"I'm very much interested," said she.

"Yes, she was a curiosity," said he carelessly.

"Has she been there--long?" inquired Josephine, with a feigned
indifference that did not deceive him.

"Several months, I believe. I never noticed her until a few days ago.
And until to-day I had forgotten her. She's one of the kind it's
difficult to remember."

He fell to glancing round the house, pretending to be unconscious of the
furtive suspicion with which she was observing him. She said:

"She's your secretary now?"

"Merely a general office typewriter."

The curtain went up for the second act. Josephine fixed her attention on
the stage--apparently undivided attention. But Norman felt rather than
saw that she was still worrying about the "curiosity." He marveled at
this outcropping of jealousy. It seemed ridiculous--it _was_ ridiculous.
He laughed to himself. If she could see the girl--the obscure,
uninteresting cause of her agitation--how she would mock at herself!
Then, too, there was the absurdity of thinking him capable of such a
stoop. A woman of their own class--or a woman of its corresponding
class, on the other side of the line--yes. No doubt she had heard
things that made her uneasy, or, at least, ready to be uneasy. But this
poorly dressed obscurity, with not a charm that could attract even a man