After that, she watched him with increasing interest and, when he turned his head in that listening attitude, a curious, resentful light came into her eyes. Presently, she asked abruptly, "What is it that you hear?" "I thought I heard music," he answered, coloring slightly and turning to his work with suddenly absorbing interest. "The violin that so enchanted you when I came to break the spell?" she persisted playfully--though the light in her eyes was not a playful light. "Yes," he answered shortly; stepping back and shading his eyes with his hand for a careful look at his canvas. "And don't you know who it is?" "You said it was an old professor somebody." "That was my _first_ guess," she retorted. "Was I right?" "I don't know." "But it comes from that little box of a house, next door, doesn't it?" "Evidently," the artist answered. Then, laying aside his palette and brushes he said abruptly, "That is all for to-day; thank you." "Oh, so soon!" she exclaimed; and the regret in her voice was very pleasing to the man who was decidedly not a mechanical something. She started eagerly forward toward the easel. But the artist, with a quick motion, drew a curtain across the canvas, to hide his work; while he checked her with--"Not yet, please. I don't want you to see it until I say you may." "How mean of you," she protested; charmingly submissive. Then, eagerly--"And do you want me to-morrow? You do, don't you?" "Yes, please--at the same hour." When the Quaker Maiden's dress was safely hidden under her wrap, Mrs. Taine stood, for a moment, looking thoughtfully about the studio; while the artist waited at the door, ready to escort her to the automobile. "I am going to love this room," she said slowly; and, for the first time, her voice was genuinely sincere, with a hint of wistfulness in its tone that made him regard her wonderingly. She went to him impulsively. "Will you, when you are famous--when you are a great artist and all the great and famous people go to you to have their portraits painted--will you remember poor me, I wonder?" "Am I really going to be famous?" he returned doubtfully. "Are you so sure that this picture will mean success?" "Of course I am sure--I _know_. You want to succeed don't you?" Aaron King returned her look, for a moment, without answering. Then, with a quick, fierce determination that betrayed a depth of feeling she had never before seen in him, he exclaimed, "Do I want to succeed! I--I must succeed. I tell you I _must_." And the woman answered very softly, with her hand upon his arm, "And you shall--you shall." * * * * * Conrad Lagrange and Czar found the artist on the front porch, pulling moodily at his pipe. "Is it all over for to-day?" asked the novelist as he stood looking down upon the young man with that peculiarly piercing, baffling gaze.