“Attractive, isn’t she?” “Think so?” So he was going to be on his guard, was he! Paula threw in the clutch viciously, jerked the lever into second speed. “Her neck was dirty.” “Crayon dust,” said Dirk. “Not necessarily,” replied Paula. Dirk turned sideways to look at her. It was as though he saw her for the first time. She looked brittle, hard, artificial—small, somehow. Not in physique but in personality. The picture was finished and delivered within ten days. In that time Dirk went twice to the studio in Ontario Street. Dallas did not seem to mind. Neither did she appear particularly interested. She was working hard both times. Once she looked as he had seen her on her first visit. The second time she had on a fresh crisp smock of faded yellow that was glorious with her hair; and high-heeled beige kid slippers, very smart. She was like a little girl who has just been freshly scrubbed and dressed in a clean pinafore, Dirk thought. He thought a good deal about Dallas O’Mara. He found himself talking about her in what he assumed to be a careless offhand manner. He liked to talk about her. He told his mother of her. He could let himself go with Selina and he must have taken advantage of this for she looked at him intently and said: “I’d like to meet her. I’ve never met a girl like that.” “I’ll ask her if she’ll let me bring you up to the studio some time when you’re in town.” It was practically impossible to get a minute with her alone. That irritated him. People were always drifting in and out of the studio—queer, important, startling people; little, dejected, shabby people. An impecunious girl art student, red-haired and wistful, that Dallas was taking in until the girl got some money from home; a pearl-hung grand-opera singer who was condescending to the Chicago Opera for a fortnight. He did not know that Dallas played until he came upon her late one afternoon sitting at the piano in the twilight with Bert Colson, the blackface comedian. Colson sang those terrible songs about April showers bringing violets, and about mah Ma-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-my but they didn’t seem terrible when he sang them. There was about this lean, hollow-chested, sombre-eyed comedian a poignant pathos, a gorgeous sense of rhythm—a something unnameable that bound you to him, made you love him. In the theatre he came out to the edge of the runway and took the audience in his arms. He talked like a bootblack and sang like an angel. Dallas at the piano, he leaning over it, were doing “blues.” The two were rapt, ecstatic. I got the blues—I said the blues—I got the this or that—the somethingorother—blue—hoo-hoos. They scarcely noticed Dirk. Dallas had nodded when he came in, and had gone on playing. Colson sang the cheaply sentimental ballad as though it were the folksong of a tragic race. His arms were extended, his face rapt. As Dallas played the tears stood in her eyes. When they had finished, “Isn’t it a terrible song?” she said. “I’m crazy about it. Bert’s going