many a Sunday's outing with the theatre folk. Jane, instinctively
aware of this, and finding in his demeanour, after examining it with
femininely jealous, microscopic eyes, nothing perfunctory, was duly
grateful. and gave him of her girlish best. She developed very
quickly after her entrance into the worid of struggle. Very soon it
was the woman and not the child who listened to the marvellous
youth's story of the wonders that would be. She never again threw
herself into his arms, and he never again called her a "little
silly." She was dimly aware of change, though she knew that the
world could hold no other man for her. But Paul was not.

And then Paul went on tour.



CHAPTER VII

PAUL had been four years on the stage. Save as a memory they had as
little influence on the colour of his after-life as his years at
Bludston or his years in the studios. He was the man born to be
king. The attainment of his kingdom alone mattered. The intermediary
phases were of no account. It had been a period of struggle,
hardship and, as far as the stage itself was concerned, disillusion.
After the first year or so, the goddess Fortune, more fickle in
Theatreland, perhaps, than anywhere else, passed him by. London had
no use for his services, especially when it learned that he aspired
to play parts. It even refused him the privilege of walking on and
understudying. He drifted into the provinces, where, when he
obtained an engagement, he found more scope for his ambitions. Often
he was out, and purchased with his savings the bread of idleness. He