“It's chucked.” Then the Worm hesitated. For a moment his breath nearly failed him. He stood balancing on the brink of the unknown; and he knew he had to make the plunge. “Pete--I've got a few hundred stuck away--and, anyhow, I'm going out for a real job.” “A job! You! What kind?” “Oh--newspaper man, maybe. I want the address--who is your tailor?” Peter jotted it down. “By the way,” he said, “here's our itinerary. Stick it in your pocket.” Then he gazed at the Worm in a sort of solemn humor. “So the leopard is changing his spots,” he mused. “I don't know about that,” replied the Worm, flushing,' then reduced to a grin--as he pocketed the tailor's address--“but this particular Ethiop is sure going to make a stab at changing his skin.” CHAPTER XV--ZANIN MAKES HIMSELF FELT |SUE was in her half-furnished living-room--not curled comfortably on the couch-bed, as she would have been a month or two earlier, but sitting rather stiffly in a chair, a photograph in her listless hand. Zanin--big, shaggy, sunburnt--walked the floor. “Are you turning conventional, Sue?” he asked. “What is it? You puzzle me.” “I don't want that picture used, Jacob.” He lighted a cigarette, dropped on a wooden chair, tipped it Lack against the wall, twisted his feet around the front legs, drummed on the front of the seat with big fingers. He reached for the photograph. It was Sue herself, as she would appear in one of the more daring scenes of Nature. “It's an honest picture, Sue--right off the film.” She was very quiet. “It's the singling it out, Jacob. In the film it is all movement, action--it passes. It doesn't stay before their eyes.” A little feeling crept into her voice. “I agreed to do the film, Jacob. I'm doing it. Am I not?” “But you're drawing a rather sharp line, Sue. We've got to hit them hard with this thing. I don't expect Mann to understand. I've got to work along with him as best I can and let it go at that. But I count on you.” The legs of the chair came down with a bang. He sprang up and walked the floor again. His cigarette consumed, he lighted another with the butt, which latter he tossed into a corner of the room. Sue's eyes followed it there. She was still gazing at it when Zanin paused before her. She could feel him looking down at her. She wished it were possible to avoid discussion just now. There had been so many discussions during these crowded two years.... She raised her eyes. There were his, fixed on her. He was not tired. His right hand was plunged into his thick hair; his left hand held the cigarette. “You're none too fit, Sue.” She moved her hands in assert. “And that's something to be considered seriously. We need you fit.”