"Fail?" cried Converse. "You've made a sensational hit, Sherrod, and you owe it to this prophet in petticoats. She made you. If it hadn't been for her, you'd be down there in the woods plowing hay and digging cucumbers and nobody'd know you were on earth. If I were you I'd jump up and crack my heels together, and yell like a cannibal. That's how happy I'd feel." The boy's excitement was contagious, and Jud began to lose some of his embarrassment. "I am happy, and I'd like to shout my gratification to Miss Wood," he said. "She fairly drove me to some sort of action. Without her encouragement I'm sure nothing could have induced me to try my luck here." "Oh, you would have discovered yourself some day. Genius like yours would sooner or later become a master and compelled you to obey. I merely poked you until you awoke from the dreams and began to see things as they are. And are you really living in Chicago?" Then she compelled him to tell her all about himself, his work, and his plans. She was so deeply interested that his heart glowed. As he sat and talked with her, forgetting that Converse was present, he felt himself gradually lulled into security, like that of a traveler who has crept along the edge of a precipice for miles and has reached a haven from which he can look back and laugh at the terrors. For an hour they conversed, seriously, merrily about his experiences in the city. He was a true gentleman, therefore modest; the pronoun "I" was used as sparingly as possible, and there was an absence of egotism that charmed his new-found friend. He was beginning to realize the success he had achieved in the city, but one look into his honest gray eyes proved that he was no braggadocio. She saw that she could safely compliment him on his progress; she compared him as he sat before her with the country boy she had first known, when she told him that she knew then that he was a great diamond that needed little polishing. The magnificence of his surroundings, the beauty of his hostess, the subtle influence of splendor, softened his first rough feelings of apprehension into the mellow confidence of ease and urbanity. It was all so strange and sweet that he lived it over and over again in the days that followed, before he could convince himself that he--poor Jud Sherrod--had not really been in fairyland. There was no questioning the sincerity of her admiration. Converse sat back and jealously watched the light in her eyes, and listened to the new fervor in her voice as she talked to the man whose demeanor plainly indicated that he considered her his guiding star in the journey from obscurity to light. "O, yes," she cried, suddenly, a taunting gleam coming to her eyes, "I have forgotten something quite important. What has become of the beautiful sweetheart? I never saw a prettier girl. Is she still down there?"