Her voice dragged a little at the end, for he was looking at her as if she were a stranger, or as if he were trying to make her feel like a stranger to him. With a moan, she lifted her arms and crept so close to him that she could lay her head against his breast. “Aren’t you—going to kiss me, David? I’ve waited so long, so long—” She felt him stiffen, then his hands came up slowly and fastened upon hers. But it was only to remove her hands from his shoulders— “You must forget me, Sally, or remember me only when you remember Sally Ford and Pitty Sing and Jan and Pop Bybee. We all belong together in your memory, and none of us belongs in Sally Barr’s life.” His voice was level, heavy, not the young, tender, musical voice that had made love to her during the carnival days. She took a backward step, a little drunkenly, and the face she lifted bravely for whatever blow he was going to deal her was pinched and white, the eyes blue-black with pain. “Don’t you love me any more, David?” “I’m a poor man and I’m not a fortune-hunter,” David answered grimly. “I—don’t know Sally Barr.” She shrank from him then, backward, step by step, so stricken, so white-faced, that the boy clenched his hands in agony. They were still staring at each other when the door opened, and an almost forgotten but now shockingly familiar voice sang out nonchalantly: “Bobby Proctor told me I’d find you here, Sally.” It was Arthur Van Horne, whom she had not seen since the last day of the carnival in Capital City. “Please don’t go, David!” Sally implored, but he mistook her distress, occasioned by Arthur Van Home’s entirely unexpected appearance, for a plea for a longer interview which he knew would only cause them both pain. He shook his head dumbly and strode to the door. He paused there a moment to bow jerkily first toward Sally, then toward Van Horne, who was watching the scene with amused, cynical eyes. Pride mercifully came to Sally’s aid then; she closed her lips firmly over the question she had been about to fling at David with desperate urgency. She even managed to wave her hand with what she hoped was airy indifference as David opened the door. “So!” Van Horne chuckled when the door had closed softly. “It’s still Sally and David, isn’t it? I’m glad I was vouchsafed a glimpse of this paragon. Astonishingly good-looking in a Norse Viking sort of way, but rather a bull in a China shop here, isn’t he? But I presume that is why Enid fondly hoped when she allowed him to come. I gather that she did invite him? A very clever woman, Enid. I’ve always said so.” Sally’s teeth closed hurtingly over her lower lip, but she said nothing. The pain and horror of David’s uncompromising rebuff were still too great to permit room in her heart for fear of Van Horne. Of course he had recognized her at once, had undoubtedly recognized her from her pictures in the papers, but what did it matter now? David was gone—gone—He had not even kissed her—