She spoke with a pretty humility, evidently meaning what she said, and
yet there was such a delightful young triumph in her manner, such an
invulnerable consciousness of artistic success, that Kendal felt a secret
stir of amusement as he recalled the criticisms which among his own set
he had most commonly heard applied to her.

'Yes, indeed,' he answered pleasantly. 'I suppose every artist feels the
same. We all do if we are good for anything--we who scribble as well as
you who act.'

'Oh yes,' she said, with kindly, questioning eyes, 'you write a great
deal? I know; Mr. Wallace told me. He says you are so learned, and that
your book will be splendid. It must be grand to write books. I should
like it, I think, better than acting. You need only depend on yourself;
but in acting you're always depending on some one else, and you get in
such a rage when all your own grand ideas are spoilt because the leading
gentleman won't do anything different from what he has been used to, or
the next lady wants to show off, or the stage manager has a grudge
against you! Something always happens.'

'Apparently the only thing that always happens to you is success,' said
Kendal, rather hating himself for the cheapness of the compliment. 'I
hear wonderful reports of the difficulty of getting a seat at the
_Calliope_; and his friends tell me that Mr. Robinson looks ten years
younger. Poor man! it is time that fortune smiled on him.'

'Yes, indeed; he had a bad time last year. That Miss Harwood, the
American actress, that they thought would be such a success, didn't come
off at all. She didn't hit the public. It doesn't seem to me that the
English public is hard to please. At that wretched little theatre in