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 trace of a smile. "Some day I shall be great and famous. I mean to be."

By now Clarence was leaning forward holding his head in his hands. His glasses had slipped from his pointed nose and lay forgotten in his lap. Presently he interrupted the music to say, mournfully, "And then I shall be Mr. Tolliver . . . husband of a famous woman."

As though amazed by this sudden resentment, Ellen ceased playing for an instant and regarded him with a curious penetrating look.

"It won't be like that," she said. And there entered her voice an unaccustomed note of warmth. It was the pity again, an old sense of sorrow.

"Besides," she continued, "the day will come when I must go to Paris. . . . You see, I will have to polish off there . . . I can live with Lily. It won't cost anything. You see, we can't forget that. We have to think of it. It's nothing new. . . . I told you that in the beginning."

For a long time there was no sound in the room save that of Ellen's music, soft, beautiful, appealing, as if she used it now as a balm for the wounds caused by all she had been forced to say. Presently her strong beautiful fingers wandered into the Fire Music and the tiny room was filled with a glorious sound of flame and sparks, wild yet subdued, thrilling yet mournful. And then for a time it seemed that, wrapped in the color of the music, they were both released and swept beyond the reach of all these petty troubles. When at last the music ceased, Clarence roused himself slowly and, coming to her side, knelt there and placed his arms about her waist, pressing his head against her. There was in the gesture something pitiful and touching, as if he felt that by holding her thus he might be able to keep her always. The little vein in his throat throbbed with violence. There were times when his adoration became a terrible thing. 