and 
 folding the blankets together anyhow. She heard 
 a key grate in the padlock, sprang through the cur- 
 tains and crouched behind the sails with Bill. 
 
 "We cannot get out, can we, through that 
 hole?" he whispered, indicating the open hatch. 
 
 She clutched him as an admonition to silence 
 because steps overhead were audible just then com- 
 
112 REAL LIFE 
 
 k 
 
 ing forward. There was a half-suppressed exclama- 
 tion of dismay and in a moment, with a swiftness 
 and an absence of noise which made the action seem 
 almost furtive, the hatch cover was fitted on and 
 twisted fast. No; they couldn't get out through 
 that hole now. The Princess threw an arm over 
 Bill's shoulder and put her lips close to his ear. 
 
 "Lie still," she commanded, "That's the very 
 best thing that could possibly happen. They aren't 
 near so likely to find us in the dark." 
 
 She was about to add that if the yachtsmen who 
 had come aboard would only sail away with them 
 somewhere the problem of giving Bill's uncle the 
 slip would be completely and satisfactorily solved. 
 But she checked herself with a resolution to let Bill 
 adjust himself to one idea at a time. 
 
 It soon became evident to her that it was no 
 mere pleasure sail of an hour or two for which the 
 yachtsmen had come aboard. The dinghy within the 
 next half-hour made a number of trips to the club- 
 house and back. Supplies were got aboard. Three 
 or four boxes and hampers presumably containing 
 food and drink were stowed away in the forehold, 
 but without leading to the discovery of the stow- 
 aways. There was a succession of mysterious 
 
THE YACHT 113 
 
 sounds : creaks, rattles, thumps ; the padding- of soft- 
 shod feet; shaq) commands and prompt nautical 
 replies. There were only three people in the party. 
 Bill and the Princess thought. It was easy to dis- 
 tinguish the voice of the skipper and that of one 
 of the crew, the youngest probably and certainly 
 the most humble; they thought there was only one 
 voice in between. 
 
 Activity came to a climax presently with the 
 order "Cast off!" and the response "All clear!" 
 Bill clutched convulsively at the Princess as the 
 yacht heeled and they heard, magnified by the 
 sounding-box of the shell-like hull, the silky rustle 
 of the water and the slapping of little waves. 
 
 "We move!" he cried; and it was horror, not 
 caution, that made his speech voiceless. "They are 
 sailing away with us!" 
 
 "Sure they are!" said the Princess. "That's 
 what I call luck!" 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE INQUISITORS 
 
 IT WAS the Princess's second foraging expedition 
 into the cabin which brought about the discov- 
 ery of the stowaways. The first had been wholly 
 altruistic and successful. She had gone to get a 
 blanket in which to roll Bill, for poor Bill had taken 
 another shivering-fit just as the sloop got under 
 way. Her second foray was wholly selfish, and the 
 moral order of the universe was vindicated by her 
 getting caught. 
 
 One of the crew had gone down to the galley to 
 get supper as soon as the sloop was fairly out on 
 the big lake and settled on a course. Quite an 
 elaborate meal, the Princess judged it to be, from 
 the time he spent fussing around in there and from 
 his replies to the hungry bowlings of the rest of the 
 crew on deck. The Princess would have liked to 
 howl herself, for it was, by then, well after seven 
 
 114 
 
THE INQUISITORS 115 
 
 o'clock, and she felt as if she hadn't eaten anything 
 for days and days. That rich strong smell of fry- 
 ing bacon literally made her mouth water. 
 
 She asked Bill if it wasn't almost more than he 
 could stand, and he replied that it was, but he went 
 on to make it clear that it wasn't hunger that was 
 ailing him. It was even easily thinkable that he 
 might not relish watching her eat. All the same, 
 when the cook had gone on deck with his grub and 
 convivial sounds made it clear that the whole crew 
 was occupied with it, the thought that something 
 edible might be found in the galley was too much 
 for the Princess's powers of resistance, and she fell. 
 She stole into the galley, spooned up a liberal help- 
 ing of beans into a tin plate, fished two or three 
 slices of very unevenly cooked bacon out of a fry- 
 ing-pan, seized a fork and a chunk of bread and 
 backed out of the galley. 
 
 It was the little shaving-mirror screwed in the 
 door that told her she was caught ; in it she saw the 
 man at the tiller staring at her. Her spring through 
 the curtain was automatic, but she didn't drop her 
 tin plate nor even spill any of its contents. She 
 steadied herself against the mast as a voice, the 
 
Ii6 REAL LIFE 
 
 skipper's, shouted, "What the devil!" and spoke 
 swiftly to Bill. 
 
 "They've spotted us, but it's all right. What- 
 ever they say to you, don't talk. Let me talk to 
 them." 
 
 Another minute, or less, and with the guidance 
 of very unceremonious hands they found them- 
 selves blinking against the level rays of the wester- 
 ing sun under the incredulous stares of their two 
 captors and the forensic frown of the man at the 
 tiller. The Princess gulped and allowed to go un- 
 answered the question, "What the devil are you 
 doing here?" but upon its repetition in a slightly 
 less exclamatory form she got herself together and 
 began her story. She was not, of course, totally 
 unprovided with one. In the intervals, down below, 
 of not thinking how hungry she was she had con- 
 cocted a (she hoped) passably plausible sequence of 
 events the last of which had been the admittedly 
 unauthorized but innocently intended boarding of 
 the Sally by the two fugitive (yet not blameworthy) 
 brothers Bill and — Patrick Lawrence. 
 
 From the moment back on the boulevard when 
 they had encountered the feline stare of Bill's 
 
In the mirror she saw the man at the tiller looking at her 
 
 See page us 
 
THE INQUISITORS 117 
 
 wicked uncle, through the window of the brown 
 taxicab, the Princess's narrative had meticulously 
 followed the facts, and she drew a little short- 
 lived comfort from the reflection that her fictitious 
 preliminaries to this moment sounded by compari- 
 son tame and truthful. But a gleam she saw 
 brightening in her inquisitor's eye roused a mis- 
 giving that it was the solid ice of cold fact that was 
 breaking under her, rather than the thinner stuff 
 of romance over which she had glided so lightly. 
 
 "I don't care!" she cried in sudden exaspera- 
 tion when he grinned irrepressibly over her last de- 
 tails. "It did happen, exactly as I've been telling 
 you ! It seemed just as wild to us as it does to you, 
 but we couldn't help that, could we?" 
 
 He nodded sympathetically. *T know," he told 
 her. "I've sometimes felt the same way in address- 
 ing a jury. — I'm a lawyer," he threw in, "except 
 when I'm out in the Sally, so you'll forgive me if I 
 make sure I've got this story straight. You've run 
 away from your uncle, you say, because he is cruel 
 to you, abuses you and so on ? You suspect him of 
 having made away with your property. He's the 
 trustee I assume, and you've an idea that he meant 
 to make away with you, as well, by way of avoiding 
 
ii8 REAL LIFE 
 
 being called to account for the other crime. How 
 did he abuse you? Starve you? Beat you?" 
 
 The Princess on the spur of the moment pulled 
 up her sleeve and displayed her wounded arm. A 
 mistake, as she realized at once; it wasn't a mascu- 
 line-looking arm at all. 
 
 "Good Heavens !" cried the skipper. "What did 
 he go after you with — his fingernails ?" 
 
 But he didn't wait for a reply. He turned 
 crisply upon Bill. 
 
 "What's the name of this objectionable old 
 party ?" he demanded. 
 
 Bill turned an appealing look upon the Princess, 
 baffled by the skipper's sharp "I'm asking you!" 
 But the Sally took a gentle roll just then (they were 
 running free before a very light wind, not more than 
 six knots, but there was a ground swell that they 
 were more or less in the trough of, and Bill, the color 
 of pipe-clay, sat down on the coaming suddenly and 
 shut his eyes. 
 
 The Princess sprang to his side and flung a pro- 
 tecting arm across his shoulders. "You let him 
 alone !" she commanded the skipper. "Can't you see 
 he's sick?" Then she added with dignity, "My 
 
THE INQUISITORS 119 
 
 uncle's name is Patrick — Walter Patrick. I was 
 named after him." 
 
 "That's plausible," observed the skipper. "But 
 come now, what were you named? Patrick — or 
 Patricia ?" 
 
 The Princess, cheeks aflame, looked from face 
 to face in the ring. The men, the skipper and his 
 friend, were grinning — hatefully, she thought; but 
 the boy — he looked about her own age, and she had 
 gathered that he was the skipper's younger brother 
 — exhibited in his wide-eyed gaze a startled surmise. 
 "I don't know what you mean," she said stiffly, but 
 it was no good of course. Her inquisitor didn't even 
 take the trouble to contradict her. Instead he turned 
 once more upon poor Bill. 
 
 "I don't wish to add to your troubles," he said, 
 in a tone of not unkindly satire, "but I would like 
 to hear you speak up and answer one question. 
 Honestly, now, is this young lady your sister?" 
 
 "All she say is true," Bill asseverated staunchly. 
 "She tell me I am not to talk " 
 
 They interrupted him there with a unanimous 
 shout. He had, of course, completely spilled the 
 beans, and their laughter informed him of it, but yet 
 he didn't know why. He'd been too sick to listen to 
 
I20 REAL LIFE 
 
 the Princess's story, but he turned upon her now a 
 look deprecator}'', imploring, and it was this, rather 
 than the jeers of the others, that demolished her. 
 Left to herself she could have snatched off her wig, 
 shaken loose her own hair and sailed into them; 
 cowed, perhaps, even the skipper. Instead of 
 that, Bill saw her struggle ineffectually against a 
 sob, turn away from that pair of hostile faces and 
 drop down forlornly upon the transom. She took 
 off her wig, indeed, but with no gesture at all, and 
 the next instant, with another sob, she had buried 
 her face in it. 
 
 For one moment Bill's sick, wobbling eyes stead- 
 ied and flashed fire. Anger burned in the pit of his 
 stomach like brandy, and he rounded upon their tor- 
 mentors. "What you do?" he shouted. "You insult 
 this lady? If that is so I will make you all sorry." 
 (He repeated this threat, with precise amplifications 
 in fizzing, spitting Russian.) "She is good to me. 
 She help me run off from my enemy. She have 
 save my life this very day." And there was some 
 more Russian after that. 
 
 But the skipper shifted the helm a little, mali- 
 ciously or not I am not sailor enough to decide; any- 
 how, the Sally gave just then a much bigger roll 
 
THE INQUISITORS 121! 
 
 than any in which she had so far indulged, and Bill, 
 going blue-white again, stared wildly at the reeling 
 horizon and then turned and bolted down the com- 
 panionway into the cabin. The Princess followed 
 him, but seeing that spiritual consolation was npt 
 called for she contented herself with covering him 
 up once more with blankets and then returned to the 
 deck with a sense of somehow keeping the wolves at 
 bay. 
 
 But the man at the tiller was distinctly less wolf- 
 like. He greeted her reappearance with a smile that 
 had no derision in it and perhaps a touch of apology. 
 
 "I'm not going to ask you any more questions," 
 he said. "If you want to tell me the true story — the 
 plain story, you know, with no motion-picture em- 
 bellishments — who you really are and who that 
 cropped-headed young foreigner is, and why you're 
 running away with him — why — why, I'll do any- 
 thing I reasonably can to get you out of this scrape. 
 If you don't want to do that, well, of course, I'll just 
 have to act according to my best judgment." 
 
 The Princess considered the proposal for a min- 
 ute or two in silence, but she felt the hopelessness of 
 it from the first. It was precisely the true parts of 
 her story, already told, that he most decisively dis- 
 
122 REAL LIFE 
 
 believed, and that remark of his about motion-pic- 
 ture embelHshments — she didn't know just what he 
 meant by it, but it sounded hatefully skeptical. 
 
 "Well, there's one thing you can be sure of," 
 observed the guest, a dry, brisk, gray young man 
 with a light voice, "and that is that she's hungry. 
 She was rifling the galley when we caught sight of 
 her." Then to the Princess, "How about supper?" 
 
 "I was hungry," she admitted, "a few minutes 
 ago." 
 
 "That's a good idea," said the skipper. "Joe," 
 — this to his younger brother — "go down and see 
 what you can find for Patricia to eat." 
 
 But the young man who had made the proposal 
 — it was he who had cooked supper for the others — 
 preferred to take this job upon himself, and went 
 below. 
 
 The yacht wanted a little sailing just then. The 
 breeze was becoming fitful. It had backed around a 
 point or two and the skipper decided that he might 
 want to gibe. Whether the way young Joe was 
 gazing, all eyes, at the Princess had anything to do 
 with this decision — ^which involved sending the lad 
 forward to tend sheet on the headsails — I am not, 
 once more, sailor enough to say. 
 
THE INQUISITORS 123 
 
 Anyhow, the Princess was allowed to eat her 
 supper in peace amid their bustling activities. And 
 during this period of shelter she managed to get her 
 mind into thinking order again. They weren't vil- 
 lains, this yachting party. They wouldn't kidnap 
 her nor hold her for ransom. They wouldn't do 
 anything horrid. She had made, she felt, a whole- 
 hearted ally of young Joe. He, she believed, already 
 had recognized her. If he were to proclaim her 
 identity to the others — well, that might help quite a 
 lot. And now that the yacht was settled in her 
 course again it was plain she was not being taken 
 back to Chicago. The sunset sky was still behind 
 them. 
 
 By the time she had finished her supper, 
 thanked, very prettily, the provider of it and turned 
 an embracing deprecatory smile upon the others, she 
 felt herself surrounded by an atmosphere of kindli- 
 ness and concern which encouraged her almost to 
 the point of confiding to them the whole adventure. 
 The skipper, perceiving this intent, tried to help her 
 along. 
 
 "Feel better?" he asked. "Well, then, we're not 
 ogres, you know, and we don't any of us think a bit 
 the worse of you for having got into this scrape. 
 
124 REAL LIFE 
 
 There are no bones broken yet, and if you'll let us 
 help you by being really frank with us we can prob- 
 ably manage so that there needn't be. We'll con- 
 trive to get you home, somehow, so that nobody need 
 know the difference." 
 
 "Yes," said the Princess in sudden dismay, "but 
 how about Bill?" 
 
 The kindly look faded from the skipper's face. 
 Yes, of course, that was how they would all take it. 
 The more they were disposed to like her and be kind 
 to her the less likely they would be to consent to 
 take Bill, as she had done, on trust. 
 
 "I'm afraid," the skipper said, "that you'll have 
 to begin by admitting that Bill was a mistake." 
 
 "Well, I won't I" she said with a sudden bright 
 blush of resolution. "He's not a mistake. He's my 
 friend and I'm going to stand by him. He's the one 
 that needs help, not me. I promised I'd help him 
 and I will." 
 
 "Just who is he ?" the skipper asked rather dryly. 
 "Are you quite sure you know yourself? How long 
 have you known him, anyway ?" 
 
 "Oh, there's no use telling you anything about 
 him!" she cried, trying to get a convincing ring of 
 scorn into her voice to cover the dismay which these 
 
THE INQUISITORS 125 
 
 questions caused her. Of course she didn't know 
 who he was, and her acquaintance with him was no 
 more than five hours old. Well, here was the test 
 whether one was a real heroine or not. It was in 
 just such circumstances as these that weak-kneed 
 pretenders caved in. 
 
 "I don't doubt/' the skipper said patiently, "that 
 you believe whatever story he's told you ; but you are 
 probably right in anticipating that I would not." 
 
 His kindness was the thing that shook her forti- 
 tude worst. If he'd sneered and bullied she'd have 
 found it easier to rise to the situation. She tried 
 herself to supply this lack. 
 
 "It doesn't matter one snap," she said, and she 
 exhibited the snap in question, "whether you believe 
 either of us or not. I'm not asking you to help us. 
 I don't suppose you'll throw us overboard or even 
 put us in that little boat and leave us out here In the 
 middle of the lake. You've got to put us ashore 
 somewhere and we don't ask anything more than 
 that." 
 
 The scornful attitude she'd managed to assume 
 didn't permit her to question him, but she'd have 
 liked some sort of comment from him upon this de- 
 claration; something that would give her an idea 
 
126 REAL LIFE 
 
 what he did mean to do with them. There wasn't — 
 was there? — anything to be apprehended beyond a 
 coldly unsympathetic neutrahty? 
 
 The gray young man, who had come once more 
 on deck, now took a hand. It was the skipper he 
 spoke to and wanted to know how they had got on 
 (during his absence from the scene. 
 
 "Oh, it's a deadlock, I guess," the skipper said. 
 ''Nothing to be done until we get to Michigan City." 
 
 "And there," said the other, "it will be a case of 
 turning them over to the authorities, I suppose. The 
 chief of police, probation officer, detention home — 
 that sort of thing ; to be held until called for. That 
 seems rather a pity, doesn't it ?" 
 
 The Princess turned her face away and clenched 
 her hands. They couldn't do that ! They wouldn't 
 dare do that ! Not if she told them who she was, at 
 least! Probably they were only trying to frighten 
 her anyhow. 
 
 "Do you know, Cap," the gray young man went 
 on, "I believe I could tell you Patricia's story as well 
 as she could. I'd bet ten dollars anyhow that I know 
 what she's running away for. She's running away 
 to go into the movies. They have been telling her 
 for the last five or six years — everybody who knows 
 
THE INQUISITORS 127 
 
 her — that she looks like Leda Swan ; of course they 
 have. And there really is a striking resemblance, 
 allowing for the difference there must be in their 
 ages. I suppose the beautiful Leda must really be 
 getting on into the thirties. But this kid — well, you 
 can see she's thought about it because she's got her 
 hair curled the same way that Leda Swan always 
 wears it when she's playing these mountain chee-ild 
 parts. She has been pretty well looked after, I'd say. 
 Certainly she had nice clothes on when she came 
 aboard the Sally." 
 
 Here he turned to the Princess and spoke to her, 
 though she wouldn't answer his look. "I hope you'll 
 forgive me for looking 'em over, yours and Bill's, 
 there in the forehold — Patricia. 
 
 "But the romance of this movie game" — he gave 
 up trying to meet her eye and turned back to the 
 skipper — "must have got her just the same. And 
 then this wop turned up from somewhere and got 
 her to run off with him. I suppose he must have 
 had a head of hair the first time she saw him. It 
 might be interesting to find out why he shaved it 
 off. Anyhow, he told her the usual cock-and-bull 
 story and she believed it, poor child. He may have 
 been anything — fiddler in some restaurant orches- 
 
128 REAL LIFE 
 
 tra, haberdasher's clerk, bell-hop. Not that it mat- 
 ters much." 
 
 He turned once more to the Princess. "Isn't 
 that about the size of it ?" he asked. "And can't you 
 see that the only thing to do is to let one of us take 
 you home — we'd frame up some excuse or other to 
 cover the ground — and forget all about him?" 
 
 The Princess didn't answer. All that was in her 
 mind now was the realization that the alternative of 
 telling who she was was no longer open to her. 
 J^dsL Swan was getting into her thirties, was she! 
 according to this wise young man. People might or 
 might not believe lies, but the truth was something 
 that there was no use trying to tell. 
 
 "Well, there you are," said the skipper. "If 
 you'll cut loose from Bill, whoever he is, and tell us 
 who you really are we'll take you home. If you 
 won't, we'll have to turn you over to the chief of 
 police at Michigan City to be held until called for. 
 You can have till we get there to think it over." 
 
 "How long will it be," the Princess asked, "be- 
 fore we get to Michigan City ?" 
 
 "That's hard to say," he told her, "with the 
 breeze as fluky as it is now. Sometime within a 
 couple of hours, I should think." 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE PEBBLE THAT STARTED THE AVALANCHE 
 
 IT WAS, by my reckoning, just about then that 
 T. J. Carstairs, a wholesale drug salesman from 
 Detroit, stepped out of an elevator upon the third 
 floor of the Tribune Building in Chicago, glanced 
 about the lobby with the air of a stranger and then 
 somewhat dubiously approached the very dignified 
 elderly gentleman who sat at the desk in the middle 
 of it. He didn't quite think that this was the editor 
 of the paper, yet he couldn't be sure. Also his atten- 
 tion was a little distracted by the appearance of a 
 very good-looking, tall, smartly clad girl who, with 
 a look of one altogether at home in her surround- 
 ings, seemed to be waiting for a down car. 
 
 In her presence he didn't want to say anything, 
 even ask a question, that would make him look like 
 a hick. Having huskily mumbled something first 
 
 129 
 
I30 REAL LIFE 
 
 which the man at the desk found inaudible, he shout- 
 ed, rather by way of compensation : 
 
 "I want to see somebody about a watch that I 
 found." 
 
 "The ground floor to the right is the classified 
 ads." 
 
 "I haven't thought of advertising it," Carstairs 
 said, "though perhaps that is the thing to do. It's 
 a very valuable watch and pretty badly smashed. 
 You see, I found it on the seat of a taxicab." 
 
 A down car stopped just then, but the girl shook 
 her head at the elevator boy and came up a little 
 irresolutely to the desk. 
 
 "Let's see the watch," she said. 
 
 As he dug in his pocket for it she led the way to 
 a bench at the back of the lobby and added, "Come 
 over here and sit down." 
 
 He put the watch into her hand as he seated him- 
 self beside her. 
 
 "It's platinum, you see," he said, "and those are 
 diamonds set in the ring around it, so it must be 
 worth a horrible lot of money. And that silver rib- 
 bon — it's torn and dirty — but doesn't it strike you 
 that that red stain on it might be blood ? That was 
 what made me think that perhaps I had better bring 
 
THE PEBBLE AND THE AVALANCHE 131 
 
 it around and show it to somebody connected with 
 the paper." 
 
 "Yes ; it might be blood," she said in a hard tight 
 voice. But what she was staring at was the mono- 
 gram on the back of the case. 
 
 "They're kind of funny-looking initials," he ob- 
 served, "but I make 'em out 'L. S.' " 
 
 "Yes; I guess so," she answered, but once more 
 as though her attention had bounded forward to 
 something else. "Have you a knife?" she asked, 
 and on his producing it she swiftly pried open the 
 back cover. She held it, to catch the light, a little 
 away from him and snapped the lid down again 
 without saying whether anything more informative 
 had been found inside. 
 
 "You say you found it in a taxicab? Did you 
 get the number? What sort of a taxi was it?" 
 
 "It was a yellow," he told her, "and I've got the 
 number written down somewhere." 
 
 While he was finding the bit of paper in one of 
 his waistcoat pockets she asked him where and at 
 what hour he had hailed the taxi. He read the num- 
 ber out to her before he answered either of these 
 questions and noted that she did not write it down, 
 a point which strengthened his impression that her 
 
132 REAL LIFE 
 
 questions were what he would have called a camou- 
 flage for something ulterior to them. He did not 
 fairly get her attention until he told her that he had 
 taken the taxi at the corner of Sixty-third Street 
 and Stoney Island Avenue at just about six o'clock. 
 At that she stared at him. 
 
 "It's a quarter to eight now. What have you 
 been doing all the time since?" she demanded. 
 
 The sharpness of the question took him aback, 
 but he told her that he'd had dinner at his hotel after 
 coming downtown, and had then gone to his room 
 for another look at the watch and to make up his 
 mind what he'd better do about it. "It wasn't until 
 then that I saw what I thought might be blood on 
 the ribbon. When I saw that I thought I'd better 
 go to somebody about it — either the police or a news- 
 paper. I finally decided to come here." 
 
 She asked him crisply for his name and that of 
 his hotel, and then she rose with a swift spring which 
 somehow suggested to him a sword coming out of 
 its sheath, and spoke first to the man at the desk. 
 
 "Tell Fred, if he comes up, to come into the local 
 room," she said. Then to Carstairs : "Excuse me. 
 I'll be back in a few minutes." 
 
 She disappeared at that tlirough one of the half- 
 
THE PEBBLE AND THE AVALANCHE 133 
 
 glazed doors, taking the watch with her. Carstairs 
 waited a long five minutes, then, again rather ill at 
 ease, asked the man at the desk if he knew who that 
 young lady was who had been talking to him, 
 
 "Of course I know her," the answer was. 
 "Why?" 
 
 "Well, it's all right then, I suppose," Carstairs 
 allowed. "She said she was coming right back, and 
 that watch she went off with was worth two thou- 
 sand dollars easy." 
 
 The man at the desk laughed. 
 
 "You should worry," he said, "if they were the 
 crown jewels of the king of England. That young 
 lady is Miss Priscilla Alden and she is, right now, 
 the smartest reporter working on this newspaper." 
 
 In this opinion of Miss Alden's ability the city 
 editor at that moment fully concurred. She'd come 
 up to his desk, put the watch into his hands and 
 asked him if he "got" the monogram on the back of 
 it. He made it out "L. S." just as Carstairs had, but 
 was instantly aware from her manner that he'd 
 missed something. He pulled down his desk lamp a 
 little lower, looked again and swore appreciatively. 
 
 "A rebus as well as a monogram — that 'S' 
 
134 REAL LIFE 
 
 worked into a swan ! That's ingenious, isn't it ? It 
 leaves no doubt as to whose it is." 
 
 "There's an inscription inside," Miss Alden told 
 him. " 'To the Princess from Her Adoring 
 Mamma, Christmas, 1918.' That's what they call 
 her, isn't it — 'Princess' ?" 
 
 "I believe so," he said. 
 
 "The crystal is smashed, you see," she went on, 
 "and one of the loops that hold the ribbon is broken 
 off. That's blood on the ribbon, I guess. Well, it 
 was found on the seat of a yellow taxicab at Sixty- 
 third and Stoney Island two hours ago. That looks 
 like a story, don't you think ?" 
 
 "Do you know about the other one?" he asked 
 her. "The tip was telephoned in from her hotel at 
 five o'clock and young Jordan was sent to cover it. 
 A man brought in a gold mesh bag — Miss Swan's ; 
 said he found it in the alley back of the Pullman 
 Building. Wanted to see Leda herself. They sent 
 down word that she was lying down and hadn't been 
 out of the hotel since two o'clock. He said he'd seen 
 her lose the bag and talked as if he had more of a 
 story than he told. But Jordan didn't get anything 
 on it and I killed the story." 
 
 "Her mesh bag in the alley at Adams Street at 
 
THE PEBBLE AND THE AVALANCHE 135 
 
 five o'clock and her wrist watch in a taxi at Stoney 
 Island and Sixty-third at six! This looks as if it 
 was going to be good !" 
 
 She turned and looked about the local room, 
 nodding to a good-looking young man, whom she 
 had attached a month or so ago in the capacity of 
 husband, a command to come over and join her at 
 the city editor's desk. While he was crossing the 
 room she turned back to the boss. 
 
 "The man who brought in the watch," she said, 
 "is T. J. Carstairs, Atlantic Hotel. I'm pretty sure 
 he didn't get on to that monogram ; but I don't want 
 to take any chances. I'll have Fred here look after 
 him till we go to press, take him to a show, keep him 
 busy somehow so he won't talk to anyone else. I 
 wish you'd have Bertie or George Wynn trace the 
 taxi and bring in the chauffeur. I'm going to begin 
 at the hotel ; give 'em a chance to show me Leda 
 Swan and give me an interview with her. If they 
 can't do that then the fun will really begin. But for 
 the love of heaven get that chauffeur quick and keep 
 him!" 
 
 He might well enough have asked whether she 
 was under the illusion that she was the city editor, or 
 perhaps the managing editor and proprietor, of this 
 
136 REAL LIFE 
 
 newspaper. But he was not a man who had to worry 
 about his dignity. He did delay the game to ask her 
 one question. 
 
 "How did you get on to this story? Carstairs 
 come to you?" 
 
 "Oh, I heard him telling Mr. Dohrmann that he 
 had found a smashed platinum wrist watch on the 
 seat of a taxicab. That sounded good enough for 
 me, so I butted in." 
 
 Well, there you were! She had just turned in a 
 cracking good story that meant several hours hard 
 work and, released for the day, had been upon the 
 point of starting off with her nice young husband 
 for a pleasant evening of some sort; but a valuable 
 smashed wrist watch, abandoned, forgotten on the 
 seat of a taxicab, had looked good to her! Report- 
 ers with as sensitive a flair as that and as irrepres- 
 sible a passion for the chase as that did not grow on 
 every bush. She was giving precise instructions to 
 an ineffectually recalcitrant husband as she walked 
 away. 
 
 The city editor's desk 'phone rang as the local- 
 room door closed behind them. He reached auto- 
 matically for a pad and pencil as he picked up the 
 receiver. But after listening for a moment he 
 
THE PEBBLE AND THE AVALANCHE 137 
 
 snatched the latter instrument away from his ear as 
 if it burnt. 
 
 ''What !" he said. "Oh, that's nonsense ! Why, 
 he gave a concert, didn't he, just this afternoon?" 
 And it was in a manner sHghtly dazed that he went 
 on noting down details and putting in motion the 
 machinery for investigating this second story that 
 had just been tipped off. 
 
 That Leda Swan should be abducted and robbed 
 in a taxicab and that Boris Lazaref, the world's 
 greatest violinist, should disappear, both in broad 
 daylight upon the same afternoon, was too stagger- 
 ing a coincidence not to suggest a misgiving that he 
 and his newspaper were the victims of some vast 
 conspiratorial hoax. 
 
 Good Lord ! What a night it was going to be ! 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE FOG-BELL 
 
 INTO the fatigue-drenched sleep of the Princess 
 the clang of a bell — a locomotive bell, it sounded 
 like — pried and forced its way. She turned, she 
 twisted, she felt for a pillow to bury her head in to 
 shut out the sound; and then all at once she came 
 broad awake in a dungeon with a round hole at the 
 top through which struggled a misty beam of lantern 
 light. 
 
 There went the bell again right overhead. That 
 hadn't been a dream then, unless this was. Her bed 
 wasn't a bed — just a heap of something. And this 
 great mound that scraped her arm was the rolled-up 
 canvas of a sail. She knew where she was now : she 
 was in the forehold of the Sally. 
 
 She wondered how long she had slept, how it 
 had been possible for her to sleep at all. She hadn't 
 meant to sleep ; that had been a contributory reason 
 
 138 
 
THE FOG-BELL 139 
 
 to her cold refusal of the cabin which they had of- 
 fered to let her have all to herself. She had pre- 
 ferred voluntary incarceration in the forehold with a 
 pair of duffle-bags and a blanket to lie upon. She 
 had told them, with a fine cold flame of passion, 
 that since they meant to make a prisoner of her when 
 they arrived at Michigan City they might as well 
 begin now. 
 
 It had been Bill's idea, as well as her own, that 
 he would share her fate and the forehold with her, 
 but this decisively had not been the arrangement 
 The skipper, out of pure malice, she felt, had decreed 
 their separation. She didn't know where Bill was 
 now ; probably in the cabin. 
 
 She noted suddenly that the Sally was not mov- 
 ing. That pleasant silky rustle of the water against 
 her sleek sides had stopped. Presently the Princess 
 felt the unmistakable tug of a taut hawser. The 
 Sally was tied up somewhere. She must have 
 reached Michigan City. The only thing the execu- 
 tion of the skipper's sentence awaited now was sun- 
 rise. Shot at sunrise! No; not that, of course, but 
 something almost as unbelievably horrible. Taken 
 through the streets, in handcuffs, perhaps ; locked in 
 a jail, she and Bill in different cells ! 
 
I40 REAL LIFE 
 
 Was there a chance, she wondered, that some 
 friendly eye falling upon her as she was led off to 
 prison would recognize her and come to her aid with 
 a file in a loaf of bread, or a few drops of some irre- 
 sistible soporific for the warden? Or would all 
 these beholders fall into the same infuriating error 
 as that of the chauffeur and the much-too-wise 
 young man on the Sally, and say, "There goes some- 
 body who's been told she looks like Leda Swan" ? 
 
 Joe, the skipper's younger brother, hadn't, she 
 felt, fallen into that error. Joe, from his looks, 
 really knew who she was. Could Joe be begged or 
 bribed into helping her and Bill to escape ? 
 
 Abruptly, at that idea, she sat erect and rubbed 
 the last grains of sleep out of her eyes. Now, in the 
 last dead hours of the night, while all was still 
 aboard the Sally — still in the inten^als of that bell's 
 nerve-destroying clangor — now was the time to find 
 Joe! 
 
 She felt her way softly to the mast and thence to 
 the green curtains, which with caution she drew a 
 little aside. There was nothing to be got in there, 
 however. It was almost pitch dark. By straining 
 her eyes she could make out the position of the com- 
 panionway; but apart from that there was no light 
 
THE FOG-BELL 141 
 
 at all. She could hear three persons breathing, all 
 unmistakably asleep. 
 
 She dropped the curtain and crept to a position 
 directly beneath the open hatch. A lantern at the 
 mast-head revealed the fact that the sails were down 
 and furled, but nothing much else. What she want- 
 ed most to know — namely, who or what was ringing 
 that horrible bell — was concealed from her. 
 
 If the agency was mechanical she'd take a chance 
 on writhing up through the hatch and prospecting 
 about for Joe. If it was human (And, of course, if 
 it was human it was hostile. What motive but mal- 
 ice could there be for keeping up a hideous din like 
 that?) she could hardly hope to get out unobserved. 
 She made a spring for the hatch coaming and pulled 
 herself up part way, but found she hadn't elbow- 
 room enough to get through; so she dropped back, 
 waited an instant to discover whether the thump 
 she had alighted with had roused anyone, and then 
 hauled a duffle-bag directly beneath the hatch for 
 another attempt. She was in the act of completing 
 these preparations when the light from the mast- 
 head lantern was cut off by the protrusion of a head 
 and shoulders over the hatch. 
 
 Caught! she reflected bitterly. They would 
 
«42 REAL LIFE 
 
 probably put her in irons now. Then she was elec- 
 trified by a friendly whisper. 
 
 "Do you want to come up on deck ? Wait until 
 I ring the bell some more and I'll help you through 
 the hatch." 
 
 The bell-ringer was Joe himself ! In the instant 
 of that realization hope came flooding back into the 
 breast of the Princess. She and Bill might not be 
 at the end of their perilous adventures; this might 
 not be the fifth reel of their story — the happy end- 
 ing never came until then — but at all events she was 
 going to escape from the sloop. 
 
 She was already halfway through the hatch 
 when Joe, having finished his violent bell-ringing, 
 was ready to help her. 
 
 "You must be awfully strong!" he said in an 
 awed whisper, commenting upon this feat. 
 
 "I'd not be much good if I couldn't do a thing 
 like that," she answered, "in my business." Then 
 she asked, "Why do you keep ringing that horrible 
 bell?" 
 
 "On account of the fog," he told her, "so that 
 some other boat won't come ramming into us. That 
 lantern up there wouldn't show a*" all a hundred 
 yards away " 
 
THE FOG-BELL 143 
 
 The Princess looked around. There was no land 
 in sight anywhere; nothing to be seen but a gray 
 impenetrable blanket of mist. Even the after part 
 of the Sally was veiled and only faintly visible. 
 
 "Where are we ?" she asked. 
 
 Joe told her he didn't know. He reached back 
 then and again smote lustily with the iron clapper 
 upon that infernal brass bell. The Princess covered 
 her ears with her hands. 
 
 "Can't you," she asked, when the clangor had 
 ceased, "stop ringing it for a few minutes so that the 
 others will have a chance to sleep? There is some- 
 thing I want to talk to you about." 
 
 "It would wake my brother like an alarm clock," 
 he said grimly, "if I stopped ringing this thing for 
 more than a minute and a half. But he is safe to 
 stay asleep all right as long as I keep it going. He 
 didn't turn in until six bells — that's three o'clock in 
 the morning." 
 
 The Princess was surprised that it was as late 
 as that and wanted to know why they hadn't got to 
 Michigan City long ago. 
 
 The breeze had fallen dead, he told her, except 
 for an occasional puff, about midnight. They'd 
 drifted more or less but hadn't really kept steerage- 
 
144 REAL LIFE 
 
 way, and then the fog had shut down upon them. 
 His brother had kept sail on the Sally, however, 
 making what he could of an occasional capful of air 
 until, heaving the lead, he had found less than three 
 fathoms of water. That showed him that he had 
 got out of his course somehow, so he had immedi- 
 ately cast anchor to wait for the fog to lift. 
 
 There probably would be a breeze of some sort 
 about daybreak that would blow away the fog and 
 permit them to set sail again. Within an hour that 
 might be, he thought. From the whitening color of 
 the mist, the dawn must already be breaking. 
 
 The Princess shivered as much with excitement 
 as with cold. Thereupon Joe stripped off his 
 sweater and insisted upon her putting it on. After 
 a moment of protest she yielded and let him help her 
 into it. 
 
 She must have been, I think, just about the only 
 pretty girl of twenty in the world who'd never 
 played a game like this before — which shows how 
 unnecessary a thing experience is. It was an im- 
 memorial instinct that told the Princess to accept a 
 service she didn't need as the prelude to asking for 
 one she did. He was very shy about touching her. 
 
THE FOG-BELL 145 
 
 she noticed, and he went back with a sort of panicky- 
 enthusiasm to banging his bell. 
 
 She was a little in doubt where to begin, but he 
 saved her the trouble by saying, as he struck the last 
 blow, "There was something, didn't you say, that 
 you wanted to talk to me about?" 
 
 "It all depends," the Princess answered, "on 
 whether you know who I really am. Because if you 
 don't know, why of course you wouldn't believe it if 
 I were to tell you." 
 
 "Yes; I know," he assured her. "It seems too 
 wonderful to be true ; or it did while you were down 
 there in the forehold and I sat here thinking about it. 
 But I didn't really doubt it even then because, you 
 see, people who just look like other people — other 
 great people — well, that's all they do — they look 
 like them. But you aren't like that. You under- 
 stand what I mean, don't you ?" 
 
 The Princess's nod of eager assent was, I'm 
 afraid, histrionic, for she hadn't been listening. Al- 
 ready she was drawing her next arrow back to the 
 head. 
 
 "Well, then," she said, dispatching it, "if you 
 really know who I am, will you take my word for 
 
146 REAL LIFE 
 
 Bill and help me get him away before they can put us 
 in jail at Michigan City ?" 
 
 She was quite prepared for his writhing at that, 
 and was not at all disconcerted. She may even have 
 been faintly pleased, who shall say, over his making 
 it plain that Bill was bitter to swallow. She didn't 
 hurry at all to reinforce her request with pleas and 
 arguments. Somehow it was given to her to know 
 that he'd find silence harder to resist than anything 
 else. 
 
 "Of course," he said, after another bout of bell- 
 ringing, "I'd do pretty near anything in the world 
 that would be — well — a real service to you, you 
 know. And I suppose helping you run away with 
 that foreigner seems to you like about the biggest 
 service anyone could possibly do for you. That's 
 how it seems now, this morning. But what I'd hate 
 to have happen beyond anything I can think of 
 would be to have you look back at this day from a 
 week from now, or a month, and think that if I'd 
 been a real friend of yours I'd have done something 
 — anything — just to keep you from running away 
 with him. I know that sounds cheeky, but I don't 
 mean it that way." 
 
 "Oh," the Princess said, "that's all right, of 
 
THE FOG-BELL 147 
 
 course, though I don't see why you should be 
 afraid I'd feel like that Anyhow, I'll promise you 
 that I won't." 
 
 Most of Joe's feelings found an outlet through 
 the bell clapper, but there was still some left to spill 
 over into his next words. 
 
 "That's just like a girl — ^millions of girls — who 
 feel just as sure as you do right now ; and then find 
 out when it is too late that they were mistaken." 
 
 "What do you mean — too late?" asked the 
 Princess. 
 
 There wasn't light enough to reveal poor Joe's 
 blushes, but his voice betrayed him. 
 
 "Why," he said, "when you marry — or — or. . .'* 
 
 "But," the Princess stammered through chatter- 
 ing teeth, "I am not going to marry him. It — it's 
 not like that at all. I'm not running away with him. 
 I'm helping him run away.** 
 
 This was perfectly true, you know. One hemi- 
 sphere — the Sancho Panza hemisphere of the Prin- 
 cess's mind — didn't conflict at all with the other — 
 |; Don Quixote — half; with the radiant daydream 
 wherein poor Bill, revealed as the rightful heir, the 
 true prince, had asked her to become his queen, and 
 they lived happy ever after in the Kingdom of Zen- 
 
I4S REAL LIFE 
 
 da. Nor, in turn, did this shining future interfere 
 in the least with her acceptance of the fact that she 
 must be in Hollywood and at work out on the lot 
 next Wednesday morning. One could not, however, 
 have expected young Joe to work this out for 
 himself. 
 
 "I'm awfully glad you told me that," he said, 
 with an enthusiasm which made the Princess flinch 
 a little and wonder whether she was deceiving him. 
 "I wish," he went on, "that you'd tell me more about 
 Bill, as you call him; who he is, I mean and why 
 he's running away." 
 
 "But you see," said the Princess, "I don't know 
 myself — hardly anything more than I told your 
 brother. He's running away from his uncle because 
 his uncle's been cruel to him. And his uncle is try- 
 ing awfully hard to catch him. He's got detectives 
 — private detectives because he doesn't dare tell the 
 police — watching for him at every hotel and railway 
 station in Chicago. And he did chase us all the way 
 to Jackson Park and we only got away from him by 
 hiding here on the yacht." 
 
 "But who is he ?" Joe demanded. 
 
 The Princess admitted that she didn't know, add- 
 ing, "He's asked me not to try to find out." 
 
THE FOG-BELL 149 
 
 "Not to. . . . !" Joe gasped and went on to ex- 
 press his exasperated astonishment better than he 
 could have done in words by banging a furious toc- 
 sin upon the bell. If that sort of noise was what his 
 brother needed to keep him asleep this outburst must 
 have submerged him deep indeed. 
 
 "I never saw him," the Princess went on to de- 
 clare when she could again be audible, "until yester- 
 day afternoon, and I don't know his name except 
 that Bill Lawrence is the translation of it from some 
 foreign language or other. And he said he liked 
 having me help him just for himself without my 
 knowing who he really was. He said he'd tell me, 
 all about himself if I asked him. But I wouldn't do 
 it for anything in the world." 
 
 Joe wrung his hands in honest despair. 
 
 "But how do you know," he demanded, "that 
 anything he has told you is true? How do you 
 know he hasn't done something perfectly horrible — 
 some crime that he has run away from? Maybe 
 that's why his head's shaved." 
 
 The Princess reached out an adventurous hand 
 and laid it upon his knee. 
 
 "Joe," she said, and at the touch and at the sound 
 of his name a charge of some twenty thousand volts 
 
I50 REAL LIFE 
 
 went through him — "Joe," she demanded with a 
 steady look into his eyes, "how did you know that 
 I'm really Leda Swan? It was just because you 
 know I couldn't be pretending to be. Well, I know 
 about Bill in the same way. I knew he was some- 
 body wonderful the very second I looked at him. 
 That's why I saved his life from the motor truck and 
 carried him away in a taxicab. I know he's good 
 and I know he's told me the truth. I wouldn't even 
 try to make your brother or the other man believe 
 that, but I thought you could because you'd believed 
 in me in exactly the same way. Well, I ask you to 
 take my word for Bill. I'm not going to give him 
 up until he's safe from his uncle — out at Hollywood 
 or somewhere. He's just as helpless as a baby. If I 
 gave him up I think he'd just die. So I'm not going 
 to. But if you'll help us I'll be grateful to you as 
 long as I live." 
 
 "I think," said Joe, after a long silence — and 
 awe would have stilled his voice to a whisper even if 
 caution had not imposed it as a necessity — "I think 
 that you're the most wonderful person in the world. 
 I think. ..." But here words failed him altogether 
 and he caught up the Princess's hand, then dropped 
 it precipitately and seized the bell clapper instead. 
 
THE FOG-BELL 151 
 
 She sprang to her feet, turned away from him 
 and clasped her own two hands tight together. Life 
 certainly was a wonder-box of thrills, once you could 
 get away and begin enjoying it on your own. Here, 
 with Bill barely a dozen hours old in her experience, 
 came Joe, knocking at the door demanding to be cast 
 for a part in the play. As what? As the adoring 
 hopeless lover ? As the one who went to the giiillo^ 
 tine in Bill's place so that she could be happy? As 
 the one carried away by the flood from the burst 
 dam after he had come riding down the valley and 
 warned her and Bill in time for them to escape the 
 peril? She felt a lump coming into her throat. 
 What a wonderful thing life was! 
 
 Joe stood beside her and pointed. "Look!" he 
 whispered. 
 
 The mirror surface of the lake was beginning to 
 shine. The mist, silvered by the dawn, was rolling 
 itself up like a bat of cotton wool. But what Joe 
 pointed at, it took her a minute to see. 
 
 Land ! Ghostly land through the raveling mist ; 
 sandhills; illimitable sandhills, dotted, and here and 
 there fairly covered, with foliage; not a sign either 
 way, as far as the eye could pierce, of human habita- 
 
i'52 REAL LIFE 
 
 tion. It might be the coast of a lost continent; it 
 might be the shore of Robinson Crusoe's island. 
 
 Joe took her arm, turned her around and pointed 
 again, 
 
 "That speck away off there, that you can just 
 barely see, is the Michigan City light. We're off the 
 Indiana dunes; and there's no such hiding-place 
 within a thousand miles." 
 
 She faced him and took both his hands. "You 
 will help us, then?" she whispered. 
 
 "I'll do anything in the world for you," he said. 
 
 Once more he flung himself upon the bell. 
 
' CHAPTER X 
 
 FATE OF THE MUTINEER 
 
 THE PRINCESS, as she looked at him, became 
 additionally aware how handsome he was ; quite 
 a different type from Bill (the original Bill with his 
 hair on) — not exotic a bit. His dark hair was per- 
 ceptibly wavy, his eyelashes were rather long and 
 his eyes were blue, bluish gray, anyhow. His face 
 was broad and short and his head rather small. He 
 reminded the Princess of a tomcat she once had had 
 for a pet. The way he said, "I'll do anything in the 
 world for you," certainly produced sympathetic vi- 
 brations in her heart. 
 
 And this effect was not lessened by the fact that 
 the one thing she asked she found it impossible to 
 induce him to accede to. Her plan of escape was 
 simply to steal down into the cabin as soon as it 
 should be light enough to distinguish which of the 
 three sleepers was Bill, wake him without rousing 
 
 153 
 
154 REAL LIFE 
 
 the others, get him up on deck and then into the 
 dinghy, and finally row him ashore herself. All she 
 wanted of Joe was that he keep his brother lulled 
 asleep by continuing to bang the bell. Of the go- 
 ings-on of the pair of fugitives until they had aban- 
 doned the dinghy on the beach, he was to feign total 
 unconsciousness. The Sally's people could easily 
 enough recover the dinghy later; or for that matter 
 the Princess herself, after landing Bill, would under- 
 take to row the boat back to the sloop and swim 
 ashore. ... 
 
 "You know perfectly well," Joe said, punctuat- 
 ing this sentence with a vicious crack or two at the 
 bell, "that I'm not worrying about that fool dinghy. 
 I could swim ashore for it myself as easily as not. 
 But there's only one sensible plan, and that would be 
 for me to row Bill ashore, leaving you here to go on 
 ringing the bell. I'd start him off in the right direc- 
 tion and then row back to the Sally. He could find 
 his way to a station on the interurban electric easy 
 enough and go wherever he pleased." 
 
 The Princess's objection to this plan, the more 
 vehement because she felt a certain weakness about 
 it, was that she had promised to take Bill to 
 Hollywood. 
 
FATE OF THE MUTINEER 155 
 
 "He can get to Hollywood all right," Joe as- 
 serted. "All he has to do is to walk south to the 
 Lincoln Highway. Once he gets there he can bum 
 his way clear to the coast, if he likes, in automobiles. 
 If he wants to hide out for a while or get away from 
 anybody there couldn't be a safer way of doing it 
 than that. 
 
 "For that matter," he went on, having noted 
 that the Princess didn't seem much impressed by this 
 program, "if it's only in Chicago that they're look- 
 ing for him. he can get to Los Angeles easy enough 
 by train. The Michigan Central has a branch line 
 over to Joliet where he can take the California 
 Limited just an hour or two out of Chicago. I'll tell 
 all that to Bill while I'm rowing him ashore and 
 setting him on his way. Then I'll come back on 
 board and we'll sail to Michigan City and you can 
 telephone your friends that you're all right. Or you 
 can just take a fast train back to town and turn up 
 as if nothing had happened. You can't deny," he 
 asserted, finding her eye and holding it with a look 
 of great intensity, " — you can't deny that that plan's 
 simple at least." 
 
 The Princess blushed. "I do deny it," she re- 
 torted. "It's all very nice for everybody but Bill. 
 
156 REAL LIFE 
 
 But what does he know about bumming rides or 
 looking up timetable connections? I promised him 
 I was going to look after him. I promised I'd see 
 him through till he was safe, and I'm going to do it." 
 
 There was a momentary silence; then Joe an- 
 nounced an inflexible resolution. 
 
 "All right," he said. "If this foreigner needs 
 you to protect him, then I'm sure that you need me 
 to protect you. I'll go along too. We'll all go 
 ashore in the dinghy and we'll stick together until 
 Bill's out of whatever danger he's in and you're safe 
 in the hands of your friends. There isn't any objec- 
 tion to that — is there ?" 
 
 "It isn't necessary a bit," the Princess protested. 
 "It would make your brother horribly angry with 
 you." 
 
 "It sure would," said Joe grimly. "George 
 would call it desertion at least, and probably mutiny. 
 But that's nothing to me compared to knowing 
 you're safe." 
 
 "Safe from what?" the Princess demanded. 
 
 And to this question she failed to get any sort of 
 explicit answer. Joe grumbled and blushed and 
 finally said he didn't know. 
 
 "I don't know why," she cried petulantly — the 
 
FATE OF THE MUTINEER 157 
 
 more so because of a pretty good notion that she did 
 — "I don't know why you can't be sensible about it, 
 instead of making difficulties for both of us. Be- 
 cause you are. Your brother would never take you 
 sailing again on his yacht. And I know if you came 
 ashore with us you'd be perfectly horrid to Bill. I 
 can tell by the way you look whenever you say his 
 name." 
 
 "I'd try not to," he said in a voice hoarse with an 
 irrepressible emotion. "But you do know why, don't 
 you? Can't you see why it's perfectly unendurable 
 to think of putting you ashore with him over there 
 on the dunes alone? Nobody to turn to for help if 
 you found you were mistaken in him! If — if it 
 hadn't been for what you told me, that — that you 
 weren't in love with him nor going to marry him 
 nor anything like that — if you hadn't told me that, 
 maybe, I'd have felt differently about it — I don't 
 know ; or perhaps it would have been worse. Oh, I 
 wonder if you understand !" 
 
 The Princess did understand — not perhaps 
 the logical, literal meaning of Joe's meandering 
 words, but the broad fact that a man was telling her 
 he loved her. Though it did seem a little incredible 
 that he should be telling her all by himself with no 
 
158 REAL LIFE 
 
 director standing beside the camera chanting in- 
 structions at him : 
 
 "Now look into her eyes .... Now she is begin- 
 ning to crack up ; reach for her. Easy there ! Wait 
 till I say. Now! Kiss her! Hold it! That's 
 good." 
 
 — It seemed, as I say, a little incredible and the 
 more thrilling to have a young man plenty good- 
 looking enough to be a picture actor going through 
 all these preliminaries voluntarily, spontaneously, 
 gratuitously. 
 
 It was astonishing what a difference it made, 
 having it done like this. She felt her jaw muscles 
 locking together and a lump coming into her throat 
 and a perfectly terrifying weakness about the knees. 
 It was so sad, a hopeless love like this. He was so 
 young to be condemned to go through life until he 
 was a bent, palsied old man of forty-five with noth- 
 ing whatever to live upon but memories — the mem- 
 ory of this one night on his brother's yacht. She 
 was surprised, and in a way pleased, to find that her 
 eyes were brimming with tear? — perfectly natural, 
 honest tears — no glycerine about them, nor onion in 
 the handkerchief. They were, she felt, a fitting 
 tribute to the burial of a beautiful young love. 
 
FATE OF THE MUTINEER 1 59 
 
 The effect of her tears pretty well overwhelmed 
 Joe. It was a case, once more, of having started a 
 hare and bringing a tiger to bay. 
 
 "Do you," he began, and stopped the chattering 
 of his teeth by locking them together — "do you 
 really care ? Oh, don't cry ! Please don't cry !" 
 
 "I can't help crying a little," said the Princess 
 pathetically. "I don't care, that way, but I'll never 
 forget you as long as I live. And I want you to 
 kiss me goodbye." 
 
 She swayed toward him a little, as he took her 
 shoulders in his hands, and lifted her own hands so 
 that her palms and forearms came against his chest. 
 She turned up her face to his and then — just then — 
 she felt him stiffen and stop; felt his hands pushing 
 her away. 
 
 Her first thought was that he had chanced at 
 that moment to remember his forgotten duty at the 
 fog-bell, and this idea of hers brought it about that 
 his hands fell from her shoulders before she relin- 
 quished her hold upon the rolled edges of his sailor 
 collar. It was a matter, of course, of only a few 
 fragments of a second before the contact was com- 
 pletely broken and she had whirled around to see 
 what it was that had prevented that kiss. 
 
i6o REAL LIFE 
 
 When you know what it was she saw you will 
 not wonder, I think, that she uttered an only half- 
 suppressed shriek. Bill ! Poor Bill ! Poor dear un- 
 comprehending (how could he comprehend?)' Bill 
 was gazing at her with the most tragic eyes she had 
 ever seen in a human face. 
 
 That is not quite all of it. That is not what the 
 Princess shrieked at. What she saw was only the 
 upper part of Bill. He was truncated at the waist, 
 to put it visually, by the fact that he had come only 
 halfway through the hatch. He was still standing 
 on the duffle-bags in the forehold and he hadn't 
 even pulled his arms through, preparatory to a 
 spring to the deck, which increased his appearance of 
 having been artificially bisected. He had, however, 
 for some reason or other, perhaps on account of the 
 cold and damp of the early morning, put on his wig, 
 and this, oddly enough, made him look more unreal 
 than ever. 
 
 For a moment as I said, the sight of him de- 
 stroyed the moral and mental equilibrium of the 
 Princess altogether. She uttered a shriek of dismay, 
 clapped her hand over her mouth and stood staring 
 — in ruins! 
 
 Then she recovered her balance as quickly as 
 
FATE OF THE MUTINEER i6i 
 
 she had lost it. Something was happening down 
 there in the forehold around Bill's legs. There were 
 voices. Bill stopped staring at her to take an expos- 
 tulatory glance through the bit of hatchway which 
 his body was not occupying. 
 
 With the speed of a terrier springing to a rat- 
 hole the Princess went scuttering aft, flung herself 
 down upon the transom, shoved to the sliding hatch, 
 slammed the two doors of the companionway and 
 slipped the bar of the padlock through the hasp. 
 Just in time! For she heard in the cabin, down be- 
 low, the simultaneous rush of two pairs of feet, and 
 there was a thump against the doors just a second 
 after she had made them fast. She danced to her 
 feet, shouted to Joe, "Quick! Pull him through!" 
 and rushed forward again to help. 
 
 What she did, arriving upon this scene, was to 
 seize the circular hatch cover. Admirable foresight 
 this proved to be ; for it had seemed to take forever 
 to extricate Bill's arms and legs from that small cir- 
 cular hole, and the infuriated skipper down below, 
 outraged and astonished as he was, and only a few 
 seconds out of a sound sleep, did not waste much 
 time at the locked doors of the companionway before 
 rushing forward again. His hands had already 
 
i62 REAL LIFE 
 
 gripped the hatch coaming before Bill's feet were 
 fairly out of the way. 
 
 But the Princess, indomitably resolute, a fanatic 
 excitement blazing in her eyes, was standing over 
 the hatchway with tliat round steel cover, its edge 
 like that of a baking-powder tin, in her hands. 
 
 "Look outl" she said briefly. "I'm going to 
 shut it !" 
 
 Evidently the skipper believed she was, for he 
 snatched his hands away just as the cover, with a 
 brutal absence of hesitation, was thrust home and 
 rotated over the bayonet catch. 
 
 The mutineers were in complete possession of 
 the Sally's decks. 
 
 Wide-eyed, Bill and Joe stood gazing at the 
 Princess. Bill was silent, but Joe muttered, "My 
 God!" 
 
 Ten seconds, perhaps, after this climax, the 
 Princess devoted to reflection. She was looking at 
 neither of the two young men; her unfocused gaze 
 lay right between them. Then, nodding to herself 
 an acknowledgment that her plans were satisfactory, 
 she turned rather brusquely to Bill and led him aft, 
 laid hold on the dinghy painter and hauled it in until 
 the little boat was broadside to the stern. 
 
FATE OF THE MUTINEER 163 
 
 "The first thing" to do," she said, "is for you to 
 get in here and sit very still in the middle of the back 
 seat. Don't move; and remember, whatever hap- 
 pens, don't try to stand up." 
 
 She was busy untying the painter as she spoke 
 and having accomplished this she hauled it in short 
 and made it fast around a cleat with a simple half- 
 hitch. 
 
 "Come along," she now admonished Bill briefly ; 
 "we haven't any time to waste. Take tight hold of 
 my shoulder and step right into the middle of the 
 boat." 
 
 She was rather glad that her position, bending 
 over and holding the gunwale with both hands, gave 
 her no opportunity to look into his face. She didn't 
 know, for a fact, whether or not he was capable of 
 negotiating the step down into that wobbly little 
 dinghy without going on overboard. If there was 
 a wrong way of doing anything of this sort he 
 seemed inspired to manage it. She heaved a long 
 breath of relief when the thing was successfully ac- 
 complished, and spared Bill a glance of 
 congratulation. 
 
 But the look he met it with was one of absolutely 
 tragic despair, and it broke over her that he probably 
 
1 64 REAU LIFE 
 
 thought, having seen her in that highly equivocal 
 attitude with Joe a few moments previously, that her 
 intention now was simply to cast him adrift. There 
 wasn't time to expostulate with him over so injuri- 
 ous a lack of faith, and she had not, for the moment, 
 even the inclination to try to relieve his fears. Her 
 emotion had to find another outlet. 
 
 As she turned away from Bill, Joe's hand fell 
 upon her shoulder. 
 
 "I'm going with you, you know," he said. 
 
 "And leave them," she asked, with a nod toward 
 the companionway, "to — starve in there?" 
 
 "It won't take them long to get out," he told her 
 grimly. "We had better be getting away. We 
 haven't any time to waste; and it will be wasting it 
 to try to get me to stay behind, because I won't" 
 
 With a confiding movement, suggestive of limit- 
 less possibilities, she slipped her hand inside his arm 
 and led him forward. As he turned a questioning 
 look into her face she made a slight backward move- 
 ment of the head which said as plainly as words 
 could have done that for some purpose of hers she 
 wanted him out of Bill's hearing. She led him for- 
 ward beyond the mast, beyond the forehold hatch, 
 quite into the Sally's bows. 
 
FATE OF THE MUTINEER 165 
 
 "You better tell me quickly, whatever it is," he 
 said, "because they may be getting out any minute." 
 
 "I know/' she nodded. "But, I do want to tell 
 you first that I'm sorry." 
 
 His interjection, "For what?" had possibly just 
 the faintest flavor of suspicion about it, but she went 
 straight on without explaining. 
 
 "And I'd like you to kiss me now, because you 
 didn't before." 
 
 Once more her two hands possessed themselves 
 of the rolled edges of his collar and her forearms 
 rested against her chest. She held up her face to him 
 and Joe, a little incredulously, kissed her. She 
 leaned away to look into his face. 
 
 "You can tell them," she said, slowly and very 
 distinctly, "it was Bill that did it." 
 
 She gave him then, instantly and with all the 
 nervous force of her perfectly poised young body, a 
 tnost tremendous push, and he went over, sprawling 
 backward into the water. During just the space of 
 time it took for the recovery of her own balance she 
 uttered a little sobbing laugh ; then in a scared rush 
 sped aft, cast the painter off the cleat, dropped into 
 the dinghy, shoved off, shipped her oars — and pulled 
 for the shore. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 PROGRESS OF THE AVALANCHE 
 
 AT a quarter to eleven — this must have been just 
 about the time that the fog over Lake Michi- 
 gan began setthng down upon the Sally — the city- 
 editor looked at his watch. 
 
 "You can have another forty-five minutes, Miss 
 Alden," he said to his star reporter, "to get that 
 story nailed down. If we haven't anything corrob- 
 orative by then, I'm going to kill it To me the 
 thing smells of fish, and the odor has grown strong- 
 er from hour to hour. That chauffeur is a patho- 
 logical liar. He has contradicted himself on a dozen 
 details, and his main story is preposterous — an anar- 
 chist with a black mustache pursuing Leda Swan and 
 Boris Lazaref in a taxicabl" 
 
 "We're not assuming," Miss Alden interrupted, 
 "that the man in the cab was Lazaref." 
 
 "Isn't that chauffeur's description of him cut to 
 
 i66 
 
PROGRESS OF THE AVALANCHE 167 
 
 fit?" the editor demanded. "A pale, long-haired 
 gink in a plush hat and cutaway coat ? The tip from 
 the detective agency was that he had disappeared 
 right after his recital, when he had been dressed like 
 that. I tell you it looks more like a plant every min- 
 ute. Some angel child of a press agent has been 
 cooking this up for weeks. As if they both hadn't 
 had publicity enough as it is !" 
 
 "I know," the girl admitted, "but I think you're 
 wrong. That was Leda Swan's watch in the taxi- 
 cab, and it was her mesh bag that the other man 
 found in the alley. And she has disappeared." 
 
 "Of course she's disappeared!" snorted the 
 editor. "They couldn't start a thing like this until 
 they tucked her away somewhere. I'd like to get the 
 real story and show *em up." 
 
 "That woman. Miss Smith, her social secretary, 
 or chaperon — whatever you want to call her," the 
 girl persisted, "is absolutely frantic. If she knows 
 where Leda Swan is then I've got softening of the 
 brain. And there's a man named Patrick who seems 
 to be a sort of chief of staff. I was talking to him a 
 half-hour ago, and while he's got himself better in 
 hand he isn't a bit less horrified, I don't believe. 
 Besides, I don't see why they should try to fake a 
 
i68 REAL LIFE 
 
 disappearance when they can get an eight-column 
 head on the front page of every evening paper just 
 by stopping over night in Chicago on the way to the 
 coast." 
 
 "Because they're insatiable, that's why!" he 
 retorted. "But as I say, you can have until eleven- 
 thirty to get some sort of real corroboration for that 
 Baron Miinchhausen of a chauffeur." 
 
 A hovering office-boy, seeing the conversation 
 about to end, came up and laid a card on the city 
 editor's desk. 
 
 Absently he took it in his fingers and scowled at 
 it, then held it out to the girl. 
 
 "You may as well stick around a minute," he 
 said, "till you hear what sort of fairy story this bird 
 is going to tell us." 
 
 The name on the card was Sergius Lazaref. It 
 was a white-faced, black-mustached, thoroughly ex- 
 otic-looking person who followed the card to the 
 desk a moment later. He was laboring evidently 
 under a terrific excitement. 
 
 "Are you the editor of this newspaper?" he 
 demanded. 
 
 "I'm responsible for the news that goes into it," 
 the editor acknowledged. 
 
PROGRESS OF THE AVALANCHE 169 
 
 "Are you responsible for the lies that are put 
 into it?" 
 
 "What's the particular lie that you've got on 
 your mind?" the editor asked. 
 
 "You have sent reporters to my hotel to ask if 
 my nephew, Boris Lazaref, the greatest violinist in 
 the world, have disappear — run off. That is a lie, 
 and if you print it you will be in great big trouble. 
 He have not disappear. He give a recital this after- 
 noon. Why would he run away from me — from his 
 uncle who have always look after him? But he 
 come home very tired. He have dinner quietly in 
 his room. He go to bed. But because I will not 
 show him to your reporters like an animal in the zoo 
 they say he have disappear." 
 
 The city editor glanced up and was a little an- 
 noyed that the reporter, despite his suggestion that 
 she stand by during this interview, had walked 
 away. 
 
 "It isn't a lie, of course," he said to his excited 
 visitor, "to ask whether a man has disappeared or 
 not, and when he's a worldwide celebrity like your 
 nephew it isn't even an impertinence. We were told 
 two or three hours ago that a certain detective 
 agency had been retained to find him and that every 
 
I70 REAL LIFE 
 
 hotel and railroad station in the city was being 
 watched." 
 
 Mr. Sergius Lazaref s head thrust itself forward 
 to within six inches of the editor's face. 
 
 "His name!" he demanded. "What is the name 
 of the serpent who have tell you that ?" 
 
 The editor backed away and got out his handker- 
 chief. "Of course I can't tell you that," he said. 
 "You assure me, do you, that it isn't true?" 
 
 He was answered by a rather hollow laugh, in- 
 volving an alarming display of teeth. "True ! How 
 would the invention of malice be true? Why would 
 I pay good money to detectives to find my nephew 
 when I know, this moment, where he is? That is a 
 joke someone have make up. But a bad joke, and he 
 shall pay . . . . " 
 
 He stopped there with a jerk, his eyes on the 
 local-room door, which had just been opened. 
 
 It was Priscilla Alden coming back with a man 
 in the uniform of a chauffeur for the Yellow Taxi 
 Company. This man also stood stock-still, staring 
 at Lazaref. 
 
 "That's the anarchist who chased Miss Swan 
 and me all the way to Jackson Park!" he said. 
 
PROGRESS OF THE AVALANCHE 171 
 
 "Where'd you get him ? Ask him if he ain't. You 
 can't believe them foreigners on oath, but ask him." 
 
 The Russian had slowly been turning purple. 
 Now, with a screech that diverted the entire local 
 room from all thoughts of tomorrow's paper, he 
 burst upon the chauffeur. 
 
 "You stealer! You bandit! Where you take 
 my nephew ? What you do with him ?" He turned 
 superbly upon the editor. "Have them lock him 
 up!" he commanded. "I, myself, charge him. He 
 have kidnap Boris Lazaref, the greatest violinist in 
 the world in a taxicab. Him and a curly-head girl. 
 I have pursue but I cannot catch. Tell me, dog, 
 what you do with him ?" 
 
 There were plenty of strong men at hand to save 
 him from the onslaught of the chauffeur. A few 
 minutes later, after the room had quieted down 
 again : 
 
 "Well," said the star reporter, "that worked bet- 
 ter than I hoped. But I had a hunch, the minute Mr. 
 Trotsky came in, that he might be the anarchist that 
 boy had been talking about." 
 
 "Oh, you're all right," the city editor said, "and 
 your story's all right. We'll take a chance on it. 
 Nobody could plant a story as well as that. But I 
 
172 REAL LIFE 
 
 give you my word, I can still smell fish. — What is 
 it, Borden?" 
 
 The young reporter who had been waiting 
 stepped up a little as if the city editor's desk had been 
 a headsman's block, manned by a waiting execu- 
 tioner. "I couldn't get that photograph," he said. 
 
 "Why not?" snapped the editor, and then 
 straight on without pause, "It doesn't matter why 
 not. There's no excuse for failing to get a photo- 
 graph. You understand that, don't you? Whose 
 photograph was it ?" 
 
 *Tt was a high-school girl who'd disappeared; 
 didn't come home from school. We got a City 
 Press flimsy about eight o'clock. You sent me down 
 to get a photo and an interv^iew with the mother. I 
 didn't think the picture mattered so much because 
 the girl has already come home." 
 
 "Then for the love of God," cried the editor, 
 passionately, "will you tell me why you are wasting 
 my time now?" 
 
 "Why, I thought," said the young reporter, 
 "that perhaps there might be a sort of kidding story 
 in it anyway, because of the wild alibi she had for 
 being out so late. She was down in Jackson Park, 
 she said, and Leda Swan was there with a young 
 
PROGRESS OF THE AVALANCHE 173 
 
 man. And they ran away from somebody and hid 
 on board a yacht. They both fell in the water get- 
 ting aboard from a little boat. This girl stayed hid- 
 ten in the bushes watching for Leda to come ashore 
 again. But she didn't, and by and by some men 
 came out in another boat and got aboard the yacht 
 and sailed away. I thought it might make a couple 
 of sticks, sort of joshing it, you know; show how 
 crazy all the girls are about Leda." 
 
 "What," the editor asked, after a silence which 
 the young man found frightfully disconcerting, 
 "was the name of the yacht that Leda Swan and 
 the young man concealed themselves aboard? Did 
 the young lady say ?" 
 
 jl "She mentioned some name; 'Sally,' I think. I 
 wasn't paying much attention to that." 
 
 I "I daresay not," observed the editor icily, "since 
 you're trying to learn to be a reporter. Call up the 
 Jackson Park Yacht Club and find whether they 
 have a yacht there called the Sally or not. Find out 
 if it went out this evening, and if so what its desti- 
 nation was." 
 
 Five minutes later the young man came back to 
 report that the Sally had sailed at seven o'clock with 
 
174 REAL LIFE 
 
 the owner — Franklin, his name was — on board, for 
 Michigan City. 
 
 Miss Alden looked at her watch. "I've got 
 plenty of time to make the midnight train," she said. 
 "I'll want a photographer, of course." 
 
 The editor devoted a priceless three seconds to 
 reflection. 
 
 "How about taking Lazaref along, too?" he 
 asked- 
 
 She made it clear, to the point of mutiny, that 
 she would not. She felt she had enough on her 
 hands without that maniac. All the same the ad- 
 vantage of losing him was obvious, and the chauf- 
 feur, too, for that matter. 
 
 "All right," the editor said, as he started for the 
 composing-room to lock up the home edition, "I'll 
 manage it for you somehow. What's a small crime 
 or so to a city editor?" 
 
 * * * 
 
 Telegram : 
 
 P. Alden, care Western Union, Michigan City. 
 Borden has left in yellow taxi with chauffeur to 
 cover Crown Point, taking Mr. Trotsky widi him 
 whom he will keep amused as long as possible. 
 Communicate Borden if clues point that way. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 INTO THE PRIMITIVE 
 
 rIE POSITION of a rower is necessarily retro- 
 spective, and much as the Princess would have 
 preferred a radical obliteration of the past, a fresh 
 start upon a new leaf, she was obliged as she tugged 
 at the oars to confront in the background the Sally, 
 where she had so abominably betrayed poor Joe, 
 and in the foreground, face to face with her and al- 
 most near enough to slap, Bill, for whose sake she 
 had perfonned that act of treachery, looking at her 
 with the righteous and martyred expression of a 
 wronged husband. 
 
 She'd like to know what right he had to look 
 like that; but her passionate proclamation of this 
 wish was probably disingenuous, for she made it not 
 to Bill but to herself only. She didn't want to start 
 an argument with him. She didn't want to speak to 
 him at all; she wouldn't until he began. Hadn't she 
 
 175 
 
lye REAL LIFE 
 
 laid the foundation, in all she had done for him since 
 half-past four o'clock yesterday afternoon, when she 
 had saved his life, for a faith impregnable to all as- 
 sault? Hadn't she trusted him and his bare word 
 through everything? Hadn't she waited upon him 
 hand and foot? Hadn't she faced prison rather 
 than give him up ? Was there a heroine in all movie 
 literature who had done more for a hero, or so much 
 in so brief a span of hours? But all of that counted 
 for nothing, it seemed, against the mischance of his 
 poking his head up through the forehatch just at the 
 one precisely wrong moment ! 
 
 She wouldn't have been so vehement about this 
 but for the fact that down in her own heart some- 
 where was a voice that sided with Bill against her, 
 telling her that for a while, in thought if not in deed, 
 she had been faithless. 
 
 Nothing in all her experience in the screen drama 
 had prepared her for a perverse phenomenon of this 
 sort. She had been led to suppose that when a girl 
 fell in love — any girl, even a vampire — it was an 
 unequivocal one-hundred-per-cent affair, an abso- 
 lute preventive against all errant inclinations for the 
 rest of her life. 
 
 Yet certainly it had seemed, for a few minutes, 
 
INTO THE PRIMITIVE 177 
 
 beginning when Joe reverently had told her that he 
 thought she was the most wonderful person in the 
 world and had taken her hand, that Bill got rather 
 out of focus. Externally her conduct had been cor- 
 rect enough, she felt, even in the matter of that first 
 kiss which had not come off. But the thing that 
 shocked her was a realization that for a horrible 
 second or two the sight of Bill halfway through the 
 hatch staring at her, had struck her as at once annoy- 
 ing and ridiculous. For just that blighting moment 
 of time she had — well — pretty near hated him. She 
 had made handsome amends of course. She had 
 given him a magnificent revenge over his rival. But 
 would a real heroine, would Leda Swan for instance, 
 in any part she had ever played, have been capable of 
 even so ephemeral a disloyalty? It was unthinkable. 
 It was all very miserable and maddening not 
 least because there wasn't anyone who could be at all 
 wholeheartedly blamed for it. Joe wasn't a villain. 
 Certainly he'd had the misfortune to fall in love with 
 her and had been unable to conceal the fact; per- 
 fectly orthodox conduct, as was also his platonic 
 project for shielding her from the possibly embar- 
 rassing results of her escapade with Bill. As for 
 Bill, his conduct too conformed to the highest stand- 
 
178 REAL LIFE 
 
 ards. In two out of five of the serious pictures one 
 saw didn't the whole plot hang upon the fact that a 
 husband happened to see his wife getting innocently 
 kissed — perhaps merely by a long-absent brother? 
 One always drew, didn't he, the most sinister infer- 
 ences from an episode like that ? Didn't it as a rule 
 cost the wife about three reels of abject humiliation 
 and apology to get such a thing explained ? 
 
 There couldn't be any doubt about what Joe was 
 thinking of her. She had, very likely, with that 
 Delilah kiss of hers, destroyed his faith in all 
 womanhood. 
 
 Oh, well, what did she care! It was his own 
 fault jwst as it was Bill's. They could both think 
 whatever they pleased. She dug her oars viciously 
 into the water and put her back into the quickened 
 stroke, and by the time the boat, ramming its bow 
 into the sharply shelving beach, stopped with a jerk 
 she had pretty well worked the bitterness out of her 
 heart. Nevertheless she sprang out without a word, 
 tugged the dinghy a little farther up the sand, and 
 without a glance in Bill's direction turned on her 
 heel and walked away along the beach. Bill could 
 come along or not just as he liked. 
 
 She expected before she had gone a dozen paces 
 
INTO THE PRIMITIVE 179 
 
 to hear either his cry "Princess !" or the padding of 
 his feet along the sands come appeahngly after her, 
 and she knew that at either of these cues she would 
 instantly relent. It was profoundly disconcerting to 
 hear nothing at all. But until she got some sort of 
 sign from him how could she stop and turn without 
 forfeiting the only thing she had left to hold her 
 own with — her air of injured innocence? Inflexi- 
 bly she plodded on along the beach, and she couldn't 
 have kept eyes front with greater care if she had 
 feared, as the penalty of a glance over her shoulder, 
 the fate of the refugee from Sodom. 
 
 As she trudged on, sometimes over springy, hard- 
 packed sand but much of the time across great tracts 
 of gravel, which slipped under her feet and spilled 
 into her flapping tennis-shoes, a forlorn and alto- 
 gether appalling loneliness invaded her spirit. She 
 had played the shipwrecked heroine on the unin- 
 habited island in many a picture, but never in her 
 life had she been in a place like this — which carried 
 somehow, just in the look and atmosphere of it, the 
 conviction that nobody lived here or ever had or 
 ever would. She could see the beach for miles 
 ahead, an endless, irregularly wide brown ribbon 
 between the gleaming amethyst lake stretching out 
 
i8o REAL LIFE 
 
 to a horizon at her right and the lowering, ragged, 
 scrub-covered sandhills at her left, thrusting out 
 their shoulders like bastions for terrors to hide 
 behind. 
 
 The persistent angle of this coastline is such that 
 at that hour of the morning no ray of the rising sun 
 fell upon it at all. The lake side of the hills and the 
 whole width of beach lay in unbroken shade. The 
 exertion of struggling on over these gravel-beds 
 kept her fairly warm, but when she got too tired to 
 struggle any farther, and that point, it seemed, was 
 not far away, what was to prevent the chill from 
 stealing into her very bones? She had made a fire 
 once in a picture by rubbing two sticks together. 
 There were plenty of sticks lying about a little 
 higher up the beach, but this time there was no tech- 
 nical director to prepare them with an electrical con- 
 nection and what not, and she felt perfectly sure that 
 in default of this special preparation the trick 
 wouldn't work. 
 
 She was bitterly hungry too, yet she couldn't 
 pump up any sort of hope of coming upon a bread- 
 fruit or banana tree, or of finding a shard of dry 
 bone and spearing a fish with it. The technical di- 
 
INTO THE PRIMITIVE i8i 
 
 rector had too much to do with these windfalls of 
 good fortune also. 
 
 In this horrible abandoned place, along this run- 
 way of despair where she might walk, it seemed, for 
 days and days, if you got cold enough you froze ; if 
 you got hungry enough you starved — there would 
 be no interposition to the contrary. 
 
 Bill, following behind her — somehow she knew 
 that was what he was doing, though she hadn't 
 looked around nor heard a sound of him — Bill was 
 perhaps more nearly starved and frozen than she 
 was. She slackened her pace a little under the im- 
 pact of the idea that perhaps the reason why he 
 hadn't overtaken her long ago was because he 
 couldn't. This accomplished nothing, however, and 
 to stop and wait for him was the thing she would not 
 do. But if she turned off and explored the dunes a 
 bit 
 
 That mightn't be a bad thing to do, even apart 
 from the chance it would give Bill to come up with 
 her. Behind this desert barrier of sandhills one 
 might find human life, civilized society; food, 
 warmth, shelter, even respectable clothes might be 
 purchasable commodities. A little ahead to the left 
 was what looked like a cleft in the sandhills. She'd 
 
iS2 REAL LIFE 
 
 turn in there when she came to it and explore about 
 a bit. 
 
 It didn't look so promising when she came oppo- 
 site it as it had from a little farther off. There was 
 no clear pass, such as her hopes had visualized, into 
 an open and inhabited country — hardly more than a 
 deep dimple in the contour of tlie hills. But she 
 poked her way into it just the same, scrambled up 
 in the loose sand, getting a friendly handhold or 
 foothold here and there from some stunted bush, 
 until she stopped, peering into what amounted to a 
 cave. 
 
 It was just a hole in the sand, left by the stump 
 of an uprooted tree, but the stump itself with a 
 mass of roots on the end of it formed a sort of re- 
 taining wall and had kept the sand from shifting 
 into the hollow. It was filled with leaves — so neatly 
 and competently filled that she couldn't believe that 
 the mere casual drift of the wind had done it. 
 They were nice dry leaves, last year's brown oak 
 leaves, and they looked comfortable and domestic, 
 like a home; the lair of some wild beast, perhaps — 
 except that there weren't any bones and things lying 
 about. 
 
 Only what was that — that brown thing — so 
 
INTO THE PRIMITIVE 183 
 
 nearly the color of the leaves that she hadn't noticed 
 it at first? It looked exactly like a naked human 
 knee ! The Princess held her breath and blinked at 
 the apparition to make sure. 
 
 A knee ! a man's knee, sharply bent, was stickmg 
 out of the leaves; a corpse, she supposed, of some- 
 one who had been murdered and flung into this hole. 
 That's why the leaves had been heaped in so care- 
 fully. She backed sharply away, up to the lip of the 
 hollow — backed because she hadn't resolution 
 enough to turn her eyes away from the grisly spec- 
 tacle until she got to where one leap would carry her 
 clean down the bank and away. The sand dislodged 
 by her feet as she scrambled went pattering down 
 upon the leaves and made a noise like rain. 
 
 As if in response to this sound the knee, to the 
 Princess's horror, moved, stretched itself galvanic- 
 ally, and a long hairy shin and a big flat foot with a 
 pink sole thrust itself up almost, it seemed, into her 
 face. 
 
 She screamed, but for a moment stood where she 
 was, paralyzed. There was a flurry among the 
 leaves at this, and a head fantastically ornamented 
 with wisps of black lank hair and wildly disheveled 
 whiskers heaved itself up inquiringly upon the ped- 
 
i84 REAL LIFE 
 
 estal of a long stringy neck and a pair of naked 
 brown shoulders. 
 
 She screamed once more, whirled, gained the lip 
 of the hollow with one convulsive spring and saw — 
 oh, blessed sight! — Bill charging up the sloping 
 sands to the rescue. She went slithering down into 
 his arms, gasping and for the moment completely 
 inarticulate with panic. 
 
 But even during that moment while she clung to 
 him speechless, supported by the surprisingly mus- 
 cular grip of his left arm, she experienced a glow 
 of comfort in the realization that Bill on hearing her 
 scream had not run away — had, on the contrary, like 
 a real hero, come rushing to the rescue. 
 
 He was standing his ground now, while he plied 
 her with questions as to the cause of her terror, with 
 a staunchness that would have done credit to Wal- 
 lace Reid. 
 
 "It's — it's a wild man," she panted, "with — 
 without any clothes on ! He was all covered up with 
 leaves ! I saw just his leg at first, and I thought he 
 was dead ! When he stuck his head up I screamed ! 
 He must be crazy, I guess !" 
 
 "Crazy?" Bill echoed, inquiringly, tapping his 
 forehead, and she nodded assent. 
 
"Look," she gasped; "he's coming!" 
 
 See page i86 
 
"You love it then?" Bill asked 
 
 Set pagt 2x6 
 
INTO THE PRIMITIVE 185 
 
 "I'm all right," she said, letting go the hold she 
 had till now convulsively maintained upon him. "I 
 guess we'd better beat it. Only I don't believe I 
 can run very well. I'm still kind of — wobbly." 
 
 "It -s better not to run," Bill decided. "Perhaps 
 he watches us now through the bushes. They are 
 like wild beasts, these mad people. To show fear 
 with them, that is the great mistake. It excite them. 
 They come and leap upon your back." 
 
 The Princess shuddered, but Bill, having hooked 
 his arm through hers, led her away at a steady 
 walk down tiie beach toward the hard sand at the 
 water's edge. 
 
 "You're a lot braver than I am. Bill," she con- 
 fessed. "I couldn't do this if you weren't hanging 
 on to me." She stole a glance over her shoulder. 
 **Don't you think we might run now ?" she asked. 
 
 But he, despite her tugging, maintained his 
 steady pace. "Do not look back," he instructed her. 
 "He does not mean to attack us or he would have 
 sprung out before this. But he is watching, and if 
 he see us look . . . . " 
 
 Obediently the Princess trudged an another 
 dozen paces or so. "You don't know what a per- 
 
i86 REAL LIFE 
 
 fectly horrible sight he was," she said. Irresistibly 
 she turned her head once more, faltered, wen: limp 
 and clung to his arms. "Look," she gasped; "he's 
 coming!" 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 THE DUNE-BUG 
 
 SHE felt a sudden rigidity possess Bill's frame as 
 he turned and saw the apparition which was 
 coming toward them at a gentle lope across the sand. 
 "It is no use to run," she heard him murmur. "We 
 should not escape those long legs so. Do not be 
 afraid. I will talk with him. Do not cry out and do 
 not run away unless I tell you. Maybe he is not 
 fierce at all," 
 
 And, indeed, as he came galloping nearer it 
 seemed more and more probable that what his wav- 
 ing arms were trying in pantomime to convey was 
 reassurance and welcome. 
 
 There never, the Princess would have taken 
 oath, had been a weirder object in the world. His 
 delay in following them was now explained: He 
 had stopped to dress. He had put on, that is to say, 
 a hat — a quite decent panama — and a pair of shell- 
 rimmed spectacles. He had combed down his wild 
 
 187 
 
Il88 REAL LIFE 
 
 whiskers into a reasonably demure Van Dyck 
 beard. The rest o£ his costume was simply a breech- 
 clout. His skin all over was the exact shade of the 
 oak leaves he had been buried in, an interesting ex- 
 ample, had the Princess possessed the phrase, of 
 protective coloration. 
 
 What made the whole thing simply fantastic was 
 the expression this only inhabitant or sole survivor 
 or whatever he was wore as he came panting to a 
 stop a pace or two away from where they stood — 
 the expression he wore and the tone in which, a mo- 
 ment later, he spoke. 
 
 "I deeply regret that my appearance should have 
 alarmed the young lady." He took off his hat with 
 a bit of a flourish toward the Princess, but his words 
 were addressed to Bill, who had come a stride or 
 two to meet him. "I am aware that it is unusual, 
 causing mirth when it does not arouse terror. I 
 frequently hear myself referred to as a dune-bug. 
 My only purpose in pursuing you," he went on, "was 
 to assure you that you have nothing to fear from me. 
 There is, I feel confident, no more hannless person 
 in the world. I prey upon none of my fellow-crea- 
 tures — not even the humblest of them." 
 
 "It is we who have trespass," Bill said with a 
 
THE DUNE-BUG 189 
 
 ceremonious bow. "We are strangers here and do 
 not know. We beg you will excuse." 
 
 "Oh, please!" cried the wild man in a tone of 
 bright distress. "This is my home, indeed, but I do 
 not attempt to hold it in adverse possession, as the 
 legality-mongers would say. The sand, the sky, the 
 horizon yonder — they cannot be appropriated. 
 They belong to you as well as to me." 
 
 His agonized expression, the Princess noted, was 
 partly due to the rigor with which he kept his teeth 
 clenched while he talked and smiled. He was shud- 
 dering with cold, just as she and Bill were. 
 
 "Can you start a fire by rubbing two sticks to- 
 gether?" she asked. "There's plenty of wood lying 
 around, if anyone could do that." She felt it would 
 be indelicate — considering his costume — to suggest 
 the possibility that he might have matches. 
 
 He looked acutely embarrassed. "I have not yet 
 learned the knack of it," he confessed, "though I 
 have tried all the standard methods, including the 
 bowstring. It is more difficult than I had been led 
 to suppose." 
 
 "I believe you," said the Princess. "But you see, 
 we're so cold and so hungry that I thought I'd take 
 a chance and ask. It's all right." 
 
190 REAL LIFE 
 
 "I can make a fire, nevertheless," the wild man 
 admitted, with the air of giving himself away. 
 "Matches are among the banes of the civilization I 
 have discarded — yet one cannot emancipate oneself 
 from everything at once. I have still a small store 
 of them, and I will use one without my usual prelim- 
 inary attempt to do without. — Also," he con- 
 cluded, "I have food, to which you are welcome, 
 though if you are flesh-eaters the nature of it will 
 disappoint you." 
 
 "I'm hungry enough," the Princess observed, 
 noncommittally, "to gnaw the bark off a tree." 
 
 "I have attempted," said their host, as he led 
 them back in the direction of his cave, "to habituate 
 myself to a diet of acorns, of which the oaks here- 
 about offer an abundant supply, but my results so 
 far have not been encouraging. If I eat them in suf- 
 ficient quantities to sustain life they make me vio- 
 lently ill. I am taking now an increasing number 
 with each meal, but I am obliged to subsist in part 
 upon food which has been defiled by coming to me 
 through the sordid channels of commerce." 
 
 This, though the Princess wasn't sure she knew 
 precisely what it meant, sounded hopeful. She 
 glanced across at Bill to see if it didn't strike him the 
 
THE DUNE-BUG 1911 
 
 same way. It was a warm little look with a touch of 
 a smile about it, and it stopped Bill in his tracks. 
 The dune-bug marched on, his head in the air, and 
 behind his back two hands that were not a pair 
 clasped and were respectively kissed. This was not, 
 she reflected, the way reconciliations occurred in the 
 pictures. There you always explained something, 
 producing documents of one sort or another in sup- 
 port; or else you pleaded; or else you touched a 
 chord that vibrated through his better nature — re- 
 minded him how his mother on her death-bed had 
 made him swear never to treat a woman as unkindly 
 as his father had treated her. This didn't slip into 
 any of the categories. She wasn't sure whether she 
 had forgiven Bill or he her. It was all right, any- 
 how. This furtive handclasp, ready to spring asun- 
 der should the dune-bug take it into his head to turn 
 around, was more eloquent and explicit than any 
 subtitle. With this understanding, and with fire 
 and food in prospect, the world became a brighter 
 place. 
 
 "Here we are," said their host, turning to them 
 with a bow of welcome and taking off his hat. It 
 was a small circular clearing in the thicket, the other 
 side of the tree from the hole where the Princess had 
 
,192 REAL LIFE 
 
 found him asleep. The tree was itself an important 
 part of the establishment, since it served as a frame 
 for the sheets of matting which made the walls or 
 awnings, whichever you wished to call them. In the 
 way of furniture and living-utensils there appeared 
 to be nothing beyond a biscuit-tin, a pail smoky from 
 having hung over a fire, a basket and a small stone 
 jug. There might be other treasures stored away in 
 the hollow stump opposite the entrance to the 
 thicket. 
 
 "Beautifully simple, is it not?" he went on. 
 "Nothing in excess, all natural wants supplied ; sun- 
 light, pure air, water — I boil it to avoid infection and 
 keep it in that jug — food" (he nodded toward the 
 biscuit-tin) "and — greatest boon of all, solitude." 
 
 "Shan't we help you build the fire?" suggested 
 the Princess, and, the dune-bug agreeing brightly to 
 this, she and Bill went scouting about for sticks. 
 Their host scouted too, but he had so much to say 
 about the craft of fire-building and found it so nec- 
 essary to make gestures that he didn't add much to 
 the woodpile. The presence of a gallery may have 
 put him off his form, but certainly he conveyed to 
 the Princess the impression that he hadn't always 
 been the child of nature he so passionately pro- 
 
THE DUNE-BUG 193 
 
 claimed himself. He took eight matches getting 
 their little blaze started, and they had a bad quarter 
 of an hour after that before they could be sure that 
 it was going to bum in earnest. At last, though, the 
 dune-bug straightened up with a look of intense re- 
 lief; one could forget intervening disappointments 
 when the final result was as satisfactory as this. 
 
 "There we are !" he said. "Now for breakfast" 
 
 He opened the biscuit-tin with the air, a little, of 
 a prestidigitator about to do a trick, and took out 
 two paper bags and a pasteboard carton. One of the 
 bags contained nuts — pecans and almonds mixed — 
 the other prunes. The carton contained a highly 
 special sort of bran biscuit, guaranteed upon the 
 label to produce the most intensely hygienic result 
 
 "I have found," said their host, as he assembled 
 two stones and began cracking the nuts and handing 
 them around, "that seven of these nuts, three prunes 
 and two of the biscuits make a normal ration for one 
 meal." 
 
 Accordingly, when he had cracked twenty-one 
 nuts and divided them with mathematical impartial- 
 ity, he replaced the bag in the biscuit-tin and dealt 
 around two apiece of the bran biscuits, upon the top 
 of each pair — they were as hard as little china sau- 
 
194 REAL LIFE 
 
 cers — balancing three prunes. This done, with an 
 air of mild finality he closed the larder. 
 
 "The Hindus," he observed, "are much more 
 highly civilized people than ourselves and their 
 etiquette I prefer to follow. Eating, as no doubt 
 you know, is not with them a social function. It is 
 not, then, discourtesy which leads me to withdraw a 
 little and turn my back until the meal is concluded." 
 
 The Princess read in Bill's eyes the same lawless 
 hope that was in her own mind : If only he would 
 withdraw far enough and turn his back completely 
 enough to make practicable a further raid upon his 
 stores ! But he didn't ; he squatted with his back to 
 the fire, his face to the biscuit-tin. No hope! 
 Would it be possible, the Princess wondered, with 
 one of those stones he'd been cracking nuts with to 
 tap him just hard enough on the head to render him 
 unconscious without killing him? She could under- 
 stand the criminal mind, at any ratel She even 
 relaxed her views a little on the subject of cannibal- 
 ism. People could get hungry enough, she 
 supposed .... 
 
 What made it worse was that the dune-bug went 
 on methodically chumping his provender long after 
 they had finished theirs. He was probably keeping 
 
THE DUNE-BUG 195 
 
 count of the number of chews he took to each mouth- 
 ful. He finished at last, and turning to them 
 greeted them with a pleasant smile, as if he were 
 just back from a journey. 
 
 "It is time," he said, "that I went about my daily 
 task." 
 
 This was, he proceeded to explain, the collection 
 of greens, the absence of which at breakfast they had 
 no doubt noted. It was the dandelion season and he 
 knew a field where they grew abundantly. It was, 
 regrettably, too near an inhabited house to make it 
 possible for him to go collecting except at night or 
 in the very early morning. There was still time, he 
 thought, providing he wasted none, to fill his basket. 
 
 He was complete enough, you'd have said, as he 
 stood there, his arm crooked like a housewife's, the 
 market basket depending from it. But he gave him- 
 self, before he departed, one fantastic finishing 
 touch. Out of the hollow of the tree he took a flage- 
 olet with a loop of cord tied about the middle of it. 
 The loop he put over his head and as he walked 
 away, very erect, his long thin legs stepping rather 
 high, he accompanied himself down the beach with 
 the cello theme from the first movement of Schu- 
 bert's B minor symphony. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 REVELATION 
 
 THE TWO beside the fire sat gazing after him 
 speechless until a projecting shoulder of the hill 
 cut him off from sight and hearing as well. Then 
 the Princess rubbed her eyes. 
 
 "Bill," she asked, "do you suppose he is true, or 
 did we dream him ? What I don't see," she went on, 
 "is why I don't laugh myself into stitches about him! 
 Maybe it's because I'm so hungry. I suppose it's 
 stealing, but we'll have to have some more of those 
 nuts!" 
 
 He made, but only half-heartedly, a gesture of 
 protest which the Princess ignored. She opened the 
 tin and placed it where both could reach. "Just a 
 few," she urged, taking out a handful. Then she 
 reverted to the former topic. 
 
 "I suppose one reason was because you didn't 
 laugh. Why didn't you?" 
 
 196 
 
REVELATION 197 
 
 "He is not funny," said Bill. "I could weep at 
 him, and I could envy him; but laugh at him, no — 
 never. — Do not risk your fingers between those 
 horrible stones. Leave the nut-cracking to me. See, 
 I do like this." 
 
 Without any appearance of effort he cracked one 
 of the pecans between the thumb and finger of his 
 left hand. The Princess stared. "How could you 
 do that ?" she demanded. "It takes a terrible lot of 
 strength to do that. I thought " 
 
 "My hands are very strong," he told her cas- 
 ually. "It is all in the training. I have been train 
 since a little boy." Then, quite definitely, she 
 thought, forestalling the next question she meant to 
 ask, he went back to the dune-bug. "You felt as I 
 did," he said. "Your eyes did not invite me to 
 laugh. I loved it that they did not." 
 
 "Well, I don't see why," she persisted. "In the 
 movies he'd be a scream. Yet he is kind of pathetic. 
 I pretty near cried myself when those matches kept 
 going out. But what do you mean, you could envy 
 him ? He's crazy, isn't he ?" 
 
 "Oh, perhaps," said Bill. "One must be a little 
 mad, I suppose, to wish his freedom so much that he 
 will pay for it. But cannot you understand? I am 
 
198 REAL LIFE 
 
 sure you can. He does not like the hustle and the 
 screech of your big city. — Look! You can see 
 from here ! Already the smoke in the comer of the 
 sky. He tell it, 'Go to the devil!' He lie here in 
 the sand and smile at it. He like the feel of the sun 
 and the wind and the rain on his bare skin and he 
 snap his fingers at the foolish ones who say he must 
 wear clothes because they do. They laugh at him ; 
 he does not care, because to him they are all mad. 
 He have it all big and still. And he play Schubert 
 on the flageolet." 
 
 He himself began humming the dune-bug's tune 
 as he munched his nuts, and presently the Princess 
 became aware that he had drifted away out of her 
 world altogether, an effect not contradicted by his 
 reaching out with his right hand for her left one and 
 taking permanent possession of it, nor by the fact 
 that he went straight on cracking nuts between his 
 thumb and finger and putting their kernels, more or 
 less alternately, into his mouth and into hers. 
 
 She drifted off lazily upon a train of reflection 
 of her own. Was that smudge of smoke over there 
 really Chicago ? Could it be as near as that? What 
 were they thinking there of her disappearance — Miss 
 Smith and the rest of them? She couldn't feel that 
 
REVELATION 199 
 
 it mattered very much. They'd keep it quiet, she 
 surmised, they were all so deathly afraid of Ma. 
 Walter Patrick, who was to have joined their party 
 last night, would have told them what to do. And 
 today, sometime, as soon as she could get to a tele- 
 phone, she would let them know that she was all 
 right. 
 
 Walter Patrick stuck in her mind. She felt, sud- 
 denly, that she understood him. The dune-bug — or 
 Bill's interpretation of him — had given her the clue. 
 The next time Patrick looked at her with that enig- 
 matic smile of his she'd be able to smile back with 
 complete understanding. They ought to be good 
 friends after this; allies, of sorts, against — well, 
 even in some circumstances against Ma herself! It 
 gave her a rather — disembodied feeling, to find her- 
 self thinking such thoughts as these. 
 
 Yet the really disembodied one seemed to be 
 Leda Swan — ^who was so always on exhibition, with 
 whom all the world was so idiotically infatuated, 
 whose faked biography it lapped up weekly in the 
 column, whose forged autographs, by thousands, it 
 cherished so carefully. To the Princess, sitting 
 ■»-~-o A^v-^n the sand in half a doze, it seemed that she 
 
200 REAL LIFE 
 
 shared with the dune-bug a joke upon all the rest of 
 the world. 
 
 The sun got his head up above the shoulder of 
 the hills and shone down warmly upon their backs. 
 The nuts they had been munching at so long gave 
 them, at last, a feeling of satiety. Bill stretched out 
 at full length, rolled over and put his head down in 
 the Princess's lap. 
 
 She was a little startled at this, but the morn- 
 ing's mood prevailed, to the extent, at least, of her 
 not moving away nor telling him to get up. What 
 troubled her was the intensity of her impulse to 
 cradle him up tight in her arms, and the insidious 
 voice that kept whispering, What would it matter 
 if she did ? It was an empty world, wasn't it, with 
 no notice-boards saying that they weren't allowed 
 in the shrubbery, no uncle to be afraid of, no per- 
 nickety yachtsman with his talk about probation offi- 
 cers and chiefs of police, no Miss Smith to tell her 
 what young ladies did or didn't do; no Ma — that 
 summed it up : nobody at all but herself and Bill and 
 the funny, nutty old dune-bug who wouldn't care 
 what they did. There were no rules, here on the 
 sands, except what they made for themselves. She 
 leaned back upon her hands to hold tb***" "^^^^^ ^^® 
 
REVELATION 201 
 
 began drawing, one after another, long deep 
 breaths. They must be starting on soon to look for 
 a telephone. 
 
 Suddenly Bill sat erect, stared out blankly over 
 the lake for a minute or two, then turned and sought 
 her eyes. 
 
 "Princess," he said in a tone she hadn't heard 
 him use before, a tone that went through her some- 
 how, and frightened her, "can we not go mad a lit- 
 tle, too? Mad enough to be free — like this? We 
 need not sleep in holes under the leaves, nor eat 
 acorns. But a little house we could build, and play 
 all day long in the sand and the water, and I shall 
 play you tunes from Schubert — ^but better than the 
 bug. And we shall tell my uncle, and all the rest of 
 them if they come, to go to hell away from here! 
 
 She shook her head sharply, like ^"c trying to 
 waken herself out of a dream. "^ ^vouW "^ke a 
 wonderful pretend. Bill," she ^aid, "but of course 
 we couldn't do it realb'-'' 
 
 "There ^^ nothing to pretend about !" he asserted, 
 angrjlr- *'V\^hy cannot we do it?" 
 
 "Well, for one thing," she said, "I've got to go 
 fo work Wednesday morning, on the lot out at 
 Hollywood. — On a picture," she added. 
 
202 REAL LIFE 
 
 "You — you paint pictures, then?" he asked. 
 
 She stared at him. "I told you who I was yes- 
 terday. I'm Leda Swan. Motion pictures, silly! 
 
 I thought everybody in the world Bill, is it true, 
 
 not kidding at all, that you never even heard of me ? 
 Where have you been?" 
 
 "In America since the war break out. Before 
 that, all over the world. But my uncle, he never let 
 me go to the cinemas, for fear I catch something." 
 
 From a feeling of acute annoyance her emotion 
 changed suddenly to pity. "You poor kid!" she 
 said. "Your uncle must be a peach, all right! 
 Well, I've been a — star in the pictures since I was 
 five years old ; ever since I can remember, anyhow. 
 I've played everything from a two-year-old baby in 
 a cnb to the Queen of Babylon. I've got my own 
 company nuw and I make so much money I couldn't 
 count it.— Not," she found herself adding, "that 
 they'd ever give me a .Jiance to try !" 
 
 "It is what I have thougv^i-r' gjjj cried. "I 
 think it while I watch your face. \ou have been 
 in the treadmill too! All your life since jou can 
 remember you have work for people, to make th«.evi 
 rich, big, important ; just as I have work all my liic 
 for my uncle !" 
 
REVELATION 203 
 
 "Work!" the Princess cried, turning an incred- 
 ulous gaze upon him. 
 
 It was distinctly a shock. She had not perhaps 
 taken her hypothesis about the Prince of Zenda with 
 complete seriousness, but it had been a rosy day- 
 dream of hers for so many hours now that the 
 dissipation of it with that harsh word "work" cost 
 her a pang. 
 
 She asked rather faintly, "What do you do ?" 
 
 "I play the fiddle," he told her. "Ever since I 
 can remember I have play the fiddle. I practice all 
 the time, all the morning, all the afternoon. I am 
 a wonder-child giving concerts at six years old. But 
 a real child playing games, having fun, I am never 
 that at all. I see them play. I do not know how." 
 The eyes of the Princess filled with tears. "CXi, 
 you poor kid !" she cried once more, and, picking up 
 one of his hands, cuddled her cheek against it. But 
 in a moment she brightened up at a happj' thought. 
 
 "I'll tell you what, Bill," she said. *'If you really 
 play the violin well — but of course you can, having 
 practiced as much as that — w^y, I can get you a 
 job out at Hollywood, so we can go out there 
 together just as we planned. I always have two 
 musicians working for me, harp and violin usually. 
 
204 REAL LIFE 
 
 I adore the harp, don't you? They play favorite 
 things of mine, off-stage, you know, during my 
 big emotional scenes so that I'll feel them more — 
 really cry, you know, instead of having to use glyc- 
 erine. They say I'm unusually susceptible. When I 
 hear anything like 'The Love Nest' or 'Let the Rest 
 of the World Go By' I simply melt away! Oh, I 
 can't wait to hear you play that — Don't you think 
 that's a good plan, Bill?" 
 
 But it was unmistakable, even without waiting 
 for his answer, that Bill did not. He pulled his 
 hand away from her with something like a snatch, 
 and he looked, she observed with consternation, 
 furious. What in the world had she done. . . . 
 
 "I am an artist!" he said stiffly. "I do not play 
 m-asic-hall slush to a harp accompaniment like a 
 street gypsy!" As suddenly the cloud lifted. 
 — "Forgive! I forget you do not know! I have 
 not tell you my name. I am Boris Lazaref." 
 
 It was a painful moment. The name had a faint 
 ring of familiarity in the Princess's ear, but her face 
 went perfectly blank m her frantic effort to find its 
 associations. She said, "Are you really?" but with 
 so little conviction that it made the insult all the 
 worse. 
 
REVELATION 205 
 
 "You have not hear of me," he stated accusingly. 
 "I am the greatest violinist in the world alive today. 
 It is not a boast. It is the simple truth. And you 
 have never hear my name !" 
 
 She flushed and sprang to her feet. "Well," she 
 said, "as far as that goes, I'm the Mary Pick- 
 ford and I are the two biggest film stars alive in 
 the world today. You've never heard of me and I 
 suppose you've never heard of her, either. So, if 
 we can stand it, I guess you'll have to !" 
 
 The sudden smile that beamed in his face was 
 like the sun coming out. He stood before her and 
 took both her hands. "We quarrel like two chil- 
 dren — not so ? And it is all silliness. You will see 
 when I tell you why I ran away." 
 
 He made her sit down again on the sand beside 
 him, and began his story. 
 
 "My uncle, he go off and leave me with a man- 
 ager. I think he have already sail for Europe. I 
 say to my manager, *We will cancel two — three of 
 these concerts. I am very tired. I wish rest* Why 
 not? I am have my twenty-first birthday. I am a 
 man. I know. He say it is all right. But I find 
 he have telegraph my uncle. Yesterday, when I 
 have finish my concert, someone come and tell my 
 
2o6 REAL LIFE 
 
 manager he is wanted ; on the telephone, I think, but 
 it must have been my uncle who wait outside. Then 
 the house manager come back with the money. I 
 say, 'Give to me. I will write receipt.' We do. I 
 put the money in my pocket and walk out the door 
 between the high buildings. I am running away. 
 
 "And do you know what I run away from? 
 From Boris Lazaref! I say, 'Now I will be what 
 the lady in New York call me. Bill Lawrence.' But 
 w^hen I come to the street, already I am lost. I do 
 not know which way to turn. And then the Prin- 
 cess, she save my life." 
 
 His arm came rodnd her then and she felt her- 
 self go limp. His voice had a music in it, as he 
 went on, that seemed to float her away upon a rosy 
 cloud. "We ride off in a taxi, and then we sail in 
 a boat. And I find out that the Princess is run- 
 ning away too. She run away from — from Leda 
 Swan just as I run away from Boris Lazaref. Is 
 it not so?" 
 
 She nodded her head, then let it go back against 
 his shoulder. "I didn't know it exactly, but I guess 
 it's so. I just wanted to get away by myself for a 
 little while to find out what — what real life was 
 
REVELATION 207 
 
 like ; to see if some of the things wouldn't happen to 
 me that must happen to ordinary people." 
 
 "So," Bill assented, "that is exact what I say. 
 We take Leda Swan and Boris Lazaref and we 
 squeeze them up together tight — so — and blow them 
 away — pouf — and we are left — Bill and his Prin- 
 cess, here in this big openness where real life can 
 commence. We will work no more for uncles. We 
 will send for Yakov and he shall bring my two 
 fiddles. He has always take care of me — now he 
 will take care of us both. He will make our fires, 
 cook our food, do all these things ; and we shall do 
 whatever we please." 
 
 "You can't live anywhere,'* the Princess lazily 
 objected, "without earning any money at all ! Even 
 the poor old dune-bug needs some to buy his nuts 
 with. And what would we do when it began to get 
 cold and the winter came ?" 
 
 "We shall build a little house that shall keep out 
 the cold. And the money — that is nothing. We 
 have much. When that is gone I will send Yakov to 
 the city and he shall arrange one concert and I will 
 be Boris Larazef again for one afternoon and I will 
 bring back the money and give it to you just as I 
 give it this time." 
 
2o8 REAL LIFE 
 
 She straightened her back and stared at him 
 **You don't mean," she demanded, "that you got all 
 that for playing one concert?" 
 
 He nodded. **I have told you I am the greatest 
 violinist in the world. That is what the man gave 
 me. I do not know how much it is." 
 
 "It is three thousand dollars," said the Princess. 
 "Gee whiz! that's most as much as I get in a day 
 myself!" 
 
 Bill pulled her back into his arms again. There 
 was, she felt, a tinge of impatience about the caress. 
 
 "Let us not talk about money," he said. "It is 
 Destiny that say we shall do this. It bring us here 
 together, to this paradise place, and it say, 'Now is 
 your chance — now you can begin to live.' " 
 
 "But we coukln't live together, Bill!" she pro- 
 tested. "People can't do that unless they're 
 married." 
 
 She said It simply enough, without pre-calcula- 
 tion, but under the intensity of Bill's gaze she felt 
 a bright blush tingling in her face. 
 
 "It is easy, is it not, in this country to marry? 
 There are no hard formalities. We find the right 
 sort of man, he read a few words out of a book and 
 say, *Now you are married.* We could do that this 
 
REVELATION 209 
 
 morning. Shall we not do that, Princess? And 
 then come back here and make our home?" 
 
 She was engulfed in a wave of panic. This 
 dream, it seemed, you couldn't waken yourself out 
 of with any mere shake of the head ; it kept on insist- 
 ing it was true, real, something to be grappled with, 
 something that was clutching her with a grip beyond 
 her strength to break. She wished wildly for a 
 moment that she hadn't pushed Joe overboard, that 
 she had let him come along. 
 
 She tried to reassure herself. This was only 
 Bill. It was silly to be afraid of him, yet her heart 
 was throbbing so loudly she thought it must be 
 audible to him. 
 
 She had scrambled to her feet and he had sprung 
 up too. He was looking at her as he had not looked 
 yesterday. He was trembling, too, just as she was. 
 Something was going to happen in another minute, 
 but she didn't know what 
 
 And then the silence was broken for them by 
 the sound, faint and far off somewhere among the 
 sandhills, of a tune played on a flageolet — turn turn, 
 te turn te turn — the dune-bug coming back with a 
 Wasket of dandelions! 
 
2IO REAL LIFE 
 
 The Princess uttered a wild little laugh. "We've 
 eaten every single one of his nuts, Bill ! We'll have 
 to run for our lives!" 
 
 But Bill didn't laugh. "We shall not run," he 
 said decisively. "We shall stay and talk with him. 
 We shall ask him where we must go to get mar- 
 ried. He will know." 
 
 There was something in equal parts delicious and 
 terrifying about this. He was a new Bill and no 
 mistake; no longer a boy, helpless, appealing to an 
 instinct in her which even she had recognized as half 
 maternal, but a man, quite clear as to what he 
 wanted and intent upon getting it. 
 
 The dune-bug, returning with a basketful of 
 greens and garlanded with the blossoms of the same 
 humble plant, was greeted by Bill with the same 
 ceremonious gravity that had been so effective with 
 him before, and the devastating raid upon his 
 larder was apologetically admitted ; and though the 
 dune-bug firmly rejected Bill's proposal to pay for 
 their consumption in sordid cash, it was plain that 
 the warmest good feeling prevailed both ways. 
 
 *Tt imports nothing," Bill said. "We go away, 
 we come back some time today, and when we come 
 we bring nuts — whatever you like." 
 
REVELATION 211 
 
 "Not on my account, I trust!" the bug pro- 
 tested. "I shall do perfectly well with what stores 
 I have left until my next marketing-day." 
 
 "We come back anyway," Bill informed him. 
 "We think this is the place where we are going to 
 live." Then, seeing that his host looked rather 
 thoughtful, he added, "We go a little way off. 
 There is room — not so? We make a little house, 
 but we live like you. We throw away our clothes. 
 (The Princess gasped.) We lie in the sun and I 
 play the fiddle. You will not mind that." 
 
 Impulsively the dune-bug stretched out his hand. 
 "We are twin souls," he said. "The solitude will 
 be the better for having you to share it with me. 
 But why go away at all ?" 
 
 "We must first be married," said Bill. "We 
 must go to find the right sort of man to do it. You 
 know where one is?" 
 
 "I myself," said the dune-bug politely, "would 
 be perfectly willing to perform a marriage ceremony 
 for you. But," he went on, after a silence which 
 had been punctuated by another gasp from the 
 Princess, "I do not pretend that such an act of mine 
 would have any standing whatever in the eyes of 
 society." 
 
212 REAL LIFE 
 
 "You mean," Bill inquired, "that it would not be 
 a good marriage?" 
 
 The dune-bug shrugged his shoulders. "In my 
 own opinion," he said, "it would be as good as any. 
 But I am not what you speak of as the right sort of 
 man. I see you prefer legality. Pray do not con- 
 sider my feelings in the matter. I trust I am not 
 intolerant, even of prejudice." 
 
 This took Bill a bit out of his depth, but he got 
 back presently to the main issue. 
 
 "You know where we could find a man like 
 that ?" he asked. 
 
 "I have no special knowledge," said the dune- 
 bug. "But there is a city not far from here named 
 Crown Point, which I understand specializes in 
 that industry. I cannot give you precise directions 
 to it, but I am sure that once upon the main high- 
 way, which goes roaring by not far from here, you 
 would have no difficulty finding it." 
 
 "And this road," Bill asked, "how we find that?" 
 
 The question troubled the dune-bug. "It's 
 rather intricate," he said at last. "I think it will be 
 best for me to set you on your way. Pardon me a 
 moment" 
 
REVELATION 213 
 
 Under their fascinated eyes he extracted from 
 the hollow tree-trunk a battered straw suitcase. 
 
 "I ignore civilization/' he said aphoristically, 
 "but I do not attack it When I go forth among 
 men I wear the garments which their convention 
 prescribes." 
 
 Suiting the action to the word he put on a pair 
 of sailor's duck trousers, a khaki uniform blouse, 
 buttonless, which he fastened with three safety-pins, 
 and a pair of elastic-sided shoes. 
 
 **Now I am ready," he said. 
 
 It was in a complete daze that the Princess set 
 off between her two companions. Her sole con- 
 tribution to this last scene had been the two gasps 
 above recorded. The sensation of being carried 
 along by the irresistible current of a dream out of 
 which she could not, somehow, waken herself, was 
 growing stronger and stronger all the while. There 
 was just one thing that her mind could cling to ; one 
 anchor that she could conceive as holding at all. In 
 this city of Crown Point, whither Bill and the dune- 
 bug were so relentlessly propelling her, there was 
 sure to be a telephone. She could call up Walter 
 Patrick. She didn't know what she wanted to say 
 
214 REAL LIFE 
 
 to him, but talk to him she would, and maybe his 
 
 voice would waken her out of the dream. 
 * * * 
 
 [Telegram : — Michigan City. 7 130 a. m. City 
 Editor, Chicago Tribune. Yacht has come in. 
 Parties missing but their clothes on board. Owners 
 held pending inquiries. Boy says they went ashore 
 in boat about four thirty this morning. Am taking 
 him for guide in motor car along shore road. Will 
 report all clues. Alden.] 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 THE COTTAGE 
 
 AS soon as the dune-bug had conducted Bill and 
 the Princess to where, from the crest of a little 
 hill, the highway was distinctly visible (there was 
 something wary about the way he did it, like a guide 
 pointing out a lion to a hunter on the East African 
 veldts) he took hurried leave of them. Even with 
 his clothes on he couldn't take the symptoms of civ- 
 ilization easily. They had wrung from him no 
 specific information as to the whereabouts of the 
 town where they could find the right sort of man 
 to marry them. They had not been able to persuade 
 him to guess how many miles it was. They were 
 to turn to the right, and that was all they knew. 
 
 They trudged down the immediate slope and up 
 the ensuing one in silence. The Princess, in a tangle 
 of contradictory emotions, feeling more tired and 
 bewildered every minute, stole now and then a won- 
 
 215 
 
2i6 REAL LIFE 
 
 dering glance at Bill. He had seemed until this 
 morning so soft and helpless that the change in him 
 amounted to a transfiguration. He was setting the 
 pace now, and his silence had something — not unam- 
 iable but stern about it, as of one vertebrated by an 
 inflexible resolution. 
 
 She was glad, when they reached the crest of 
 the next little hill, to be commanded by his peremp- 
 tory gesture to stop. This was, she discovered, the 
 last of the dunes. Before them lay the flat prairie 
 country, and to the left a considerable stretch of 
 the highway was before their eyes, shadeless, glar- 
 ing white. It did not at all invite the tired feet of 
 the Princess. The prospect of tramping unreckon- 
 able miles over it was almost too hard to bear. 
 When she turned to ask Bill what they were stop- 
 ping for she saw that he was listening. 
 
 ^'Automobile," he said with a satisfied nod, "and 
 coming the right way.*' 
 
 He caught her hand and started on. "If we 
 run down to the road quick, perhaps we are in time 
 to catch a ride." 
 
 But she held back. "I can't run, Bill !" she pro- 
 tested. "I am most too tired to walk." 
 
 "But if we ride we shall not have to walk V* 
 
THE COTTAGE 217 
 
 This was common sense, of course, and she was 
 mustering her resolution for the dash when the 
 thing he had heard hove in sight, and with complete 
 accord they stopped again and stared at it spell- 
 bound. 
 
 It was a motor vehicle of the most prolific and 
 widely known of all breeds. But its body was — you 
 felt it at a glance — unique. It would have had a 
 little the look of a gypsy wagon, if one could imagine 
 a clean gypsy. It had a gable roof with eaves; it 
 was painted to resemble a summer cottage, white 
 with green trim about the curtained windows; it 
 created so strongly the illusion that a summer cot- 
 tage was just in effect what it was that one won- 
 dered a little at the absence of window-boxes and 
 trailing vines of honeysuckle. 
 
 The Princess uttered an outcry of clear delight 
 at the sight of it. It was just the jolliest little thing 
 she had ever seen ! She'd tell Walter Patrick about 
 it the first chance she got and get him to write her 
 a picture around it. 
 
 She would have spoken In this tenor to Bill, but 
 the look in his face silenced her. He stood literally 
 entranced, like one who has just heard thd voice of 
 the Delphian oracle, while the cottage rolled briskly 
 
2i8 REAL LIFE 
 
 toward the point where their trail debouched into 
 the highway. Then all at once he came to, waved 
 his arms, shouted and went leaping down the hill 
 toward the highroad. 
 
 He was too far off, the Princess saw, to have 
 much chance of attracting the attention of the cot- 
 tagers, or any of intercepting them. And before he 
 had gone very far he also perceived that this was 
 true, and stopped in an attitude of extreme dejection 
 to wait for her to overtake him. 
 
 Just as she came alongside, though, he sprang 
 once more to the alert, listening again. "It have 
 stopped!" he cried, "You hear? Nothing! They 
 wait for us. It is fate, just as I have thought!" 
 
 He seized her hand and fairly dragged her out 
 of the trail and up the wooded bank to the right. 
 
 "We go this way," he explained. "It is 
 quicker." 
 
 He was mistaken about this. Shorter no doubt 
 it was, if one could have traveled by a surveyor's 
 line. But the grove of trees through which they 
 had to make their laborious way was heavily under- 
 grown and offered, besides, a little hill, the curved 
 projection of the one they had just descended, to 
 climb. There came presently to their ears however 
 
THE COTTAGE 219 
 
 the reassuring sound of voices, and Bill moderated 
 his furious pace in favor of a more silent approach. 
 
 There was no hurry. This they perceived the 
 moment they got the cottage in sight again. It had 
 pulled out upon the grass by the roadside with the 
 evident purpose of making a stay, and it looked even 
 more delectable at rest than it had in motion. They 
 had opened out the back of it, somehow, into a little 
 veranda. 
 
 *T just can't wait to see the inside of it, Bill!" 
 the Princess cried. Then, since he now was lag- 
 ging, she took his arm and added, "Come along." 
 
 But Bill stood still in his tracks. "You shall see 
 the inside," he promised her. "But first we will 
 watch a little. There is plenty of time. We sit 
 down here behind this bush where we shall see and 
 they will not notice us." 
 
 He seated himself on the ground as he said it 
 and pulled her down beside him. 
 
 "I don't get the idea !" she protested, but good- 
 humoredly enough. "What are we waiting for?" 
 
 "You see," said Bill, "they have a flat tire. It 
 will take long to fix. And it is what I thought from 
 their voices. They are cross. They fight. And 
 that is good for us, you shall see." 
 
220 REAL LIFE 
 
 How their chance of getting a Hft to Crown 
 Point — or wherever it was — was improved by the 
 crossness of the cottagers the Princess couldn't see; 
 didn't indeed feel much like trying to guess. She 
 was for the moment content to watch the little 
 scene that was playing itself out before their eyes 
 as it might have done on the stage of a theatre. 
 Patently the cottage was not at this moment the 
 abode of peace. Its occupants, husband and wife 
 apparently, were not actually doing each other vio- 
 lence, and their voices, though audible at the dis- 
 tance, did not offer an intelligible word oftener than 
 now and then, but a strong mutual exasperation was 
 revealed in every tone and gesture. Evidently that 
 punctured tire was the culmination of a long series 
 of annoyances. 
 
 The man had got the axle jacked up by now and 
 the woman was helping him, but with an air of 
 protest, to get the casing off the wheel. Presently 
 there was an accident. "Damnation!'* the man 
 roared, and sprang away, shaking his bruised fin- 
 gers. Evidently she had let the tool slip. She 
 flung it down now with a gesture of passionate 
 indignation and walked away. 
 
 The Princess giggled. It was perfectly good 
 
THE COTTAGE 221 
 
 comedy stuff. But Bill began very carefully put- 
 ting on his wig, which for coolness as they had 
 walked along, he had been carrying in his hand- 
 Then he sprang up with eyes alight. 
 
 "Give me some money/' he said. "You have 
 in your pocket — not so?" 
 
 "Why, yes," said the Princess, her mirth 
 instantly extinguished; "but — but. Bill, what are 
 you going to do with it ? How much do you want ?" 
 
 But it occurred to her then that it was all his, 
 and she put the whole roll into his outstretched hand 
 without waiting for an answer. 
 
 "You shall see," said Bill, beaming triumph. 
 "You shall wait here a little. It is better I am 
 alone." 
 
 And with that he walked briskly down the slope 
 toward the Ford cottage and its disgusted owners. 
 The Princess sat gazing thoughtfully after him. 
 
 The acrimonious cottagers had at last seen him 
 coming. The man straightened up from his tire 
 long enough to stare ; then, perceiving that his wife 
 was going to meet the newcomer, bent over it again 
 sulkily. The Princess had no more time for him. 
 Her attention riveted itself upon the woman. It was 
 easy to see that the apparition startled her. There 
 
222 REAL LIFE 
 
 was something somnambulistic about the way she 
 moved toward Bill that suggested to the Princess 
 the way Joe had first gazed at and approached her 
 on the yacht. She was reminded, too, of something 
 Bill had said about women in one of the first of their 
 conversations — about the habit they had of kissing 
 his hands. Was this woman going to try it ? She'd 
 better! She was, the Princess decided, despite her 
 trimness of waist and ankle, old, but in that period 
 of old age before one has the grace to acknowledge 
 it; thirty, if she was a day. The Princess rocked 
 forward on her knees and parted the bushes with 
 both hands in order to see better. 
 
 Bill was being introduced with a great deal of 
 ceremony to the woman's husband, and while she 
 couldn't suppress a thrill of pride in his princely air 
 — mightn't he perhaps be a prince after all as well 
 as the world's greatest violinist? — she couldn't help 
 thinking that his strategy was bad. That sulky- 
 looking man who had excused himself from shaking 
 hands apparently on the ground that his own, duly 
 exhibited, were in too much of a mess, was the per- 
 son presumably with the final say as to whether they 
 got their lift or not. Yet Bill, instead of offering to 
 help with the tire (and with those steel-strong hands 
 
THE COTTAGE 223 
 
 of his he might have helped effectively), had point- 
 edly ignored this opportunity. He turned away to 
 the woman, followed her up the veranda steps at 
 the back of the little cottage and with her disap- 
 peared inside. 
 
 The Princess scrambled to her feet and moved a 
 little nearer. Wasn't it time, in spite of Bill's wish 
 to keep her out of it, that she intervened? It might 
 make that man frightfully jealous to have his wife 
 carrying on with a casual stranger like that, though 
 certainly she wasn't attractive enough to cause any 
 worry, one would think. Mightn't it be well all 
 around if she, the Princess, went down there and 
 made up a little to the man ? Only Bill would think 
 that she had come tagging after him. So she loit- 
 ered irresolutely between an intention she could 
 avow and an emotion she would not, until, unex- 
 pectedly, the drama moved to a new phase. 
 
 The man had just finished pumping up the tire 
 when the woman emerged from the cottage, said 
 something to him with an air of brisk resolution and 
 led him away down the road. Bill now appeared on 
 the little back veranda, looked eagerly toward the 
 spot where he had left the Princess, caught sight of 
 her and joyously came running to meet her. 
 
224 REAL LIFE 
 
 It wasn't possible to resist him in that mood of 
 gaiety. She had meant to be a Httle on her dignity 
 since he had allowed himself to be carried off, as it 
 were, by another woman under her very eyes. But 
 the look of him melted all that and she met him half- 
 way. He caught her by the hand and they raced 
 to the cottage like a pair of children. 
 
 "Inside is the best of all!" he told her. "She 
 have show me how it works !" 
 
 The Princess hung back at the threshold, from a 
 feeling that entrance uninvited would be an intru- 
 sion. The thing had an intimate look, like a home — 
 a home with love built into it. There was in every 
 detail of it (for Bill had excitedly pushed her in and 
 begun an instant demonstration of its wonders) a 
 whimsical touch which managed to reconcile itself 
 with the most demure practicality. It was trans- 
 formable at will, this gaily painted little room, into 
 kitchen, bed-chamber, sitting-room. 
 
 You pulled down the lid which covered the pan- 
 try shelves to keep things in their places, and had 
 your dining-table. The bunk at the side opened out 
 ingeniously into a double bed. A trap door in the 
 floor swung up and revealed a ridiculous little round 
 bathtub attached to the frame of the car. Even a 
 
THE COTTAGE 225 
 
 prosaic thing like the sink was an enameled preserv- 
 ing-kettle suspended by its two handles and so capa- 
 ble of being emptied by tipping it over backward and 
 discharging its contents out into the road. The little 
 two-burner stove lived beneath it and swung out on 
 a rotating shelf when you wanted to cook, and then 
 swung back when you had finished and boiled the 
 water in the sink for washing dishes. And you 
 knew, somehow, that the man who made it had 
 laughed. The cottage didn't seem to belong to the 
 quarrelsome pair who were in possession, and the 
 Princess said so. 
 
 Bill's explanation showed that this was a good 
 guess. A man who lived in their town had built it ; 
 had spent a whole winter building it all with his own 
 hands, looking forward to just such a vagabond voy- 
 age as this pair had embarked upon. And then, just 
 as he had finished it, his wife had run off with 
 another man, and he had sold it to these two, who 
 weren't, it seemed, good enough sports to appreciate 
 it. 
 
 "That's the way things happen in this world, 
 isn't it !" said the Princess gravely. 
 
 Tucked away in the very back of her mind was 
 the consideration that here was a ^ood start for the 
 
226 REAL LIFE 
 
 picture she was going- to have Walter Patrick write 
 around just such a cottage as this; this very one, 
 should it prove to be procurable. But this thought 
 v/asn'l fully recognized by herself, let alone passed 
 on to Bill. 
 
 "It's a shame," she went on; "the dear little 
 place! It ought to be lived in by people that love 
 it." She sprang to a seat on the high bunk and with 
 eyes that brightened with ready tears gazed out at 
 the picturesque bit of woodland that was framed by 
 one of the curtained windows. "Wouldn't it be 
 wonderful always to be at home and yet to go wher- 
 ever you liked? Pick out a new view from your 
 veranda every night ? And if the sun began to shine 
 in too hot, move over into the shade somewhere? 
 Wouldn't that be just sweet?" 
 
 "You love it then ?" Bill asked, in that new voice 
 of his that went through her somehow, and made her 
 teeth feel as if they wanted to chatter. 
 
 "Of course I love it!" she told him. "But. ..." 
 
 "There is no 'but'!" Bill cried. "It is your 
 house, Princess!" 
 
 He snuggled up close and slipped an arm about 
 her. "I have buy it for you. I have give the woman 
 money; a thousand dollars. She make the man take 
 
THE COTTAGE 227 
 
 it now. They go away, then we will be by ourself. 
 
 We drive to Crown Point. We marry. Then the 
 
 uncles can say nothing. We go where we please. 
 
 We come back here to the sand, we go to California, 
 
 it is all the same. — You cry because you are happy 
 
 — not so?" 
 
 * * * 
 
 [Telegram : Borden, care Western Union, Crown 
 Point. Have seen man who gave them breakfast 
 who says they are on way to Crown Point with in- 
 tent to marry. Still dressed sailor's clothes. Girl 
 may be wearing boy's wig. My informant a little 
 insane but honest. Alden] 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 THE VAMPIRE 
 
 THE PRINCESS couldn't for the life of her 
 have told whether she was crying because she 
 was happy in the possession of Bill and this darling 
 little house and the prospect of a position within the 
 stronghold of matrimony whence mothers and uncles 
 could be defied to the end of time, or because of the 
 sensation that she was slipping helplessly down a 
 glacis into an unfathomable abyss. She felt both 
 ways about it, not only in alternation but 
 simultaneously. 
 
 But it seemed not to matter how she felt, because 
 inexorably, for the next half-dozen hours or so, the 
 logic of events pushed her along. 
 
 The woman (their name was Jenkins)' presently 
 brought back her husband, acquiescent in but clearly 
 unenthusiastic over Bill's bargain. The Princess 
 was duly presented and, she felt, unduly stared at. 
 
 228 
 
THE VAMPIRE 229 
 
 The inappropriateness of her attire seemed to shock 
 Mrs. Jenkins, who led her forthwith into the cottage 
 and suppHed her with the articles which modesty 
 most clearly required, a skirt and a pair of stock- 
 ings, and also a sun-hat of untrimmed straw. 
 
 The skirt was a horrible affair of faded green- 
 ish-yellow plaid, too long, too full and a good two 
 inches too big in the band. She felt like a guy in 
 it, and it was evident from Bill's expression when he 
 first caught sight of her descending the back steps 
 of the cottage that it affected him as painfully as it 
 did her. He said, as he walked beside her toward 
 the bank where the man was waiting (the woman 
 had stayed inside to pack) : 
 
 "As soon as they are gone you shall take it off 
 again. It is hideous !" 
 
 "As soon as we get to a town that has any sort 
 of stores in it," the Princess retorted, "I'm going to 
 borrow some money from you and buy some decent 
 clothes ! But you'll have to stand me like this until 
 then ; this was the best thing the old cat would let me 
 have." 
 
 The one emotion she was unequivocally sure of 
 just then was that she hated that woman. She de- 
 cided that she rather liked the man. In a philo- 
 
230 REAL LIFE 
 
 sophic, humorous way he talked to her and Bill, 
 while they sat on the bank by the roadside waiting 
 for the woman to finish packing, about their misad- 
 ventures with the cottage. 
 
 The cottage itself was perfectly all right, he said, 
 and the car, too, for that matter; it must be since it 
 was quite new — a little too new perhaps for all the 
 adjustments to be just right. The trouble was that 
 he was a mechanical idiot and had been helpless in 
 the face of difficulties that an average man would 
 have made nothing of. They wouldn't have any 
 trouble, he was sure. And even if they did, his view 
 of the matter was, what were the odds ? They could 
 be perfectly comfortable, so far as that went, any- 
 where they happened to be. Mabel, to be sure (this 
 must be his wife), didn't look at things in quite the 
 same way. She was a person with definite ideas, 
 and if she'd got set on camping for the night in a 
 certain spot on the map, she felt disappointed if they 
 didn't get there. Quite right, too. It was all a 
 question of how you looked at it. 
 
 "I drove a Ford in a picture once," the Princess 
 remarked, "so I suppose I'd get along all right as 
 long as it ran. But if anything went wrong. . ." 
 
 "I don't believe anything will go wrong," Mr. 
 
THE VAMPIRE 231 
 
 Jenkins interrupted earnestly, "unless just possibly 
 the carburetor needs a little looking into. Prob- 
 ably your..." He broke off for a glance at Bill 
 and looked hastily away again. You could see that 
 Bill was a mechanical idiot as easily as if it had been 
 written all over him in indelible ink. Jenkins backed 
 up for a fresh start. "Certainly at the next town 
 you could get any necessary adjustments made in 
 any garage." 
 
 "But we may never get to the next town!" the 
 Princess cried. Then : "You and your wife will 
 ride with us as far as Crown Point, won't you? Oh, 
 of course you will ! I don't believe it's out of your 
 way a bit, but even if it is — you'd do that much for 
 — for us — wouldn't you?" 
 
 The Princess meant no harm — as God was her 
 judge she meant nothing at all! — by the instinctive 
 gesture which had accompanied this request. Her 
 hand, adventuring out toward him, while the bright 
 gaze of her eyes held his, had come to rest for just 
 an instant upon his knee. That was absolutely all. 
 
 But the man, with a jerk as if the contact had 
 burnt him, snatched himself away, and his eyes, full 
 of guilty panic, flew around toward the cottage 
 window. The glance of the Princess followed 
 
23C2 > REAL LIFE 
 
 quickly enough to see the curtain pulled sharply 
 across the pane. 
 
 "I don't believe," poor Jenkins faltered miser- 
 ably, "that that was exactly Mabel's idea. You see, 
 there's an interurban station on the electric line that 
 we passed just a little way back on the road, and she 
 thought we'd better walk back to that. But here 
 she comes now. Perhaps if you were to ask her. . . " 
 
 Here she did come, for a fact, but no one in his 
 senses wotfld have ventured, just then, to ask her 
 anything that had the color of a favor. She was 
 dressed concisely in her most urban clothes. She 
 had a suitcase in each hand (she had packed for her 
 husband as well as for herself), and upon her brow 
 there sat a resolution that was simply adamantine. 
 
 "We'll start now, Julius," she said. At the 
 Princess she merely looked. (She hadn't even a 
 glance for poor stricken Bill. Her first view of the 
 shameless little baggage Boris Lazaref was travel- 
 ing with had reduced his romantic image to dust. ) 
 
 But the Princess was not to be so easily demol- 
 ished. She turned her back upon the wife and stood 
 face to face with the husband. "You'll have to show 
 me how the car starts," she said. "I don't know one 
 thing about the machinery." 
 
THE VAMPIRE 233 
 
 "Julius !" said the woman ; but he, under the fire 
 of the Princess's eyes, mustered up courage to 
 answer her. 
 
 "Well, she's right, my dear — about this, anyhow. 
 We did sell the thing to them as a going concern. 
 It's only fair that I should get it going if I can." 
 
 He walked round with the Princess to the front 
 of the car, the woman putting down her bags in the 
 road and following, ostentatiously upon the watch. 
 
 The provocation, it may be admitted-, was great. 
 Still, the Princess's behavior during the next few 
 minutes was indefensible. She herself, when she 
 had time to reflect upon it, was shocked, almost in- 
 credulous. For to put it bluntly, she attempted to 
 vamp poor Julius; to wreck a home! And from the 
 most feline of motives, too : to inflict suffering upon 
 a virtuous member of her own sex who held her in 
 disdain. 
 
 She mounted to the driver's seat of the car and 
 for an opening maneuver falsely professed a total 
 ignorance of all levers, pedals and keys within reach. 
 She refused to be instructed except by tactile meth- 
 ods. Neither hand nor foot could find its place until 
 Julius had taken hold of it and put it there. She con- 
 trived two or three times, in a flagrantly factitious 
 
234 REAL LIFE 
 
 manner, to squeeze his hand. But the technique of 
 that sort of performance doesn't need elaboration ; it 
 is familiar to all. 
 
 "Oh, be a sport," the Princess murmured, "and 
 come along with us ; anyhow, as far as Crown Point. 
 She'll come if you do. She and Bill can be company 
 for each other inside while you go on teaching me to 
 drive." 
 
 Lip-reading may have been one of Mabel's ac- 
 complishments, or her sense of hearing unusually 
 acute. She'd been staring all the while, not indeed 
 with the sort of look usually described as melting, 
 but with one which might almost have been expected 
 to have that effect upon the windshield. Now with 
 a passionate gesture she turned, seized one of the 
 suitcases and started away in the direction from 
 which the car had come. 
 
 Julius gazed after her a moment in horror ; then 
 with one brusque movement he disentangled himself 
 from his Delilah and sprang into the road. 
 
 But instantly, indomitably, she followed him, 
 snatched up his suitcase and flung it rather at ran- 
 dom into the interior of the cottage, where unluckily 
 it collided with the shins of poor Bill, who during 
 
THE VAMPIRE 235 
 
 the whole of this episode had been perched in a cor- 
 vine manner upon the bunk. 
 
 "Crank up the car," she commanded excitedly, 
 "and we'll go back for her." And she added, as he 
 stood there miserably dubious, "You've got to start 
 the car before you can go !" 
 
 He rushed round to the crank and desperately — 
 once, twice, thrice he turned it with no results save 
 the familiar, futile cough of a sulky or impotent 
 motor. 
 
 "I'm afraid I can't start it," he admitted at last, 
 "You see, I didn't turn it off. It died all by itself 
 just when the tire went flat. It's nothing. It can't 
 be anything, except perhaps the carburetor. Per- 
 haps if you spun it, round and round, you know, it 
 would start ; but I've been warned not to do that be- 
 cause a backfire would break my wrist. I'm s- 
 sorry," he stammered, his face glistening with the 
 sweat of shame, "but — but I'm afraid I must go 
 after my wife." 
 
 With that, avoiding the Princess's devastating 
 eye, he slunk around to the back of the car, received 
 his suitcase from the ready hand of Bill and went off 
 up the road at a labored canter. 
 
 There is nothing less likely to put one in an 
 
236 REAL LIFE 
 
 amiable temper than attempting to be wicked and 
 not succeeding. There was lightning in the air, and 
 it had to find a mark somewhere. 
 
 "Idiot!" the Princess stormed at Bill. "What 
 did you give him his bag for? If you'd just had 
 gumption enough to hang on to that we could have 
 kept him cranking until the beastly engine started !" 
 
 "I am glad he go," Bill retorted morosely. "I 
 have enough of your pretend driving lessons. I 
 would not keep him back." 
 
 "All right, then," said the Princess, "if you feel 
 that way about him come out and crank it up your- 
 self." 
 
 She weakened a little at the sight of him. A 
 man simply hadn't any right to look as beautiful as 
 that! But she braced herself and pointed implacably 
 at the dangling iron handle. 
 
 "Princess," he somberly demanded of her, "do 
 you think it is accurse, this house? You know the 
 man who make it, his wife run away. And those 
 two who buy it of him, it' is nothing with them but 
 fight all day long. And now we begin. Is it to be 
 with us like that?" 
 
 "Oh, I guess not," said the Princess, trying not 
 to be impressed. "We'll be all right when we get 
 
THE VAMPIRE 237 
 
 started. Come along; let's see if we can't make it 
 go. 
 
 She caught him stealing a look of aversion at 
 the crank, and certainly he moved no nearer it. 
 
 "Why should we hurry to get on ?" he asked. "I 
 think that Julius have the right philosophy. We 
 can be happy here — not so? We have our house. 
 We have this nice place. Sometime a man come 
 along and help, then we make the engine go." 
 
 A destructive conviction was forming itself in 
 the Princess's mind. "You were in all sorts of a 
 hurry to get to Crown Point a few minutes ago/* 
 she argued. "Now you want to stay forever out 
 here in the middle of nowhere. Why should anyone 
 help us if we don't try to help ourselves?" And 
 then the real question, point blank : "Are you going 
 to crank it up, Bill, or aren't you?" 
 
 That smoked him out of his defenses. "No!" he 
 cried. "I will not. You hear him say it break the 
 wrist. If it break my wrist I am ruin for life. I 
 can never play the fiddle again. I will not risk that 
 for a hundred such houses." 
 
 "Not even," observed the Princess dryly, "to 
 marry me. All right, then, I will do it myself." 
 
 She gripped the handle and pulled it around; 
 
238 REAL LIFE 
 
 again and then again and then again. Bill mean- 
 while wrung his precious hands together, snatched 
 off his wig and gripped it into a ball (a painless 
 equivalent to tearing one's hair, the Princess noted), 
 and finally, learning the futility of entreaties, of 
 prohibition and of such poor manifestations of force 
 as were at his command, he cried out that he couldn't 
 endure the sight and rushed into the cottage through 
 the little front door beside the driver's seat, slam- 
 ming it after him. 
 
 "Oh, damn! — damn! — damn!" sobbed the Prin- 
 cess after every futile effort. She had never es- 
 sayed profanity before and she got poor comfort out 
 of it. Sweat and tears flowed indistinguishably 
 down her face, and she stopped at last even trying 
 to wipe them away with the sleeve of her middy 
 blouse. 
 
 But she stuck to the crank after all hope of suc- 
 ceeding was gone. She stuck even when her ears 
 brought the hope of a rescue : the sound of a car 
 coming down the road; the sound of it stopping in 
 a cloud of dust beside her; the sound of a big, nice, 
 comfortable bass voice saying, "Can't I help you 
 out ? You certainly seem to be up against it !" 
 
 Here was the sort of man — this was the shatter- 
 
THE VAMPIRE 239 
 
 ing idea which sprang upon the Princess when at 
 that she turned and looked up at him — here was the 
 sort of man to go a-vagabonding with ; somebody 
 strong and kind ! He must be kind to have stopped, 
 because he couldn't possibly in the circumstances 
 have seen that she was pretty, or even guessed. 
 
 "There must be something the matter with the 
 engine," she said breathlessly, "because it won't go 
 for cranking. I've been trying for 'most an hour." 
 
 "You poor kid !" he rumbled. Then, looking at 
 her in a manner meditative at first, but growing 
 from moment to moment more intense, he began and 
 abandoned in the middle half a dozen questions, each 
 apparently blown to pieces by the cogency of its suc- 
 cessor. "What. . . .You aren't. . , .Where are you 
 .... Who . . . Why ..." Then he laughed a big 
 laugh at himself and said he'd rescue her first and 
 try to get his mind unscrambled afterward. 
 
 "There's one question, though, that I always ask 
 before I go to work on a dead motor, and that is, 
 how much gas have you in the tank?" 
 
 Upon her admitting that she hadn't the least idea, 
 he investigated. "Bone dry!" he pronounced. 
 "Well, I've got a five-gallon can in my car that I 
 
240 REAL LIFE 
 
 can spare as well as not. That'll take you to your 
 next stop if it isn't too far." 
 
 It would be ungracious, she perceived, not to 
 treat this as a question, so she mentioned the name 
 of the only town hereabouts that she knew. Crown 
 Point. He blinked at that and visibly held back 
 another flight of questions. Then he got into 
 action again, emptied his can into her tank and after 
 a glance at spark and throttle, turned the engine 
 over and got a welcome roar for a response. 
 
 The Princess, however, was conscious of a pang 
 of disappointment. He looked so nice and he 
 seemed so safe and dependable — it was sad that they 
 must part with no better acquaintance than this. 
 Yet the two chugging motors, pointing in opposite 
 directions, seemed to forbid delay. He shared her 
 reluctance, though, she thought ; at all events, he had 
 the air of waiting for something. 
 
 Then, with a pang of embarrassment, it broke 
 over her. Gasoline cost a fabulous amount of money 
 these days. He was waiting to be paid. And the 
 only money in the world that she could command 
 was in Bill's pocket. And where was Bill ? She had 
 managed, in the past few minutes, to forget his very 
 existence! 
 
THE VAMPIRE 241 
 
 "I'll have to go into the house a minute to get 
 you the money," she explained. 
 
 "Oh, please don't mind about that !" he cried, as 
 overwhelmed by the thought of it as she had been. 
 "Really, I wasn't waiting to be paid. But if you'd 
 just let me have a look inside ; because it's the jolli- 
 est thing I ever saw." 
 
 It was not a request possible to refuse, so she 
 nodded a speechless assent and, leading the way 
 around to the veranda, where the steps were, went 
 in ahead. Bill was in there, just as she had supposed 
 he must be, sitting cross-legged on the bunk^ look- 
 ing, without his wig, more like the Raven — in the 
 act of saying, "Nevermore!" — than he had even 
 when she had heaved Julius's suitcase at his legs. 
 
 Turning to reassure, as best she could, their 
 guest, the Princess saw him standing on the step 
 gazing in with the look of one who has been pre- 
 vailed upon to bite into a ripe olive just plucked 
 from the tree. She whipped round again upon Bill. 
 
 "Will you give me some money," she said icily, 
 "to pay for the gasoline ?" 
 
 Bill snatched the whole roll from his pocket and 
 thrust it into her hand. "I have no use," he said. 
 
242 REAL LIFE 
 
 "Take all." And since this was the quickest thing to 
 do she did it. 
 
 Outside — for the good Samaritan hadn't fol- 
 lowed her in — she asked him how much it was. 
 
 "One dollar and fifty cents," he told her crisply, 
 and made change with equanimity for the twenty she 
 tendered him. 
 
 "Thank you very, very much," she ventured. 
 
 "Don't mention it," he replied with dignity, and 
 climbed into his car. 
 
 The Princess mounted her own driving-seat, 
 made expert play of her pedals and, only a moment 
 later than her rescuer, was speeding away in the 
 opposite direction, toward, she assumed, Crown 
 Point. 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 OUT OF THE LOOKING-GLASS 
 
 THE PRINCESS'S intention during that twenty- 
 mile drive, even when a row of cottages along 
 the road and discontinuous patches of sidewalk indi- 
 cated that they had pretty nearly reached the end of 
 it, was perfectly ambiguous. If some supernatural 
 messenger had confronted her at any stage of it with 
 the question "What are you going to Crown Point 
 forf" she'd have been utterly at a loss for an answer. 
 She'd have denied, I think, that she meant either to 
 desert Bill or to marry him. And yet the one thing 
 that she was avowedly determined upon was that she 
 wouldn't drift along with him any farther like this. 
 Something was going to happen when they got to 
 Crown Point — so much she knew. 
 
 She couldn't have remained thus precariously 
 balanced upon the needlepoint of a paradox for a 
 good hour and a half if she hadn't been driving the 
 
 243 
 
244 REAL LIFE 
 
 car herself. The task involved in keeping a grip 
 upon that squirming wheel, and a bright lookout for 
 shell-holes in the falsely smooth-looking white sur- 
 face of that worn macadam road, kept the rigorously 
 analytical processes of self-scrutiny in abeyance. 
 
 She soon got over being mad at Bill. She'd been 
 completely furious with him of course when she 
 sprang to the wheel and drove away from that dis- 
 illusioned good Samaritan. After a mile or two 
 he had come clambering over the back of the seat 
 from the interior of the cottage and without a word 
 huddled down beside her. For another mile after 
 that she neither spoke to nor looked at him. 
 
 He had failed her lamentably, there was no get- 
 ting away from that. He had allowed her to run a 
 risk which she had forced him to admit he was afraid 
 to assume himself, and in the interest of their com- 
 mon good at that. He had been afraid to crank the 
 car that was to start them on their wedding journey! 
 
 Could you imagine Richard Barthelmess or 
 Earle Williams, or even a foreigner like Sessue 
 Hayakawa, doing a thing like that? Could you 
 imagine any sort of hero, even the most equivocal — 
 anyone, indeed, short of an ignominious villain- 
 being guilty of such an act? No; you couldn't. 
 
OUT OF THE LOOKING-GLASS 245 
 
 Her own derelictions in trying to vamp poor 
 Julius didn't justify him in the least — they made it 
 all the more imperative that he be noble and mag- 
 nanimous. Poor Bill had made the great refusal, 
 there was no getting away from that. And yet . . . 
 
 He sat so still that at last she stole a glance at 
 him and was reminded poignantly of a moment, 
 ages ago, there in the shrubbery in Jackson Park, 
 when she had told him he must let her think. His 
 attitude now and the solemn, scared look in his face 
 made him seem once more like a little boy ; one who 
 has misbehaved at a party and is being taken home 
 to be spanked. She looked away from him hastily 
 and fixed her eyes upon the road again. 
 
 He must have felt the glance, although he hadn't 
 turned to meet it, for now he cuddled a little closer 
 and laid his hand upon her knee. For another mile 
 she ignored this approach; then momentarily she 
 yielded to the extent of taking one of her hands 
 from the wheel and laying it upon his. But as she 
 found herself going limp at that, she quickly took it 
 away again, straightened up and gave the car a little 
 more gas. 
 
 "You'll have to move farther away. Bill," she 
 said. **I can't drive like this." 
 
246 REAL LIFE 
 
 Meekly he did precisely what he was told and 
 from then on, though there were no more caresses, 
 there was no longer between them the sense that 
 they were quarreling. They chatted intermittently 
 over the minor incidents of the drive, and especially 
 found amusement in the sensation which the appear- 
 ance of their moving house created whenever they 
 passed through a hamlet or encountered another 
 vehicle on the road. 
 
 Bill, the Princess was aware, would have liked 
 to stop. He made some tentative remarks about 
 being hungry and thought she must be in need of a 
 little rest. But she ignored these suggestions — for 
 stopping, she knew, would bring matters to some 
 sort of head — and he did not press them. 
 
 So it came about that when they found them- 
 selves rolling down a brick-paved hill into a good- 
 looking little rural city, which, they took it for 
 granted, was Crown Point, their affair was really 
 no farther advanced than it had been when they took 
 leave of the dune-bug. 
 
 They had, however, got to the point, in the heart 
 of the town, where further postponement was no 
 longer possible. The Princess ran the cottage up to 
 the curb and stopped. 
 
OUT OF THE LOOKING-GLASS 247 
 
 Catacomer, in the middle of a square, tree-plant- 
 ed lawn, stood an imposing — relatively imposing,, 
 anyhow — public building of some sort with a high 
 basement and columns, a political sort of dome and 
 a broad flight of stone steps leading monumentally 
 up to the entrance on the first floor. 
 
 The streets bounding the square in which it stood 
 were built up solidly with shops — bright, good-look- 
 ing shops with a really imposing luster of plate-glass 
 and electric signs. 
 
 The building before which their little cottage 
 had so incongruously stopped was a veritable de- 
 partment store, and the frocks, shoes and hats dis- 
 played in its windows had a metropolitan air which 
 brought vividly to the Princess's consciousness the 
 indubitable fact that she looked a fright. 
 
 Meanwhile a crowd had gathered around the 
 cottage. A wild-beast wagon strayed from a circus 
 parade wouldn't have provoked more curiosity. 
 Three, four, five deep, both sexes, all ages, the citi- 
 zens gathered, staring, the Princess felt, insuj>- 
 portably. 
 
 Bill didn't seem to mind a bit. Why, he hadn't 
 even bothered to put on his wig! He just sat there 
 looking about with a mild curiosity of his own. 
 
248 REAL LIFE 
 
 "This is the place, I think," he said to the Prin- 
 cess. Then, giving" her no warning of his intention, 
 he turned to the nearest of the spectators, a man who 
 had been crowded forward until his face wasn't 
 three feet from Bill's own. "You can tell us, per- 
 haps," he said, "where we go to get married?" 
 
 "Why," said the stranger, recovering from his 
 start at being addressed like that, "there's the court- 
 house right across the street." 
 
 Bill wanted to be sure he understood. "You get 
 married at a courthouse?" he asked. 
 
 "You get a license at the courthouse," his infor- 
 mant explained; "at the coimty clerk's office. 
 When you get a license you can get married by who- 
 ever you like ; any preacher or justice of the peace. 
 For that matter, the court is sitting today and I 
 guess the judge himself would marry you if you 
 asked him." 
 
 "All right," said Bill, turning back to the Prin- 
 cess; "we go now and get married all in the same 
 place — not so? — by the judge." 
 
 "Bill," she said desperately, "you know what I 
 told you about clothes. I just can't get married — 
 anyway — looking like this. I want to go right into 
 this store and get something fit to wear." 
 
OUT OF THE LOOKING-GLASS 249 
 
 He was perfectly agreeable to this idea and vol- 
 unteered to come along and help with the selection. 
 To this she said "No!" so resolutely that she made 
 him blink. 
 
 "You couldn't really help — because I'd have to 
 be trying on. And anyway, somebody's got to stay 
 here and watch the cottage." 
 
 He must still have been feeling very meek, for 
 he offered no answer to either of these easily de- 
 structible argfuments. All he said was that he hoped 
 it wouldn't take long. She was reminded again, by 
 the scared look in his eyes, how he hated to be left 
 alone. 
 
 "No," she faltered; "it won't take very long — 
 I— I don't think." 
 
 With that she slipped down into the road and 
 around the back end of the cottage, and squirmed 
 through the crowd on the sidewalk into the store. 
 
 She hadn't as yet made her choice. She wasn't 
 even facing the fact that the choice must be made 
 now, in this hour, between a lifetime with Bill and 
 one without him. She needed clothes, whatever she 
 was going to do. Nobody could deny that. 
 
 Shoes first; it was queer how those flapping 
 sneakers demoralized her! And of course you 
 
250 REAL LIFE 
 
 couldn't tell how any sort of garment looked, even 
 the simplest little suit, until you saw it pedestaled 
 upon properly clad feet and legs. Black would do 
 all right for both. She didn't, heaven knew, want 
 to be any more conspicuous than necessary. 
 
 Equipped with these indispensables she went up- 
 stairs to the suit department and found with very 
 little trouble something that would do quite well : a 
 snug little sport suit of blue jersey cloth that might 
 almost have been made for her. The selection of a 
 hat was a matter of more difficulty, for most of the 
 things they showed her had a fixed-up look she 
 didn't care for. But she bought at last, since it 
 really looked rather nice and would do equally well 
 for motoring or for riding in the train, a floppy blue 
 silk tam-o'-shanter. 
 
 She went straight on after that, swiftly like a 
 hound upon the scent, accumulating the remaining 
 items she needed — a sport shirt; silk gloves; a 
 leather vanity-case, equipped. 
 
 And then, complete at last, she paused for a final 
 inspection before a floor-length mirror. She'd been 
 looking in mirrors all along of course, to get the 
 effect of the various garments she was purchasing. 
 Now it was the ensemble merely — in other words. 
 
OUT OF THE LOOKING-GLASS 251 
 
 herself — at which she was looking, and herself look- 
 ing back at her out of the mirror. 
 
 Leda Swan, authentic, unmistakable! Leda 
 Swan of Hollywood! — missing, frantically searched 
 for of course ! She must telephone at once ! What 
 in the world had she been thinking of all this while I 
 She must get to Chicago! She must, if possible, 
 talk to Walter Patrick ; tell him where she was ! 
 
 A vision of Bill suddenly possessed her: Bill, 
 patiently guarding their future home ; that cottage — 
 that sweet little cottage — she wanted so much to 
 make a picture of; that cottage out there in the 
 street surrounded by a crowd ten deep. 
 
 Oh, it was ridiculous; not only the cottage — 
 Julius and Mabel — the dune-bug — the yacht — Joe, 
 whom she'd pushed off into the water. It was a 
 dream, that's what it was ; a perfectly frantic dream. 
 
 All but Bill. Bill wouldn't be dissolved that way. 
 Bill was waiting. 
 
 But was he? It wasn't like him to wait very 
 long. More probably he was right here in the store, 
 wandering around looking for her. At any second, 
 around any corner, he might appear. 
 
 She blinked and shook her head in the effort to 
 
2Sit REAL LIFE 
 
 rouse herself out of this trance into which the sight 
 of Leda Swan in the mirror had plunged her. 
 
 Others besides herself, shoppers and salespeople, 
 had identified her — were staring, nudging, whis- 
 pering. She fled for refuge to a floorwalker, a 
 rather nice-looking young man in a cutaway coat 
 
 "I want to telephone," she said. "Where's the 
 nearest, quickest place where I can telephone — ^to 
 Chicago?" 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 THE FIFTH REEL 
 
 ^ I *HAT last Specification put him off, checked in 
 •*• the middle a rather Delsartian gesture toward 
 the telephone booth and caused him to blush. 
 
 "Oh," he said, "you'll have to go to the telq)hone 
 exchange two blocks up Main Street for that." 
 
 "I won't go out on the street !" said the Princess 
 passionately. *T want to telephone now, from here. 
 Do you — do you — know who I am ?" 
 
 "Oh, yes, Miss Swan," he said huskily and went 
 on to assure her that she was welcome to telephone 
 from the office upstairs. 
 
 He led her, not to the elevator as she had hoped 
 (because in an elevator you are comparatively safe 
 from a chance encounter with a person like Bill), 
 but down the main aisle to the back of the store, up a 
 broad flight of stairs to where, on a sort of mezza- 
 nine, were the offices. Everybody up here was very 
 nice to her and of course polite no end. 
 
 253 
 
254 REAL LIFE 
 
 After she had told the telephone operator that 
 she wanted to talk to her suite in the Congress 
 Hotel and to Mr. Walter Patrick, if he was there, 
 they showed her into the private office of the pro- 
 prietor, who was out of town for the day, and told 
 her she could wait here until her call came through, 
 and talk from here at the desk instrument when it 
 did. 
 
 It was very quiet and comfortable with no one 
 to stare at her and nothing to be apprehended from 
 Bill, and she just sat and waited, until the bell rang, 
 without an idea what she should say. She discov- 
 ered that her hand was trembling, though, when she 
 reached out to unhook the receiver; and when, in 
 response to her "Hello!" Walter Patrick's unmis- 
 takable voice answered with a steady, "Is that you. 
 Princess ?" the trembling got a whole lot worse and 
 crept into her voice, so that after she'd said, "Yes," 
 she added, " — and I'm perfectly safe and all right.'* 
 
 He said, at that, "Thank God!" in a way that 
 brought a lump into her throat. 
 
 "Did I frighten you horribly?" she asked, in a 
 wave of the first real contrition she'd felt. 
 
 He said he didn't mind admitting it now, though 
 he'd spent the night assuring the others that she'd 
 
THE FIFTH REEL 255 
 
 turn up somewhere, safe and sound, no matter what 
 had happened to her. — By the way, where was 
 she? 
 
 "Crown Point," she told him, and since it 
 seemed, from the way he said "What?" that he 
 couldn't catch the name of the place, she added that 
 it was the town where people came to get married. 
 And so completely was she absorbed in the man she 
 was talking to that even this explanation was made 
 without rousing a thought of the man whom she had 
 left waiting in the cottage. 
 
 But the way Walter Patrick took it, waked her 
 up. "Princess," he said, — quietly enough but with 
 an edge in it that brought the color flooding into 
 her face — "you haven't married anyone — have 
 you?" 
 
 "No !" she cried. "Of course not !" 
 
 "And you aren't going to marry anyone, are 
 you, within the next couple of hours ? Not before I 
 can get down to you ? I'll come just as fast as a car 
 can take me." 
 
 Just the mere size and density of the lump in her 
 throat kept her from answering this question until 
 after an agonized little silence he had repeated, "You 
 won't, will you, Princess ?" 
 
256 REAL LIFE 
 
 "Of course not !" she cried once more. "I'm not 
 going to marry anyone at all. I'm coming back to 
 Chicago just as quickly as I can." 
 
 He surprised her by demurring to that. "I'd 
 rather come and get you," he said, and took a few 
 seconds of silence to think something out. "Your 
 mother's getting in this morning," he added; 
 "should be here now, but her train's late." 
 
 For some reason, obscure to herself, the Princess 
 laughed. "All right," she said. "I'll wait here. Do 
 you want me to go to the hotel ?" 
 
 His answer was emphatic that he did not. "And 
 I'd like," he went on, "to get you out of that whole 
 damned town just as quickly as possible. If you 
 could drive somewhere to meet me. . .Listen, Prin- 
 cess, I'll tell you just what to do." 
 
 She said, "Wait a minute, Walter. There's so 
 much noise out in the hall that I can't hear." 
 
 A hasty hand just then snatched the wrong jack 
 out of its socket in a telephone exchange somewhere 
 along the route, and Walter Patrick was again a 
 hundred miles away. The Princess jiggled her hook 
 impatiently. He hadn't told her yet what he wanted 
 her to do. No use; she couldn't raise anybody. 
 
THE FIFTH REEL 257 
 
 She'd hang up the receiver for a few minutes and 
 then try again. 
 
 Her Hps were touched with a faint reflective 
 smile. Calling him Walter like that was almost as 
 funny as her having laughed just now when he spoke 
 of her mother, or his having sworn an outspoken 
 **damn" in a conversation with her. 
 
 It didn't seem to be quieting down much out 
 there in the store. Somebody with heavy feet was 
 clumping up the steel-shod stairs. She heard a door 
 flung open and then a big voice asked: 
 
 *Ts there anyone in here who answers to the 
 name of Princess?" 
 
 Now, so far as anything about her could be pri- 
 vate and personal, that name was. It was known, I 
 suppose, to several thousand persons, but it didn't 
 get into print. So her response to it was automatic. 
 She jumped up, opened the door and went out into 
 the corridor, saying to the first man she saw — a big 
 bony person in a blue-serge suit — "Does anyone 
 want me ?" 
 
 By this time an explanation had occurred to her. 
 Walter Patrick had himself succeeded in re-estab- 
 lishing the connection and had asked for her by that 
 
258 REAL LIFE 
 
 name to avoid causing a riot. So she added to the 
 big man, "On the telephone, or anything?" 
 
 The big man blinked at her, as people nearly al- 
 ways did when they came upon her unexpectedly, 
 and asked in a startled way, "Is your name 
 Princess?" 
 
 She nodded, and asked, as the ring of spectators 
 crowded up, "Can't I talk to him from the little of- 
 fice back here where I was ?" 
 
 "I haven't got him with me," said the big man. 
 "He's locked up over at the jail, but he was carrying 
 on so for somebody he called the Princess that I 
 came over on a wild-goose chase, you might call it, 
 to see if I could find her. That was the only name 
 we could get out of him." 
 
 She gazed up at him, wide-eyed, and gulped. 
 "The jail !" she echoed. "Who's in jail ?" 
 
 "Oh, a queer-looking young fellow with a shaved 
 head. Came into town a while ago in a contraption 
 that was a sort of moving house; took up half the 
 street. Do you know him?" 
 
 She acknowledged in a daze that she did — an 
 answer which seemed to perturb somewhat the offi- 
 cer of the law. 
 
 "Well, then," he suggested dubiously, "perhaps 
 
THE FIFTH REEL 259 
 
 you wouldn't mind coming along with me and tell- 
 ing the chief what you know about him. Maybe 
 you can quiet him down, too. He's been lashing out 
 like a wildcat at anybody who came near him. 
 Talking some sort of cat language, too, Russian, I 
 guess. We wouldn't have locked him in the cell if 
 he'd have kept quiet." 
 
 "I'll come," the Princess said, speaking in a sort 
 of spiritual vacuum. Nightmares again! This 
 couldn't really be happening to her! 
 
 The policeman took her, gently for him, by the 
 arm and partly by main force, partly by the weight 
 of authority, forced a passage for them through the 
 swiftly gathering throng, down the stairs, down the 
 aisle, down the street, not very far, thank heaven, to 
 a modest little building that nestled in the court- 
 house square, under the wing of its imposing neigh- 
 bor; through a door into a sort of office where 
 another big man with a gold star got up and ex- 
 changed cryptic utterances with her guardian; and 
 then, the accompanying crowd pressed back, down 
 a corridor to a steel-barred door with a little window 
 in it through which, they indicated to her, she was 
 to look. 
 
 It was Bill, of course, that they had in there. 
 
26o REAL LIFE 
 
 The faint, forlorn hope that the wildcat prisoner 
 would turn out to be somebody else got its coup de 
 grace. It had never been really alive. 
 
 He was sitting on the edge of the bunk, his dis- 
 heveled wig a little awry, his head buried in his 
 hands. She tried to call his name, but the voice 
 wouldn't come. She found she couldn't see him 
 very well. Things were beginning to turn black. 
 Then she felt a steadying arm thrown around her 
 and found herself being carried away. 
 
 She was tilted back in a swivel chair by an open 
 window when things began coming clear again, and 
 she W2iS just in time to save herself from having a 
 glassful of water dashed into her face by uttering 
 an eager "No; I'm all right!" The next moment, 
 sitting a little straighter, she asked, "Did I really 
 faint?" She felt rather pleased about this. She'd 
 never done it before. 
 
 They were as nice as they could be, these two 
 policemen. They'd driven the rest of the crowd 
 away, outside a wooden rail. 
 
 "You just take it easy," the gold-star policeman 
 said, "and evei-ything will come out all right." 
 Then a little diffidently he added a question. "You 
 are Miss Leda Svran, aren't you ?" 
 
pq 
 
THE FIFTH REEL 261 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 "Well, well, well!" said the big policeman, imr 
 mensely pleased. "This will be a story to tell my 
 wife. I never thought to really meet you yourself, 
 let alone like this." 
 
 She was feeling pretty weak and tremulous. 
 Her eyes blurred with tears. If she could just be let 
 alone, stop existing altogether, until Walter Pat- 
 rick, who was probably already on his way as fast 
 as a car could take him, came and carried her off 
 and put her on the train for Hollywood ! 
 
 "There, there," said the big policeman comfort- 
 ingly. "You take it easy. There's nothing to feel 
 bad about. If you really know this young man and 
 will tell us who he is, we'll turn him loose in a min- 
 ute. I don't know if you got a good look at him 
 before you fainted. That ain't his own hair. He's 
 wearing a wig. His head was shaved not very long 
 ago and that made him look kind of suspicious to us. 
 You see, there was a convict escaped from the state 
 prison up at Michigan City the first of the week and 
 we've all been instructed to keep a lookout for him. 
 One of these Russian Bolsheviki. . . Got sent up 
 last year. This young fellow don't look much like 
 the rogues'-gallery picture we've got of him, but 
 
262 REAL LIFE 
 
 then they ain't much to go by. He seems to be a 
 Russian all right and he wouldn't account for him- 
 self at all. Hit right out and liked to blacked Offi- 
 cer Jones's eye the minute he laid a finger on him. 
 But as I say, if you can really vouch for him — tell us 
 who he is and where he comes from and so on. . .. 
 You see, he won't even tell us his name." 
 
 It broke over the Princess with terrific force 
 that she didn't know his name either; she'd forgot- 
 ten! He'd told it to her there on the dunes this 
 morning, but it was gone now. All she knew was 
 Bill Lawrence. She never could get by with that. 
 She couldn't get by with any of it. There was no 
 recital of plain facts that would convey to that police- 
 man's blunt official mind the least assurance that 
 the man in the cell was not in fact the escaped con- 
 vict he was looking for. There was a growing mis- 
 giving in his gaze now as she hesitated. That 
 yachtsman last night on the Sally had looked at her 
 with just that expression. 
 
 "I guess maybe," he said, "you'd better have 
 another good look at him to make sure that he's the 
 man you think he is. Go and fetch him out, Pete." 
 
 The other policeman got up deliberately and lum- 
 bered down the corridor. 
 
THE FIFTH REEL 263 
 
 Well, there were only two possible things to do. 
 One was to deny Bill utterly ; leave him to get out of 
 his scrape as best he could. It wouldn't take more 
 than a few hours to discover that he wasn't an es- 
 caped convict. Anyhow, Walter Patrick, when he 
 came, would attend to that. The other was to take 
 the high line. All or nothing! 
 
 And she didn't know, when she heard two pairs 
 of steps coming back along the corridor, which it 
 was to be. 
 
 But when she saw him, when he stood there be- 
 fore her, pale, pitiable, helpless in the hostile grasp 
 of that big policeman, and looking at her — a stricken 
 look — with those wide childlike eyes of his, there 
 was no choice. 
 
 And there wasn't even perceptible hesitation. 
 She felt the blood come flushing into her face. She 
 sprang to her feet. She cried out in a sob, "Bill !" 
 and flew to him, flung her arms around him and 
 fairly wrested him out of the grasp of the dazed 
 policeman. 
 
 "He's the man I'm going to marry!" she said. 
 "Why should he have to account for himself to 
 you?" 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 THE FIRE-ESCAPE 
 
 FROM then on it was easy. Indeed, for half an 
 hour or such a matter the Princess had a won- 
 derful time. Powerful emotional scenes were not 
 supposed to be precisely in her line, but she didn't 
 believe that Pauline Frederick or Elsie Ferguson or 
 anybody could have risen to this situation any bet- 
 ter than she did. The opposition was just stubborn 
 enough to give her a thrill of pure triumph in batter- 
 ing it to pieces. 
 
 The chief took — or would have taken if she'd 
 given him half a chance! — the yachtsman's line 
 exactly, and poor Joe's. Bill didn't look to him like 
 a fitting bridegroom for any young girl, let alone 
 for Leda Swan. How long had she known him? 
 Who was he anyway ? 
 
 Luckily the second question could be taken as 
 cancelling the first. "Who is he !" cried the Princess 
 
 264 
 
THE FIRE-ESCAPE 265 
 
 in a fine burst of rhetoric. "He's the greatest vioHn- 
 ist in the world, that's who he is! And you let a 
 common policeman arrest him and lock him up in 
 jail! If you've hurt him anywhere — his hands or 
 anything — it will — it will cost you dear." She felt 
 a little selfconscious over that phrase, but she got 
 into her stride again at once. "Why, he gets three 
 thousand dollars just for playing one concert!" 
 
 She turned, now, on Bill. "They haven't hurt 
 you, have they, Bill darling? Feel and see." 
 
 Bill was beyond words. He flexed his hands 
 just the way he had done in the taxi at the beginning 
 of their first ride together, and vaguely shook his 
 head. 
 
 "I guess the only one to get hurt," the chief 
 remarked rather drily, "was the man he hit in the 
 eye. But now look here, Miss Swan. He's told 
 you he's the greatest vioHnist in the world and 
 maybe he is, even if he did lie about the amount he 
 got paid for one concert. There ain't a fiddler in 
 the world ever got paid as much as that ; but talkin' 
 to a young lady a fellow might stretch three hun- 
 dred, perhaps, with another nought on the end of it, 
 not meanin' any special harm. But do you know 
 he's a fiddler at all ? And if so, will you tell me how 
 
266 REAL LIFE 
 
 it comes he turns up from nowhere with a shaved 
 head, without a cent in his pockets, in another man's 
 clothes — a pair of pants three sizes too big for him 
 and a sweater with the name George Gordon Frank- 
 lin sewed on the inside?" 
 
 Once more the chief had asked one question too 
 many. The former question was far deadlier than 
 the one with which he had blanketed it. The Prin- 
 cess was regally ready with an answer to the second. 
 
 "We left Chicago last night together on a 
 yacht," she said, "with friendsi And the yacht was 
 shipwrecked." 
 
 "Shipwrecked !" cried the chief. "Last night?" 
 
 ''We ran aground," the Princess amended coldly. 
 **And we came ashore in a rowboat — in some sail- 
 ors' clothes that we borrowed of them. And Bill 
 bought that little car, that's fixed up like a cottage, 
 and gave it to me for a wedding present. And we're 
 going to drive out to Hollywood in it. That's where 
 we meant to go when we left Chicago. All we came 
 here to Crown Point for was to get married." 
 
 "Crown Point !" echoed the chief. "This isn't 
 Crown Point." 
 
 "But they have tell us," protested Bill (these 
 were his first words except the "Princess!" he had 
 
THE FIRE-ESCAPE 267 
 
 cried out at first sight of her), " — they tell us we 
 can get married here." 
 
 "Sure you can," the policeman said. "Every- 
 body in Indiana don't go to Crown Point to get mar- 
 ried. It's Chicago people do that." 
 
 "But — but we wanted to go to Crown Point," 
 stammered the Princess. She had to gulp at the 
 lump in her throat, though she knew the chief was 
 looking at her. Somehow the realization that Wal- 
 ter Patrick wouldn't be able to find her after all, 
 gave her a frightful wrench; illogical, of course, 
 which made it all the more bewildering. What did 
 she want of Walter if she was going to marry Bill ? 
 As best she could she pulled herself together. "I 
 think we'll carry out our original plan," she said. 
 "It isn't very far to Crown Point, is it?" 
 
 The chief didn't answer her question. He 
 rocked back in his chair and reflectively began 
 thumping the arm of it with his thick palm. "No," 
 he announced at last. "No, by gum ! I'm sorry, Miss 
 Swan, but I can't O. K. that plan. If you want to 
 get married, here and now, I don't see as there's 
 anything I can do to prevent you, little as I like it. 
 You're both of legal age, I guess, and so far as I 
 know you're neither of you married to anybody else. 
 
268 REAL LIFE 
 
 But I won't turn this young fellow loose to go 
 trapesing over the country with you in that portable 
 house of yours — unmarried. So if you don't feel 
 like taking the fatal step right now, you can leave 
 your young man here with me till I can find out who 
 and what he is. It won't take more than a day or 
 two at most." 
 
 With a superb toss of the head the Princess 
 turned upon the subordinate. "Is it a legal marriage 
 that they do here?" she asked. "If it is, I think 
 we'll have it at once. We've been insulted, both of 
 us, long enough ! Will you tell us where to go ?" 
 
 "He'll go along with you," said the chief. "I'm 
 sorry you feel that way about it. Miss Swan. I 
 never meant to insult you, and I don't believe I did. 
 I hate to have as pretty a little lady as you thinking 
 ill of me, but a man has to do his duty as he sees it. 
 And if you'll wait ..." 
 
 Still she did not look at him. She dared not, 
 the fact was, with that impulse in her to throw her- 
 self upon his big broad chest and beg to be hidden 
 away where no one could even look at her until some' 
 one of her own people — like Walter Patrick — should 
 come to the rescue. And for some less definable 
 
THE FIRE-ESCAPE 269 
 
 reason she dared not look at Bill either. He was 
 there, she knew ; that was enough for the present. 
 
 So, without a word, high-headed, with bright, 
 blurred eyes, she marched upon her fate. The po- 
 liceman fell in beside them on Bill's other hand, as 
 they passed through the gate in the rail and made 
 their way through the crowd to the door. 
 
 Quasi-criminal as their appearance was, escorted 
 like that, she was glad they had the officer along 
 since without his powerful shoulders they never 
 could have progressed at all through the crowd. It 
 flowed straight along with them up the courthouse 
 steps and into the wide hall. It was still worse in- 
 side, and they fairly had to fight their way to the 
 door that had the legend ''County Clerk"'' painted 
 upon it. And when they found it locked, the Prin- 
 cess broke down and wept. 
 
 "Oh, he ain't far off," announced the policeman, 
 after a second quite superfluous bout of rapping and 
 thumping on the door. "He's getting his dinner, I 
 guess, over at the Gem Cafe." 
 
 "Then go and fetch him back instantly," the 
 Princess commanded. 
 
 The policeman took off his hat for the single- 
 minded purpose of scratching his head. "I don't 
 
270 REAL LIFE 
 
 just see how I can do that, Miss Swan," he said. 
 "We could all go together, of course." 
 
 She squeezed the tears out of her eyes and would 
 perhaps have been able to annihilate him with a look 
 had not the crowd pressed her up so close against 
 him that she had to crane her neck to see his face 
 at all. 
 
 "You mean we're still under arrest?" she de- 
 manded. "Like criminals?" 
 
 "Well, you aren't, that's so," he conceded. "If 
 you'll let me take your friend along with me I can 
 go all right." 
 
 "I won't be left alone," said the Princess, "with 
 this mob. I'm afraid I'm going to faint again." 
 
 The policeman did his athletic best to win a little 
 clear space for this luckless pair of honeymooners, 
 and the inner ring of the crowd aided as best they 
 could, but they were helpless. The situation was 
 really serious. 
 
 And then a big voice took command of it. The 
 Princess, squeezed in as she was, couldn't see where 
 it came from but it checked the feeling of panic that 
 was taking possession of her. 
 
 "Clear the hall at once," it commanded. "Go 
 straight out of the building, all of you, beginning 
 
THE FIRE-ESCAPE 271 
 
 with those nearest the doors. Gus Axelson, Jim 
 Martin, I appoint you bailiffs. Clear them out. 
 This building's been condemned for twenty years." 
 
 "You're all right now," the policeman told the 
 Princess. "That's the judge. They won't monkey 
 with hinx" 
 
 Already, indeed, the pressure of the crowd had 
 sensibly diminished and it wasn't thirty seconds be- 
 fore a sufficient clear space had opened around her 
 so that she could turn and look at their rescuer. 
 
 He stood on the landing of the broad stair lead- 
 ing up to the second story, where the courtroom was, 
 a short but immensely big man in a silvery-gray 
 alpaca suit. He had a panama hat in his hand with 
 which, in a majestic manner, he fanned himself. He 
 came lumbering down the stairs as the Princess 
 watched him, but he stopped three or four steps 
 from the bottom and spoke again. 
 
 "I don't want anybody left in here," he said, 
 "who isn't prepared to tell me personally the nature 
 of his business in this courthouse." 
 
 By the time he got down to the floor level the 
 only persons not visibly on their way out were the 
 policeman and the forlorn pair in his charge. 
 
 "What started the riot, Pete?" the judge in- 
 
274 REAL LIFE 
 
 bookcases around most of the walls and a deeply 
 tufted leather-upholstered sofa in one corner. 
 
 But the thing to which all these observations 
 were secondary in the mind of the Princess was the 
 smell of bananas, and there was a half-eaten banana 
 on the desk. 
 
 The judge's eye may have followed her glance. 
 
 "Tommy Hahn, the county clerk," he somewhat 
 breathlessly observed, "weighs one hundred and 
 twenty-eight pounds and eats three square meals a 
 day. I weigh most three hundred and eat nothing 
 from breakfast to supper-time but an occasional 
 banana. There's an injustice that the law don't 
 provide a remedy for." 
 
 The Princess managed a feeble smile by way of 
 answer to this remark, but this was the best she 
 could do. She hadn't a word to throw to a dog. 
 
 "Well, well," the judge went on, removing the 
 banana by way of tidying up, "I guess you've been 
 having a pretty hard time. Make yourselves at 
 home in here. I'll be right in the courtroom, next 
 door. The clerk will be back in a few minutes and 
 make out your license, and as soon as he does that 
 I'll marry you. Then things will begin to look a 
 little brighter, maybe." 
 
THE FIRE-ESCAPE 275 
 
 With that he waddled out into the next room 
 and shut the communicating door behind him. Bill 
 crumpled down on the edge of the sofa and the Prin- 
 cess seated herself in the big swivel chair. 
 
 The only thing she could think of, somehow, was 
 that half-eaten banana which the judge had flung 
 into the waste-paper basket. It was a crime to waste 
 good food like that when there were so many thou- 
 sands of starving people in the world ! 
 
 One of the deep bottom drawers of the desk was 
 half open, and as her eye fell upon it she discerned 
 a paper bag — a biggish paper bag with the top 
 twisted tight. Irrepressibly her hand strayed 
 toward the drawer, reached within and toyed with 
 that twisted neck of paper, which somehow came 
 undone. 
 
 Yes ; it had been a good guess. 
 
 "Bill," she said in a vibrant whisper, "there are 
 five bananas in here. I'm going to eat one. Will 
 you?" 
 
 "I do not eat bananas," said Bill dully. "My 
 uncle does not permit. He say they make me sick." 
 
 "Well," said the Princess, "I suppose it's steal- 
 ing, but I'm going to just the same." 
 
 She ate one — like a wolf, one might say, except 
 
276 REAL LIFE 
 
 that wolves don't eat bananas, broke off another 
 and began a Httle less ravenously on that. 
 
 "It doesn't matter any more what your uncle 
 says. Bill," she remarked between bites. "Do they 
 make you sick? That's the point. You'd better 
 try one. I never tasted anything so good in my 
 life." 
 
 He didn't answer. She looked around at him — 
 she had rather carefully kept her gaze averted until 
 now — and saw that he was weeping. 
 
 "Bill !" she cried, springing up — she didn't relin- 
 quish her banana, however — and going over to him. 
 "Tell me what's the matter." 
 
 "Everything is the matter," he sobbed. "I feel 
 very bad. I think I am going to die." 
 
 She patted his shoulder, though there wasn't 
 much life in the caress, and tried to comfort him. 
 
 "I know it's just because you're hungry," she as- 
 serted. "I feel a lot better already. Try just one 
 bite, there's a dear." 
 
 She peeled back the skin a little farther and held 
 it out to him invitingly. But he shuddered and went 
 rather green at the sight. 
 
 "I do not want !" he cried in a convulsive whis- 
 per, and flung himself away from her. "It look 
 
THE FIRE-ESCAPE 277 
 
 nasty. It make me sick. I want Yakov. Yakov 
 know to take care of me. I want Yakov." 
 
 "Well, you'll have to do without him, I guess," 
 said the Princess, and walked away to the window. 
 
 She didn't precisely feel hurt that her ministra- 
 tions had been so frantically rejected; she went on 
 quite calmly munching at the despised banana. But 
 she was aware that the future simply didn't bear 
 looking at. The very inexorability of the fate that 
 was closing down upon her contributed to her calm. 
 
 Physically, of course, flight was still open to her. 
 Indeed, the means by which it could be accomplished 
 were patent to her eye as she stood there at the win- 
 dow. But it was impossible just the same. She 
 stood committed; she had taken her line, given her 
 word. She could never again regard herself as a 
 heroine if she took French leave now. No; there 
 was nothing more to think about. So she went on 
 and finished her banana. 
 
 Crossing the street at the visible corner of the 
 square was her policeman, coming back with a wiry 
 little man who must be Tommy Hahn, the county 
 clerk. It would soon be over now. They were com- 
 ing up the sidewalk. They were at the foot of the 
 courthouse steps. 
 
278 REAL LIFE 
 
 And then, just as she was about to turn away, 
 she started, gasped and stared. A yellow taxicab, 
 dusty and unkempt from a long hard run, but an 
 authentic yellow Chicago taxi all the same, exactly 
 like the one she and Bill had begun their momentous 
 flight in yesterday afternoon, had pulled up with a 
 jerk opposite the courthouse steps. 
 
 Why, it was the same taxicab ! She'd know that 
 chauffeur as far as she could see him ! 
 
 A rescue ! Walter Patrick — just in time ! 
 
 Her eyes flooded with tears, but she squeezed 
 them angrily out of the way. It couldn't be Walter, 
 could it? It was too soon for him to have arrived 
 here, even by the most furious driving, since she had 
 talked with him over the telephone in Chicago. And 
 anyway, she had told him she was in Crown Point. 
 Why didn't the passenger get out, whoever he was? 
 What was he waiting for ? 
 
 Then the cab door opened and she turned away 
 from the window with a wild little laugh. 
 
 "Bill," she said, "here's your uncle !" 
 
 His look at first was merely vacant. 
 
 "My uncle!" he repeated. "My uncle Sergius!" 
 
 Then a light of lurid terror came into his eyes. 
 
THE FIRE-ESCAPE 279 
 
 "Take me away !" he cried. "Take me away quick ! 
 He must not find me here !" 
 
 "But, Bill, he can't do anyt^-ng," the Princess 
 argued. "He can make an awful scene, of course, 
 if he wants to, but it won't get him anything. He 
 can't stop us from l^eing married." 
 
 "He can! He can! He would never permit. 
 You do not know him, when he shine his teeth and 
 glare his eyes at you. Come — we must run! We 
 must be quick !" 
 
 He snatched her hand and tried to drag her 
 toward the door. 
 
 "There's no good trying to get out that way," 
 she said. "We'd only meet him in the hall or on the 
 stairs. — But if you zvant to get away," she went on 
 more tensely, "if you want to run away with me to — 
 Crown Point or anywhere, we can do it easy 
 enough. Come here and I'll show you." 
 
 She lugged him along, half dazed as he was, 
 toward the window. 
 
 "You see that yellow taxicab?" she whispered. 
 "It is the one your uncle came in. But it's the very 
 same one — anyhow, it's the same chauffeur — that 
 we had yesterday when we ran away from him. 
 
28o REAL LIFE 
 
 He'd do anything for me, I know. And we've still 
 got plenty of money." 
 
 "But you say we cannot get to him," Bill pro- 
 tested. "We cannot go down the stairs. We meet 
 my uncle." 
 
 "It's easy," she whispered. "Come here closer 
 to the window and I'll show you. All we have to do 
 is go down the fire-escape and make a run for it. 
 He'll drive away with us all right — leave that to 
 me!" 
 
 By this time he was standing beside her at the 
 open window. 
 
 "But it do not go down," he protested. "It stick 
 straight out along the wall. We shall fall off the 
 end and be killed." 
 
 "But, silly," she explained, "it's made that way. 
 You crawl out on that little platform and then scoot 
 out on the edges of those steps and when you've 
 gone part way they go down with you and make a 
 regular flight of stairs to the ground. That's how 
 everybody gets out of buildings when they're on fire. 
 Come along, quick. There's Tommy Hahn in the 
 other room now." 
 
 He tried — he really tried — to do it. But half- 
 way out the window he paused for an irresolute look 
 
THE FIRE-ESCAPE 281 
 
 at the ground below — the distance was thirty feet 
 perhaps^ — swayed a moment giddily and then came 
 scrambling back into the room. 
 
 "It is no use !" he said. "I cannot do it. I give 
 up. I let my uncle catch me. I go where he say. I 
 am finish." 
 
 Thoughtfully, compassionately, she gazed into 
 his face, "I guess you're right. Bill," she said. "I 
 gness it's no go. But it's been a wonderful time, 
 hasn't it? Goodbye, Bill. Oh, yes; I'm going." 
 
 She took him by the shoulders and kissed him. 
 Then, hearing voices in the courtroom, she slipped 
 out through the window, sped, like a cat along a 
 fence, out to the end of the horizontal fire-escape, 
 rode down with it two-thirds of the way to the 
 ground and impatiently jumped the rest, flew across 
 the sward to the yellow taxi, sprang inside and 
 slammed the door behind her. 
 
 The chauffeur must have been in a doze, for he 
 gave a galvanic shudder at the noise, straightened 
 up and said without turning around: 
 
 "Didn't I tell you there wasn't any use of com- 
 ing here? Where do you want to go now?" 
 
 "Anywhere," said the Princess, sinking limply 
 back against the cushions; "anywhere out of this!" 
 
282 REAL LIFE 
 
 Then as he whipped around and stared at her 
 she added, "Drive me to the Congress Hotel." 
 
 "But look here, Miss Swan," he protested, "I've 
 got a fare. What do you want me to do about Mr. 
 Trotsky?" 
 
 "He doesn't need you any more," she argued. 
 "He's got Bill." 
 
 The tears came into her eyes at the thought of 
 that and she squeezed the lids tight shut. 
 
 "That's all right," the chauffeur persisted, turn- 
 ing sulkily away from a feeling that the sight of her 
 tears put him at an unfair disadvantage, "but he 
 hasn't paid me yet. Of course, if you want to take 
 over his meter " 
 
 The Princess gasped as it came over her that she 
 was running away with the entire residue of Bill's 
 three thousand dollars. The theft of the dune- 
 bug's nuts and the judge's bananas was one thing, 
 but stealing a matter of eighteen hundred dollars. . . 
 
 She sat erect again with one last spurt of deter- 
 mination. "I don't care!" she cried. "Yes; of 
 course I'll take it! I've got money enough in my 
 pocket to buy your silly cab! Don't talk. Drive — 
 drive as fast as you can !" 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 THE PRINCESS SKIDS 
 
 BUT the apprehension of pursuit, under which 
 she fled from the Httle city which was not 
 Crown Point, was unfounded. Uncle Sergius might 
 gnash his teeth when he learned what had become 
 of the three thousand dollars his nephew had carried 
 away from Orchestra Hall the afternoon before, but 
 he was too busy, just now, to attempt to do anything 
 about it. On this ride there was no need for the 
 Princess to sit on the little folding seat and keep a 
 lookout astern. 
 
 As a matter of fact, her adventure was much 
 nearer over than she supposed. Indeed, there wasn't 
 much more than an hour between the moment when 
 she kissed Bill goodbye and the one when she was 
 pitched — almost literally pitched — into Walter Pat- 
 rick's lap. 
 
 A violent summer thunderstorm was really the 
 
 283 
 
284 REAL LIFE 
 
 decisive factor in this denouement. It burst upon 
 them just as they were making a forced detour from 
 the main road, which was under repair. There was 
 a stretch of clayey loam in this substitute route to 
 which the rain, even after it had ceased, gave a mir- 
 rorHke glaze, so that the single pair of ruts exactly 
 in the middle afforded the only practicable footing. 
 
 It was just here that the yellow taxi, north 
 bound, met a heavy touring-car coming south. 
 Both chauffeurs had trouble climbing out of the 
 ruts and both had to set brakes abruptly, with the 
 result that both cars skidded, the taxi turning clean 
 around with a waltzlike movement into, as it were, 
 the embrace of the other car. They locked together 
 with, indeed, a certain splintering of spokes and 
 crumpling of fenders, yet rather gently withal, and; 
 as one, slid down into the bank. 
 
 The chauffeur of the taxi, hearing his door flung 
 open just at the beginning of this maneuver, had 
 screamed at the Princess not to jump. But he had 
 misread her intention. The only danger present in 
 the Princess's mind was that the friend whom she 
 had recognized in the other car might go straight 
 on past without seeing her, and she held the door 
 open while she excitedly called and repeated his 
 
THE PRINCESS SKIDS 285 
 
 name. And she couldn't herself have told how much 
 of the propulsive force which shot her over into the 
 other car, and more or less into Walter Patrick's lap, 
 was due to the jolt with which both cars brought up 
 against the bank, and how much was due to her own 
 initiative. 
 
 However, there was no occasion for inquiry into 
 this matter. The way he cried out, "Princess! 
 Thank God !" and then simply hugged her, was com- 
 pletely satisfactory. 
 
 The manifestation wasn't more than momentary. 
 He let go of her all at once, blushed to the hair and 
 essayed a more ceremonious manner. It was a piece 
 of such inconceivable good fortune, he explained, 
 finding her like this, that he was afraid he had rather 
 forgotten the proprieties. 
 
 Adroitly the Princess changed the subject. 
 
 "Just look at those two chauffeurs, will you?" 
 she observed. "They both think we're perfectly 
 crazy." 
 
 And indeed it was safe to suppose that in all 
 their rather wide experience neither of them had 
 seen two victims of a road accident take it just like 
 this. The victims now laughed and proceeded to 
 forget all about them. 
 
286 REAL LIFE 
 
 "But you're alone, Princess?" Patrick inquired. 
 "You haven't got Boris Lazaref tucked away in that 
 taxicab anywhere, have you ?" 
 
 She shook her head rather soberly. 
 
 "His uncle's got him now," she said. "And I 
 guess that's the best way for it to have happened. 
 I'm sure it is for me." After a momentary silence 
 she went on. "I'm going to tell you something. I 
 didn't want to marry him, but I nearly did, even 
 after I'd telephoned to you, because they came and 
 told me he was in jail and it seemed to be the only 
 way to get him out. We were up in the judge's 
 room waiting for the county clerk to make out the 
 license when his uncle came, in this yellow taxi, and 
 I went down the fire-escape." She added anxiously, 
 "You see how it was, don't you ?" 
 
 But this was less a literal question than a plea 
 for tolerance. His expression of total bewilderment 
 made it plain that he didn't see at all. 
 
 "It's only," he explained, "that I don't under- 
 stand just how it could have happened. Why did 
 they put him in jail? His uncle had been waiting 
 there for the pair of you to show up ever since eight 
 o'clock this morning. And the whole of Crown 
 Point has been swarming with reporters for hours.'* 
 
THE PRINCESS SKIDS 287 
 
 "But we weren't in Crown Point at all," she 
 explained. "I thought we were, when I telephoned, 
 because the place had a courthouse where people 
 could get married, but it was another town alto- 
 gether." 
 
 Then, seeing that she had simply astounded him 
 with this small matter of fact, she asked, "But what 
 difference does that make ?" 
 
 He shook that question off like the mere buzz- 
 ing of a fly. 
 
 "Princess," he demanded, "have you talked to 
 any newspaper people at all ? Or to anyone else who 
 would be absolutely sure that it was really you and 
 not somebody pretending to be ? Has anyone photo- 
 graphed you during the last twenty-four hours?" 
 
 "Not that I know of," she said in answer to the 
 last question, the others having been disposed of by 
 a mere shake of the head. 
 
 Then, her gaze becoming intent, she asked, 
 "What were the reporters in Crown Point for? 
 They couldn't have been waiting for me, because 
 how could they have known I meant to go there? 
 It couldn't be . . . Walter, is it in the papers already — 
 about my running away with Bill ? Have they been 
 — horrid about it ?" 
 
288 REAL LIFE 
 
 "Oh, the Tribune carried a story this morning," 
 he said. "We'll have to try to get hold of a copy for 
 you to see/' 
 
 But the nonchalance of tliat was just a hair's 
 breadth overdone. She looked away from him and 
 for a moment pressed the back of her hand against 
 her lips to steady them. The question she wanted to 
 ask wasn't easy to frame either. 
 
 "Is it. . ." she began, then tried again. "Had I 
 better go back and find Bill now and marry him, 
 anyway ? Is it as horrible as that ?" 
 
 He laughed raggedly. Intending to reassure 
 her, it was as if he had found some reassurance for 
 himself in the mere form of the question. 
 
 It was a relief to both of them that the two 
 chauffeurs now emerged from the mud ready to 
 report on the condition of the two cars. The taxi 
 was undamaged except for its crumpled fender and 
 a smashed door. All it needed was a little jacking 
 and prying to set it free and it could go on to Chi- 
 cago. The touring-car with a splintered rear wheel 
 couldn't safely run under its own power until it had 
 been provided with a new one. Patrick, who had 
 climbed down into the road where matters could be 
 pointed out to him, could see this for himself. The 
 
THE PRINCESS SKIDS 289 
 
 nearest farm, a few minutes' walk up the road, 
 could no doubt provide a team to haul it out of the 
 ditch and a roof of some sort to shelter it under until 
 temporary repairs could be made. 
 
 The obvious course for the two passengers was 
 to take the taxi into Chicago. But this, after two or 
 three minutes of reflection, Patrick seemed inclined 
 not to do. 
 
 "Do you want to leave it to me. Princess?" he 
 asked, suddenly looking up at her across the taxi. 
 
 "Oh, yes!" she said with an explosive sigh. "I 
 want to leave everything to you." 
 
 "Good!" he said with a nod. "We'll walk to 
 the farmhouse and have them send back a team for 
 my car. And," — he turned to the taxi chauffeur — 
 "we'll pay you off now." 
 
 But this wasn't quite so easy as it looked. The 
 young man, passionately protesting his complete in- 
 difference as to what they did or he did or anybody 
 did, firmly declined at the same time to be dismissed. 
 Miss Swan was his rightful and legal passenger. 
 She'd engaged him to take her to the Congress Hotel 
 and he intended to do so. 
 
 "If we pay you for taking her to the Congress 
 Hotel that'll be satisfactory, won't it?" Patrick 
 
2go REAL LIFE 
 
 asked pleasantly, for it was not his way to quarrel 
 with people, "How much will that be?" 
 
 The young man consulted his meter and two or 
 three crumpled memoranda extracted from his 
 trousers pocket. He made some calculations with 
 the stub of a pencil and at last, with a touch of de- 
 fiance, announced his result : — eighty-four dollars 
 and seventy-five cents. 
 
 The Princess saw a look of blank distress come 
 into Walter Patrick's face, and made a swift guess 
 at the cause. He wasn't, most likely, in the habit of 
 carrying large sums of money around with him, and 
 in his haste to come to her he had set out without 
 being especially munitioned in this respect. It was 
 even conceivable that some difficulty had been made 
 about it and he had come to her simply on his own. 
 
 She nodded him a smile, and saying, "Leave it 
 to me, Walter; I'll fix it," she rather decisively ex- 
 cluded him from the confab with the chauffeur by 
 inviting that young man, with a gesture, to the run- 
 ning-board of the touring-car. From her vanity- 
 case, where she had stowed Bill's eighteen hundred 
 dollars, she took out a hundred-dollar bill and 
 pressed it into his hands, 
 
 "You needn't bother about the change," she said. 
 
THE PRINCESS SKIDS 291 
 
 "That'll do for a tip, won't it? And I'm very much 
 obliged." 
 
 He unfolded the bill, gazed at it reflectively on 
 both sides and then, shaking his head, offered to 
 hand it back to her. 
 
 "Look here, Miss Swan," he said, "you come 
 along back with me. We'll make it right when we 
 get to the hotel That's the best thing for you to do. 
 You've been trapesing around the country long 
 enough. It's a good thing you got rid of that other 
 gink, but you don't want to hook up with this one 
 just because I happened to skid you into him. You 
 think it over and come along with me." 
 
 "Who," the Princess demanded, with a gasp, — 
 **who do you suppose this — gink is ?" 
 
 "I don't know," the chauffeur retorted violently, 
 "and I don't care. I know I'll get you safe home to 
 your folks and I don't know whether he will or not. 
 But if he thinks I'm going to turn you over to him 
 for any hundred dollars he can guess again.'* 
 
 The Princess, as you may have observed, was 
 never addicted to half measures; and this, perhaps, 
 was not the moment for them. 
 
 "It happens," she observed with splendid, icy 
 mendacity, "that he's my husband !" 
 
292 REAL LIFE 
 
 The chauffeur stared at her, crumpled the hun- 
 dred-dollar bill and shoved it into his pocket. 
 
 "I guess you movie queens are too swift for 
 George!" he said, and went in ruins, out of the 
 Princess's life. 
 
 She wasn't sure, when she and Patrick set out 
 through the wet grass at the roadside to the farm- 
 house, whether or not he had overheard her explana- 
 tion to the chauffeur. Partly by way of creating a 
 diversion and partly because she wanted to transfer 
 all her worries to him as expeditiously as possible, 
 she took the rest of Bill's money out of her case and 
 handed it over to Patrick, telling him what it was 
 and how she had come by it. 
 
 "Do you suppose his uncle could have me ar- 
 rested for stealing it like that?" she asked. — "I 
 wish," she went on after he had told her not to 
 worry about it, "that mother would pay the whole 
 of it back — the whole three thousand, I mean, and 
 not just this. I think Bill's uncle would be more 
 likely to forgive him if she did. And maybe he'd 
 be more likely to forgive me." Then with a sigh: 
 "But of course she won't. She'll be so i>erfectly 
 furious with me for having run away that I wouldn't 
 even dare ask her." 
 
THE PRINCESS SKIDS 293 
 
 Indeed it frightened her just to be talking about 
 her mother Hke this to anybody, even to Walter 
 Patrick. 
 
 "Of course," she went on, for he made no imme- 
 diate reply, "if she did pay back the whole three 
 thousand dollars then the cottage would belong to 
 us, wouldn't it? It's the darlingest little thing you 
 ever saw. I thought of you the minute I saw it. 
 I'm sure you could write a picture around it. And 
 then — well — I don't suppose I ever could go travel- 
 ing around in it with — anybody, out into the desert 
 or down to the seashore, but it would be nice to 
 think about" 
 
 "Princess," Patrick burst out at the end of a 
 rather long silence, just, indeed, as he was laying his 
 hand upon the farmyard gate; "Princess, I don't 
 believe there's anything unfair about saying this to 
 you. In fact, I think the unfairness would be the 
 other way. Don't you know that you can pay that 
 money back to the Lazarefs if you want to, whether 
 your mother agrees to it or not?" 
 
 She clutched the gate with both hands, holding 
 it shut while she stared blankly into his face. 
 
 "But," she said, " — ^but, Walter, I haven't any 
 money of my own, except my allowance — have I ?" 
 
294 ^^ REAL LIFE 
 
 "Why, you poor child/' he said, "you're per- 
 fectly enormously, inhumanly rich. It's all yours, 
 every dollar of it, and it's been yours to dispose of 
 ever since you came of age. You've given your 
 mother power of attorney, I suppose, so that she can 
 go on taking care of it for you, but that's purely for 
 your own convenience. All you have to do to get 
 any amount of money you want is to keep a check- 
 book of your own." 
 
 At that, oddly enough, she put her head down 
 upon her hands, which still clutched the top rail of 
 the gate, and began to cry. It seemed silly to cry, 
 and unkind as well, because he, she could feel, was 
 reduced to a state of utter consternation by it 
 
 "I guess it's just because I'm so tired and hun- 
 gry !" she sobbed. But it was only a minute or two 
 before she got herself together and opened the gate. 
 "You see/' she explained, "I haven't really eaten a 
 square meal since we left New York. On the train 
 and there in the hotel in Chicago I was so excited 
 planning to run away that I couldn't." This was of 
 course literally true. 
 
 She was too tired even to try to think, but she 
 was accessible to the comforting sensation of being 
 once more the Princess, with no more decisions to 
 
THE PRINCESS SKIDS 295 
 
 make, no more difficulties to struggle with. Wal- 
 ter would look after everything. 
 
 He did. He made some sort of explanation — 
 she didn't even listen — to the farmer's wife. He 
 made a wholehearted ally of the farmer's daughter, a 
 big, nice-looking girl, rather incredible from the fact 
 that she neither spoke nor dressed the way farmers' 
 daughters of the Princess's acquaintance — on the 
 screen — always did. 
 
 There was a delightful stir of activity in the in- 
 terest of the Princess's comfort A wonderful meal 
 was cooked — ^ham and eggs, a bowl of milk toast, a 
 cup of chocolate — and at the conclusion of it she 
 was in good part undressed and put to bed with a 
 hot-water bottle, a pair of fleece-lined slippers and 
 a pretty pink bathrobe left handy against her waking 
 and wanting to get up. 
 
 Walter Patrick had remained^ in the background 
 during these ministrations, consulting with the 
 farmer, the chauffeur and so on. But she was per- 
 fectly aware of him as the inspiration of them. 
 
 "After all," she told herself, just as she was 
 dropping off, "if it hadn't been for him I never 
 would have run away in the first place." 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 
 THE RETURN OF THE PRINCESS 
 
 IT WAS getting on in the afternoon when Patrick 
 sent in Genevieve, the farmer's good-looking 
 daughter, to ask if he might see her presently — any- 
 time within a half-hour would be soon enough. 
 
 Oddly enough, this ambassadorial approach 
 frightened her a little; reminded her rather grimly 
 of the days of long ago — that was how it seemed, 
 though yesterday had begun as one of them. She 
 thought he might have banged on the door and 
 shouted to her to get up and dress and come along 
 if that vras what he wanted. She played up to his 
 new-old manner, however, by telling Genevieve she 
 would receive him in fifteen minutes and asking the 
 girl to come back, after she had delivered this mes- 
 sage, to help her get ready for him. 
 
 They staged the scene rather carefully, and, with 
 the aid of a straight-backed armchair (backed into 
 
 296 
 
THE RETURN OF THE PRINCESS 297 
 
 the bay window, opposite to and facing the door), 
 the pretty pink bathrobe and an eiderdown quilt, 
 produced an effect rather suggestive, the Princess 
 thought, of a royal levee. 
 
 Genevieve was accorded the ecstatic privilege of 
 brushing the Princess's hair — you know all about 
 that hair, of course, so you don't need a description 
 of it! — ^and with the help of its proprietor got a 
 formal-looking, though not very substantial, "do" 
 on it, which helped out the picture. 
 
 She meant Walter to get the full effect of this, 
 and she was glad, in a way, to be able to read in his 
 face the moment he opened the door that he did. 
 Yet it gave her an odd sort of pain in the heart the 
 way he halted just inside and bowed to her from 
 clear across the room, and when she caught in his 
 eyes a glint of that look, compounded half of amuse- 
 ment and half of pity, which once had so profoundly 
 perplexed her, she was divided between the impulses 
 to laugh and to cry. 
 
 But she did neither. This sort of thing was what 
 he had invited, and this, for the present, was what he 
 should have. 
 
 She did invite him to have a chair, and a little 
 
298 REAL LIFE 
 
 dubiously he pulled one up facing" her, perhaps a 
 couple of yards away, and sat down. 
 
 He was sorry, he began by saying, to have been 
 obliged to cut short her nap, especially as there was 
 still time to spare before beginning to carry out the 
 plans he had tentatively made. But with the possi- 
 bility in view that she might wish to revise them, or 
 perhaps reject them altogether, he had thought it 
 better to take them up with her now. 
 
 She assured him that she felt perfectly rested and 
 restored and quite ready to hear about his plans. 
 
 It was at this point that Genevieve, who was not 
 only a nice girl but a good bit of a heroine, offered 
 household duties as her excuse and left them alone. 
 Patrick, directly he began to talk, shifted his chair 
 a little and looked fixedly out of the window. 
 
 He had made his plans, he said, with reference 
 to the newspapers. The story in the morning paper 
 had sounded rather cruel, from the jocular and al- 
 most derisive tone in which it had been written. 
 Certainly in their frantic anxiety about her it had 
 stung like a whip. 
 
 **I came to see that they had played it like that/' 
 he went on, "as a hedge, from a misgiving that the 
 thing might turn out to be some sort of gigantic 
 
THE RETURN OF THE PRINCESS 299 
 
 hoax. It was largely my fault that they took it that 
 way; for I refused, in spite of the others, either 
 to give out anything to the reporters or to 
 report your disappearance to the police, which of 
 course would have been the same thing. I didn't 
 deny an3rthing, nor invent anything; simply stuck to 
 it that we had nothing to say. If you had been car- 
 ried off either by force or by seduction . . . But I 
 had a sort of bed-rock confidence, based on a belief 
 that I knew you, somehow, better than any of them, 
 that neither of those things had happened to you. 
 Of course, when the whole night passed and the 
 morning. . ." 
 
 He broke off there Just in time to save her from 
 breaking down altogether and went on in a manner 
 much more endurable. 
 
 "Well, as things have fallen out, that line of 
 mine leaves us a loophole, if you care to take it, 
 Princess. You didn't go to Crown Point, where 
 they were all looking for you. You didn't get pho- 
 tographed and you didn't sign your name to any- 
 thing. And the story is nothing, in consequence, but 
 a series of prodigious and rather incredible rumors. 
 
 "On the strength of that fact this is what I have 
 arranged. The order for the private car has never 
 
300 REAL LIFE 
 
 been canceled and your whole Chicago party, includ- 
 ing your mother, are going to go down and get on 
 it in the Santa Fe yards this evening exactly as if 
 you were with them, and as if nothing had happened. 
 It will be attached to the limited when it pulls out. 
 
 "I have arranged with Mr. Stokes — he's the man 
 who owns this farm — to drive us over in his Ford 
 this evening to Joliet — it's only a little more than 
 thirty miles; and when the limited makes its stop 
 there you'll get on. No one will see you or be look- 
 ing for you. And when the train gets to Los Ange- 
 les, the same train it's been announced all along you 
 were going to take, you'll get off with the others. 
 Holden [he was the head press agent for Leda 
 Swan, Incorporated] will give out tonight a pub- 
 licity story that you've been out personally to look 
 over a location and buy some properties for a 
 picture. 
 
 "If that's done in the right way, I think the story 
 of your having run away with Lazaref or anyone 
 else will go up in its own smoke. Everybody who 
 likes to think of himself as a sophisticated and in- 
 credulous person — and that is about nine out of 
 every ten inhabitants of the United States — will 
 believe the whole thing was a plant and that we've 
 
THE RETURN OF THE PRINCESS 301 
 
 stung the newspapers for about a million dollars' 
 worth of free advertising. They may regard it as a 
 rather unscrupulous piece of business on the part of 
 your staff, and very likely as a little cruel to you, 
 but there won't be — I think you can really count on 
 this, Princess — one single smallest spatter of mud 
 that will stick to you." 
 
 She'd taken advantage of the fact that her face 
 was in shadow to watch his pretty intently through 
 all this, and she hadn't interrupted once. Even now 
 that he had finished she remained silent. After a 
 moment he got up restlessly and went to the 
 window. 
 
 "So," he concluded, "if that's along the general 
 lines of what you want to do, I'd recommend it as 
 the best way of doing it." 
 
 She said then, rather petulantly, "I don't suppose 
 there's anything else that I can do, is there ?" 
 
 What he said wasn't an answer, but it startled 
 her half out of her chair. 
 
 "I've bought the cottage for you, Princess. 
 That's to say, I told Lazaref that you wanted it and 
 that you'll send him a check for the whole three 
 thousand dollars." 
 
 "But — but," she stammered, "how could you do 
 
3Q2 REAL LIFE 
 
 that? You haven't seen him, have you? He's not 
 here?'' 
 
 "No; he's not here," Patrick said, "but I man- 
 aged to find out where he was and I talked with him 
 over the telephone. I know where he is now and 
 where his nephew is, so that if you want to talk to 
 him, or see him again — the boy, I mean — why, it 
 can be managed/* 
 
 Her answer now startled him. She spoke dis- 
 passionately enough, but her words were intense 
 with cold conviction. "I wish someone would shoot 
 his uncle." 
 
 He cried out some sort of protest at that, and 
 the Princess went on to explain. "I think it's 
 wicked that anyone should be as afraid of anybody 
 as poor Bill is of that man. You can't blame Bill, of 
 course. It's gone on ever since he was a little boy. 
 [Why, he began giving concerts, he says, when he 
 was six years old. He's never had any fun — never 
 done anything but work to make his uncle big and 
 rich and important And the way his uncle must 
 have treated him 1 . . . . Why, he screamed Just at 
 the sound of his uncle's voice talking Russian to the 
 chauffeur of the other taxi. — T simply couldn't 
 bear it, so I tried to help him run away. I'd have 
 
THE RETURN OF THE PRINCESS 303 
 
 done anything to get him away. I was even going 
 to marry him until I saw it wouldn't do any good. 
 — Do you suppose he's — killing him now ? Walter, 
 his eyes, when that horrible man was after us, were 
 just like a little cocker spaniel's that we used to have, 
 when mother was going to whip him for having run 
 off. And I had to go away and leave him. He was 
 too frightened to come down the fire-escape with 
 me. 
 
 Walter came around behind her chair and took a 
 steadying hold of her shoulders. "I don't believe 
 he's getting beaten. Princess," he said, comfortingly. 
 "The uncle sounded calm enough when I talked with 
 him over the 'phone; and really quite amiable when 
 I said we'd pay the three thousand dollars. I 
 shouldn't be surprised if he'd learned his lesson from 
 this rebellion of his nephew's." He paused there 
 and took his hands away. "I even believe he'd con- 
 sent," he went on, "to your seeing the boy again this 
 afternoon, if that's what you want to do." 
 
 The Princess was aware of no logical reason for 
 bursting into tears at this point, but this, neverthe- 
 less, was what she did- She knew the reason was 
 not the one which Patrick naturally enough assigned 
 to the phenomenon, and all his rather panicky at- 
 
304 REAL LIFE 
 
 tempts to comfort her, his promises to produce Bill 
 at once and so on, went down, of course, the wrong 
 way. She managed at last to be coherent enough to 
 correct, in one exasperated outburst, this misappre- 
 hension of his. 
 
 "What do you want to make me go back to Bill 
 for?" she cried. "I don't want to see him again! — 
 I wish you'd go away yourself, and let me alone!" 
 
 But this last wish was not genuine, for she 
 stopped him on the way to the door with the queS" 
 tion, "What made you think I wanted to go back 
 to him?" 
 
 "Why," he said, "I thought you must have 
 cared for him a whole lot or you wouldn't have run 
 away with him in the first place." 
 
 "But I didn't run away with him," she declared. 
 "I'd never seen him nor heard of him when I ran 
 away. I didn't even know who he was until this 
 morning, out on the dunes, when he told me." 
 
 His look of complete incredulous bewilderment 
 goaded her a little farther. 
 
 "If you want to know why I ran away — I ran 
 away because of you ; because," — the words caught 
 on a sob and then came out in a rush — "because you 
 were always laughing at me." 
 
THE RETURN OF THE PRINCESS 305 
 
 He wilted at that, leaned back against the door, 
 his hand on the knob, and gazed at her with a look 
 that reminded her a little of Bill. After a breathless 
 silence he said simply, in a voice that brought the 
 tears back into her own eyes : 
 
 "I'm sorry, Princess.'* 
 
 And presently, before she could make any reply 
 to that, he added, "Well, that's a trouble you're go- 
 ing to be delivered from. When you get on the 
 train at Joliet you'll have seen the last of me." 
 
 "Don't be silly," she commanded. "I didn't 
 mean you laughed at me in a horrid way. You 
 didn't laugh, either, exactly. You smiled, as if you 
 were sorry for me. As if you thought I was a sort 
 of poor little — beggar-girl you wanted to be kind to. 
 It made me wonder if I was. I thought I'd like 
 to get away where I wasn't Leda Swan for a little 
 while, and see what — what real life was like. Well, 
 I have all right!" she concluded, subsiding into her 
 chair again. 
 
 "I was sorry for you," he said. (Could it be 
 possible, she wondered, that the brightness in his 
 eyes was tears?) "I never suspected, of course, 
 that you'd guess. No one would have guessed but 
 you. I thought about you, don't you see, a little 
 
3o6 REAL LIFE 
 
 the way you've been thinking about Bill: as some- 
 one whose childhood had been stolen from her, 
 someone whose magnificence and celebrity did oth- 
 ers more good than they did her. I shouldn't have 
 felt that way if only I'd had penetration enough 
 to see what a brave little adventurer you were, 
 tinder all the coronation robes and so on. And I'll 
 never feel that way about you again, Princess. I'll 
 be permanently happier about you for having had 
 this one good look at what you really are. I shall 
 remember you here, in this farmhouse." 
 
 "Remember me!" she repeated, sitting erect 
 again and suddenly tense. "You didn't nieaiyi what 
 you said just now — about not coming to Hollywood 
 with me!" 
 
 "That was serious enough," he told her. "I 
 meant to keep it dark, but you surprised it out of 
 me. Your mother discharged me this afternoon." 
 
 "What did she do that for?" the Princess 
 demanded. 
 
 "Oh, I left her no alternative," he confessed. 
 *'You see, we disagreed categorically about my 
 plans. She wanted you brought straight into Chi- 
 cago at once; and, failing that, she wanted to come 
 straight down to you here. The only reason she 
 
THE RETURN OF THE PRINCESS 307 
 
 didn't was because I refused to tell her where you 
 were. I took advantage of my strategic position, 
 you see, to make them carry the thing out exactly 
 as I wanted it done. I did it in good faith, of 
 course, because I'm absolutely sure it's the only 
 clean way out. But your mother regards me quite 
 simply as a kidnapper." 
 
 The Princess indulged herself in a reflective 
 silence. Finally she asked whether it had really 
 been true, what he had told her out there at the 
 gate, about her having the disposal of her own 
 money? And, pursuing the topic a little farther, 
 how much authority in other directions had she? 
 Was she really, as his answers seemed to imply, the 
 boss of the whole show? 
 
 She saw that he was parting with this series of 
 affirmative admissions rather reluctantly and with, 
 to her, meaningless qualifications. 
 
 "Why do you keep saying 'technically ?' What 
 do you mean by that ? And 'legally,' and 'theoretic- 
 ally,' and all the rest of it? Either I am the boss 
 or I am not !" 
 
 But he tried absurdly to deny this axiom. In 
 real life it didn't work out that way. You could 
 boss only as much as your experience and resolu- 
 
3o8 REAL LIFE 
 
 tion enabled you to command. And to boss an im- 
 mense institution like Leda Swan, Incorporated, 
 required not only those qualities but an unremit- 
 ting diligence as well. 
 
 "Look at your mother," he concluded. "She's 
 a marvelous woman. She has perfectly Napoleonic 
 ideas. And think how hard she's had to work for 
 all these years." 
 
 "Poor old mother!" sighed the Princess. "She 
 has worked hard, hasn't she? I think it's time 
 she had a vacation. I'm glad she discharged you 
 this afternoon," she went on, with just a flicker of 
 light in her eyes, "because I want to engage you 
 myself — to be my manager." 
 
 "I had an idea that was what you were getting 
 at," he said. "And I'm deeply pleased that you 
 thought of it, because it shows you've forgiven me 
 for making you run away. But of course it 
 wouldn't do. Princess. I think you're right in 
 wanting somebody in that capacity, but you don't 
 want me." 
 
 "I'd like to know why not!" she said. She 
 turned away from him as she spoke and looked out 
 the window. 
 
 "I think you do know why not," he told her. 
 
THE RETURN OF THE PRINCESS 309 
 
 "In the first place, I'm not a managerial person, 
 exactly. But we don't have to argue that. I'm not 
 eligible for the job because I'm not disinterested. 
 If I took it I'd be just about what your mother at 
 this moment thinks I am. Look at the sequence of 
 events. She discharges me for what appears to her 
 good cause and I take advantage of the fact that 
 I've got you hidden away here where she can't 
 come to you and advise you, to — well incite you to 
 rebel against her authority. I tell you you're your 
 own boss and your first act as boss is to hire me 
 back in a better position than I had before. It 
 would be perfectly good proof, if I let you do that, 
 if I took advantage of your feeling this afternoon 
 that you wanted to do that, that I wasn't a fit per- 
 son for the job. You'd see that for yourself in 
 time and then where would I be? We're good 
 friends now, ciren't we? Well, I'd rather keep it 
 so." 
 
 "Oh, all right," she said a little absently, "if you 
 feel that way about it. Yes, of course we're friends. 
 When do we start for Joliet?" 
 
 They had a good two hours before it was neces- 
 sary to set out, and during all that time she never 
 reverted to her rejected proposal. She sent him 
 
3IO REAL LIFE 
 
 away for a few minutes so that she could dress and, 
 this accomphshed, they wandered for an hour about 
 the farm. They sat side by side on the pasture 
 fence and watched a coHie dog herd the cows into 
 the bam to be milked. They had supper together 
 and afterward, on the front porch, while they 
 waited for Mr. Stokes to drive around with the 
 Ford, they sat in a splint-bottomed rocker settee. 
 
 Pretty much all this time they talked — the 
 Princess doing the most of it, telling him, somewhat 
 disjointedly, the story of her adventures. She told 
 him of the yacht and the yachtsmen and Joe; she 
 told him about Mabel and Julius, and her unsuccess- 
 ful attempt to be a vampire ; she told him about the 
 good Samaritan, and the judge ; she told him about 
 the incredible dune-bug. And finally, in the twilight 
 on the porch, she began telling him about Bill. 
 
 "I didn't know you could feel about anybody 
 in that mixed-up sort of way," she confessed. "I 
 always thought you loved them or you didn't; and 
 if you loved them truly, it lasted all your life. Well, 
 I didn't love him that way, I suppose. I thought I 
 did yesterday, when I saw him getting killed by 
 that motor truck. And all day yesterday, when- 
 ever we had a minute's peace — whenever people 
 
THE RETURN OF THE PRINCESS 311 
 
 weren't chasing us or catching us or telHng us they 
 were going to put us in jail or something — it was 
 ....well, it was just heavenly. It was like hav- 
 ing the loveliest dream there ever was in the world 
 — come true. I was perfectly sure he was a prince ! 
 
 "Oh, of course, I know it was silly of me to 
 think that. You see, I was really — just a child, yes- 
 terday. I didn't know anything about real life at 
 all." She drew a deep sigh. "Well, I do now all 
 right!" 
 
 She turned upon her companion with sudden 
 vehemence. "But I'm never going to forget him, 
 Walter. I wouldn't forget him for — for anybody 
 in the world; nor pretend I was sorry I ran away 
 with him — and took care of him — and kissed him — 
 twice. But I wouldn't see him again for anything 
 in the world, either. — There comes Mr. Stokes. I 
 guess we'd better be starting, even if there is lots 
 of time, for I'd hate to miss that train. I want to 
 get back into the movies. Because, honestly, Wal- 
 ter, I don't see how the people in real life stand it!" 
 
 She became a good deal less talkative when they 
 had begun their thirty-mile drive. She'd said her 
 say for the present. If he wanted to talk he might. 
 He did pretty well for the first half of the way. 
 
312 REAL LIFE 
 
 entertaining her with the story of the young man 
 who found her mesh bag under the motor truck 
 and who wished for his sole reward the opportunity 
 of handing it back to her personally; the story of 
 Mr. Carstairs and how he found her wrist watch; 
 his own encounter with Miss Priscilla Alden, and 
 so on. But when this vein played out he fell silent 
 too. 
 
 It occurred to her rather poignantly that he 
 must be as tired as she was. He'd probably had 
 even less sleep in the past twenty-four hours than 
 she — if he'd had any at all; and he'd had the bur- 
 den besides of a racking anxiety. So if he'd gone 
 a little slack now and shown a disposition to drop 
 asleep it wouldn't have been surprising. She was 
 pleasantly aware, however, that his silence had none 
 of this quality. There was no lassitude about him 
 as he sat drawn rather carefully away from her 
 and gazing fixedly out ahead at the dancing patch 
 of illumination made by the car lights. He seemed 
 to be feeling pretty sad, and more so the nearer they 
 got to Joliet., Well, the Princess hoped he was. 
 
 The drive afforded no incidents, let alone any 
 misadventures. Now that she was getting back 
 into the movies again life seemed to be ironing itself 
 
THE RETURN OF THE PRINCESS 313 
 
 out Into its familiar uneventful texture. They found 
 themselves in the outskirts of the town which was 
 their destination a good half-hour before their train 
 was to be expected. 
 
 "We'll stay right here In the car until the train 
 comes in," Patrick announced, as they stopped in 
 a dark little side-street near the station. "I don't 
 believe there's anyone here looking for us, but we 
 may as well play it safe." 
 
 Then, by way of winding up his connection with 
 the Princess's affairs, he paid Mr. Stokes the stipu- 
 lated price for his services and handed the rest of 
 the money over to the Princess, along with the scrap 
 of paper upon which was written, he told her, 
 Lazaref's address. 
 
 "I have explained to your mother," he added, 
 "about your agreement to buy the cottage." 
 
 "That's all right," she said rather absently. 
 
 From then on until the gleam of the approach- 
 ing locomotive headlight appeared, neither of them 
 spoke a word. But when it did she sprung a care- 
 fully planted mine under him. 
 
 She turned upon him suddenly and clutched him 
 tightly by the hand. 
 
 "Walter," she said, "I'm not going to gtt on 
 
314 REAL LIFE 
 
 that train unless you do ! Now then, are you going 
 to be my manager, or aren't you ?" 
 
 He protested that this wasn't fair, but she knew 
 just from the sort of gasp he gave that she had him. 
 
 "I know it isn't fair," she admitted. "I didn't 
 mean it to be. It's the only way to treat stubborn 
 people, I've found." 
 
 He said nothing more until the train had pulled 
 in and stopped. Then as he opened the door to the 
 Ford and stepped down he capitulated. 
 
 "I'll get on the train with you, anyhow," he 
 said. "We'll talk over the other matter at leisure.'* 
 
 "That'll do to begin on," she agreed. 
 
 But during the moment on the back platform, 
 while they waited for the porter to unlock the door 
 to the private car, she betrayed him again — broke 
 the terms of their armistice to bits. 
 
 "I'm going to tell mother you're my manager," 
 she said, "and unless you back me up. . . .Did you 
 hear what I told the chauffeur of the yellow taxi 
 you were? Well, I'll tell mother that, too." 
 
 "Good Lord ! Princess !" he cried. 
 
 By now they were in the presence of the porter 
 and Ma herself was looming in the background. 
 
THE RETURN OF THE PRINCESS 315 
 
 "That's fair enough/' the Princess insisted. 
 
 "You see, I'm leaving you your choice !" 
 * * * 
 
 [Editorial from the Chicago Tribunel 
 
 WE ARE A BOOB 
 
 In the humility of a chastened spirit we admit 
 that Miss Leda Swan has not disappeared. She 
 came into Chicago on schedule, and equally accord- 
 ing to plan she left it. Indeed, it may be said she 
 left it flat on its back. 
 
 It is announced that she spent the hours of her 
 sojourn with us in looking over a location for a pic- 
 ture and in the purchase of properties for it. We 
 hasten to offer Miss Swan the use of our local room, 
 and our reportorial staff as supernumeraries. She 
 may come up here at her convenience and shoot 
 whatever she likes. 
 
 We offer apologetic condolences to our contem- 
 poraries who followed us so confidingly down to 
 the pit into which our innocent and trusting nature 
 decoyed us. We, like the young-lady waitress of 
 recent fame, have been kidded by experts. 
 
 The End 
 
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