“Oh, no.... I only mean that it’s--it’s a thing which has not--occurred.... I have not thought about it, much.” “Nor wished for it?” “Oh, no.” “Still,” said Betsy, smiling, “we’re made for it, you know.... That is, if we’re quite healthy.” “I suppose so,” said Eris absently. After a silence Betsy pressed her hands, rose, looked down at her with friendly gaze. “I ought to join the others. You won’t forget to come? Please don’t: I’d like to have you with us. Good-night, Eris. Get well quickly!” As she was going out: “Make my peace with Barry Annan,” she added. “I’m in dutch with that young man.” * * * * * The slangy girl really was not. Annan, at the piano, pounding out a rag while Rosalind and Coltfoot danced, merely called out to her that the responsibility for Eris Odell was hers from that moment and if they ever found the girl in the river it was none of his doings. Betsy smiled scornfully: “I’d trust that girl anywhere,” she said. “Some day a girl like Eris will teach you a few new steps in the merry dance of life, Barry.” “What new steps?” He continued playing but looked curiously up at Betsy, who had come over beside him. “You’re so cocksure of yourself,” she said, “aren’t you, dear?” “You mean I’m a prig?” “No, just a very clever, good-looking boy with kind instincts and a fatal facility. You think you’re real. You think you write realisms. You’ll come up against the real thing some day. _Then_----” “Yes, yes, go on!” “Why,” she said, smiling at him, “then you’ll bump your complacent head, my dear. _That_ will be reality. And maybe you’ll know it again when you run into it. Maybe it will rid you of that bland grin.” “That’s a melting smile, not a grin, darling,”--pounding away vigorously. “But tell me about this ‘real thing’ that I’m to crack my noodle on.” “A girl, ducky.” “Sure. I’m cracked already on ’em all.” “The one I mean is named Nemesis and she’ll knock your silly head off.... Like that child upstairs, for example.” “She’s got a Greek name, too. I’d better remember to ‘fear the Greeks’--yes?” “Little Eris could double _you_ up.” “Wh-at?” “I don’t mean Eris in particular, dear friend. But one of her species.” “What’s her species?” “You, a writer!--and you haven’t even doped her out!” “I have, however,” he contradicted her tranquilly. “All right. Analyse her for me.” “Quantitatively?” “Certainly.” “Here she is then: clean, plucky, uneducated, obstinate, immature; and, like any other girl, perfectly pliable when properly handled by an expert.” “_You?_” “Oh, I wouldn’t say that, tweetums----” “You don’t have to say it. But I’m glad you think you’re an expert. For it’s going to be _that_ kind of girl who will some day put a crimp in you, Barry, and teach you what you don’t know anything about.” “What’s that, Rose of my Harem?”