After Polly halfway promised that she would find the shortest, most forceful method of requesting marriage to a blind hero who could become a sublime poet in deathless stone and bronze, Ernestine departed to find Caleb in a changed, softened mood in which he admitted that when a chap witnessed such a tragedy—and such rose-colored clouds encircling it, who saw what Thurley had done, forgetting herself and her career, and the men at the Fincherie quietly getting used to themselves and ‘life as usual’ all about, it made him realize what a smashing story could be written about such real people. Caleb had awakened to his possibility of being a vigorous realist. Thurley turned off the lights in her room and opened the window to commune with the genial moon. She wondered if Bliss Hobart would ever be in dire need of gray angel courtship.... The memory of Miss Clergy’s message, “Tell Thurley to use her own judgment,” caused the color to flood her tired cheeks ... she almost hoped he would not—it would be so very splendid to have Bliss Hobart plead his own cause ... she was only a small part gray angel, she admitted, she was mostly—just Thurley! CHAPTER XXXIX Thurley returned to New York in October to sing some engagements. The public clamored for her until one engagement seemed naturally to lead to another and after the signing of the armistice, Thanksgiving Day confronted her, recalling her to the Fincherie to help the celebration to be as perfect as possible. Besides, Lorraine had written that Dan was home, a slight heart trouble as the reason, but otherwise the same splendid Dan, and Lorraine was waiting to confide in Thurley all that had happened. “So you cannot be induced to stay any longer?” Bliss asked, as she came into his studio to say good-by. “I’m not as needed here as at the Fincherie—and then, Dan Birge is home and I want to see him,” she admitted honestly. “So don’t dare dig up another date for me until after the New Year. I must stay at home that long for I’m to be Mrs. Santa Claus, you see; even he has been ousted by the new women!” “I won’t see you for a long time,” he objected drolly. “And you look to-day like the little girl of six years ago when you explained how you wintered with the circus and then sang hymns until I thought I had discovered the Yogi trick of having one’s soul slip out of the body and wander at will—that I was listening at Saint Peter’s keyhole—” “So I please you,” she answered seriously. “Of course. I knew you would,” his hand touched the little idol which had always remained on his desk. “It was just that I dreaded the inevitable transition period; so many women never rise above it to find the gray angel part of themselves—” “Ernestine did,” Thurley murmured. “Ah, she is a gray angel of gray angels! Fancy her making Caleb stop his fulsome tales and write real things!” “But she hasn’t played a concert! Must she sacrifice her talent, too?”