pounding until in my own ears it sounded like an anvil chorus. I don't
know whether I was very happy or very miserable. I would have died to hear
that voice again. It is the truth!

With a sudden sob and a sniffing that told of tears unashamed, Miss Bryant
found frivolous words to veil our emotion.

"Ladies and gentlemen," she quavered, "this is a high-class concert; three
dollars each for tickets, please. Helen, you don't know how to sing, but--
don't learn! Come Pros."--the big drops ran down her cheeks; "I've got to
look up a story in the morning."

"Wait a minute," said Reid, his long, delicately shaped fingers trembling.
"Let me recover on something."

Picking up Kitty's banjo, he smote the strings uncertainly and half sang,
half declaimed:--

"'With my Hya! Heeya! Heeya! Hullah! Haul!
Oh, the green that thunders aft along the deck!
Are you sick of towns and men? You must sign and sail again,
For it's Johnny Bowlegs, pack your kit and trek!'

"By Jove! Kipling's right; nothing like a banjo, is there? Now then, Young
Person, I'm with you. Good night; good night!"

While his voice was still echoing down the stairway, Miss Bryant came
running up again.

"Say, got a photograph of yourself, Helen?" she asked.