“She told me. I knew her well in those days. Oh, use the story if you like, only don't credit it to me. She's very mad because I made a hit to-night and she didn't.” “But what was the name of her husband?” “Poor devil!--his name was--what was it, anyhow? By Jove, I can't think of it! It'll come back to me, though, and I'll let you know later. He had literary aspirations, by the way. She used to laugh at the poetry he had written about her. Poor boy!” The next night, radical changes having been effected in the burlesque, the prima donna made a more creditable showing. I happened to be at the stage door again when she came out with her maid after the performance, as I had under my guidance one of the newspaper's artists, who had been making some sketches of life behind the scenes. She was in a gayer mood than that in which she had been on the previous night. As she was entering the cab, I heard a muffled exclamation, which came from the shadow opposite the stage door. Dimly in that shadow could be seen a form with arms outstretched toward the woman, as in an involuntary gesture. The cab rolled away. The form emerged from the darkness and wearily strode by. It was that of my manuscript man. He had the same straw hat, stick, and frock coat. “That queer old chap must be really in love with her,” I thought, smiling. Such things often happen. I knew a gallery god--but that will keep. Evidently here was an amusing case, not without its aspect of pathos. Being in that vicinity on the following night, I strolled up to the stage door, merely to see whether the straw hat would be there again. There it was, patiently waiting, scourged by the most ferocious of January winds. Doubtless the man came here every night to catch a glimpse of his divinity. He was quite unobtrusive, and I was probably the only one who noticed his constant attendance. I learned at the newspaper office that he had called for the rejected manuscript bearing his name,--Ernest Ruddle. Then for a time I neither saw nor thought of him. One night, in the last of January,--the coldest of that savage winter,--I happened again to be in the corridor leading to the stage door, having come from within the theatre in advance of my friend the comedian, with whom I was to have supper at the Actors' Athletic Club. The actress's cab was waiting. The dark little portion of the world back there was deserted. Along the corridor, through which the sound of chorus girls' laughter came, strolled the comedian, his cigar already lighted and behind it his cheerful, hearty, smooth-shaven visage appearing ruddy from the recent washing off of “make-up.” “Hello!” he began, thrusting his hand into his overcoat pockets. “By the way, while I think of it, I just passed Miss Moran coming from the dressing-room, and suddenly that name came back to me, the name of her husband. It was a peculiar name,--Ernest Ruddle.”