don't know your private life; you may have reasons to help her
de--"

"Mr. Potter!" cried the distressed man. "What could be my
object? I don't know Miss Lyston off. I was only telling you the
simple truth."

"How do I know?" Potter gave him a piercing look. "People are
always trying to take advantage of me."

"But Mr. Potter, I--"

"Don't get it into your head that I am too easy, Packer! You
think you've got a luxurious thing of it here, with me, but--"
He concluded with an ominous shake of the head in lieu of words,
then returned to the centre of the stage. "Are we to be all day
getting on with this rehearsal?"

Packer flew to the table and seized the manuscript he had left
there. "All ready, sir! 'Nothing in this world but one thing can
defeat'--and so on, so on. All ready, sir!"

The star made no reply but to gaze upon him stonily, a stare
which produced another dreadful silence. Packer tried to smile,
a lamentable sight.

"Something wrong, Mr. Potter?" he finally ventured, desperately.

The answer came in a voice cracking with emotional strain: "I
wonder how many men bear what I bear? I wonder how many men