_"When the girls Came out to play, Georgie-Porgie Ran away----"_ After dinner they went into the drawing-room so that Louise could play for them. A great mirror which hung at the end of the room reflected Louise on the piano bench in her baby frock. It reflected Madge, slim and gold, with a huge fan of lilac feathers. It reflected Becky--in a rose-colored damask chair, it reflected the three men in black. Years ago there had been other men and women--the Admiral's wife in red velvet and the same pearls that were now on Becky's neck---- She shuddered. As they drove home that night, the Major spoke to his wife of Becky. "The child looks unhappy." "She will be unhappy until some day her heart rests in her husband, as mine does in you. Shall I spoil you, Mark, if I talk like this?" When they reached their hotel there were letters. One was from Flora: "You asked about George. He is not with us. He has gone to Nantucket to visit some friends of his--the Merediths. He will be back next week." "The Merediths?" Madge said. "George doesn't know any--Merediths. Mark--he is following Becky." "Well, she's safe in Boston." "She is going back. On Wednesday. And he'll be there." Her eyes were troubled. "Mark," she said, abruptly, "I wonder if Randy has left New York. Call him up, please, long distance. I want to talk to him." "My darling girl, do you know what time it is?" "Nearly midnight. But that's nothing in New York. And, anyhow, if he is asleep, we will wake him up. I am going to tell him that George is at Siasconset." "But, my dear, what good will it do?" "He's got to save Becky. I know Dalton's tricks and his manners. He can cast a glamour over anything. And Randy's the man for her. Oh, Mark, just think of her money and his genius----" "What have money and genius to do with it?" "Nothing, unless they love each other. But--she cares---- You should have seen her eyes when I said he had sold his story. But she doesn't know that she cares, and he's got to make her know." "How can he make her know?" "Let her see him--now. She has never seen him as he was in New York with us, sure of himself, knowing that he has found the thing that he can do. He was beautiful with that radiant boy-look. You know he was, Mark, wasn't he?" "Yes, my darling, yes." "And I want him to be happy, don't you?" "Of course, dear heart." "Then get him on the 'phone. I'll do the rest." IV Randy, in New York, acclaimed by a crowd of enthusiasts who had read his story as a gold nugget picked up from a desert of literary mediocrity. Randy, not knowing himself. Randy, modest beyond belief. Randy, in his hotel at midnight, walking the floor with his head held high, and saying to himself, "I've done it." It seemed to him that, of course, it could not be true. The young editor who had eyed him through shell-rimmed glasses had said, "There's going to be a lot of hard work ahead--to keep up to this----"