They traveled from town to town, staying just a night or two in each place, usually drawing full houses, and Geraldine proved a great attraction, winning always so much admiration that it was a wonder her pretty little head was not turned by flattery. It might have been had not her heart been so sore over its brief, broken love-dream. To have known a man but two brief, bright, happy days, and not be able to forget him, it was absurd, she thought, in desperate rebellion against her own heart. And yet, through the busy weeks of travel, study, and acting, Harry Hawthorne's image staid in her mind, and his voice rang through her dreams, sweet and low and tender as it had always been to her whenever he spoke. In her waking hours she knew him light and false; in her dreams he was always tender and true, and inexpressibly dear. "Last night in my deep sleep I dreamed of you-- Again the old love woke in me and thrived On looks of fire, on kisses, and sweet words Like silver waters purling in a stream-- A dream--a dream!" Through all the changing days in which the silent struggle against a hopeless love went on in her young heart, Clifford Standish was ever near, patient, tender, devoted, telling her with his yearning eyes the love she was not ready to listen to yet. And in spite of herself, Geraldine found a subtle comfort in his devotion. It was a balm of healing to her proud heart, so deeply wounded by Harry Hawthorne's trifling. Many hearts have been caught in the rebound in this fashion, many true loves won. True, there are many proud ones who do not prize a love they can only have because it has been scornfully refused by another. They will say, resentfully: "I will not accept a love that is given me only because it was left by one who did not prize it." Others, more humble, will gladly accept the grateful love of a wounded heart that finds consolation in their tenderness. Clifford Standish, madly in love with Geraldine, was glad to accept such crumbs of love as might fall to him from the royal feast that had been spread for Harry Hawthorne. So he hovered by her side, he paid her the most delicate attentions, anticipating every wish, and found ample reward as he saw himself gaining in her grateful regard. At the same time the arch-traitor was intercepting the few letters that came to her, and the ones she wrote to Miss Carroll. For Geraldine had long ago gotten over her pet with her friend, since she know in her heart how dear she was to Cissy, and that the girl had advised her for her own good. Geraldine had found out that the career of an actress--even a young, pretty, and popular one--is not always strewn with roses.