There are dumb creatures that let themselves be slain without resistance; but in their doomed eyes is something that the slayer never, never can forget. And, as Annan looked at this girl, something of his masculine egotism and arrogance became troubled. He said in a more subdued voice: “After you are firmly established in your profession, we can think about marriage, can’t we?” “I always think about it.... I often wonder if you can wait.” “I suppose that I must.... How long, Eris?” “I don’t know.... Darling! I don’t know----” Suddenly she took his head in her arms and kissed him passionately, strained him to her convulsively. “I don’t want you to have a living corpse for a wife,” she said tremulously. “That’s what I’d be if I stopped work now. I’d be a dead, inert, mindless thing. I couldn’t love. Let us go on this way. I must have my freedom.... I’ll come to you when I’m ready, Barry.... There’ll come a time when I’ll have to have you to go on at all. I’ll not be able to work without you.... There’ll come such a time.... Then, if I don’t have you, I shall be unable to work at all.... Work will stop. I _know_ it.... If only you will understand....” It seemed that he did understand. He said he did, anyway. But he also wanted their engagement to be understood. And she promised him to consult his lawyer as soon as work permitted and find out what could be done to eliminate from her life the last traces of Eddie Carter, alias E. Stuart Graydon. For Eris never expected to lay eyes again upon the nimble Mr. Graydon. But it is the unexpected that usually happens, particularly if it’s disagreeable. CHAPTER XXV Her first picture--from a popular novel of the hour called “The Bird of Prey”--was finished and ready for cutting, except for picking up a mass of ragged ends. Few sets had been knocked down, for there were re-takes necessary--accidents due to Shunk or to Creevy, and charged to everybody else from door-keeper to star. The barn-like studio was in disorder and it rang all day with a hell of dissonance--infernal hammering, trample of heavy feet, the racket of hoarse voices, scrape of props and electric cables over the wood flooring, and the high-pitched, spiteful scolding of Ratford Creevy--as though a noisy mouth could ever remedy confusion resulting from mental incapacity. Smull came every day to take Eris to lunch--such frequent consultation being both customary and advisable, he informed her. As a result the girl was a target for gossip and curiosity, sneered at by some, leered at by others, but generally fawned on because of suspected “pull with the main guy.” Courted, flattered, deferred to by one and all, she was inexperienced enough to believe in such universal friendliness, innocent enough to entertain no suspicion of these less-fortunates who were kind to her; of Albert Smull’s unvarying and eager cordiality. The girl was radiantly happy, despite misgivings regarding Mr. Creevy.