Between Friends

Why the impudence of a model should have irritated him he was at a

loss to understand--unless there lurked under that impudence a trace

of unflattering truth.

As he sat looking at her, all at once, and in an unexpected flash of

selfillumination, he realized that habit had made of him an actor;

that for a while--a long while--a space of time he could not at the

moment conveniently compute--he had been playing a role merely

because he had become accustomed to it.

Disaster had cast him for a part. For a long while he had been that

part. Now he was still playing it from sheer force of habit. His

tragedy had really become only the shadow of a memory. Already he

had emerged from that shadow into the everyday outer world. But he

had forgotten that he still wore a somber makeup and costume which

in the sunshine might appear grotesque. No wonder the world thought

him funny.

Glancing up from a perplexed and chagrined meditation he caught her

eye--and found it penitent, troubled, and anxious.

"You're quite right," he said, smiling easily and naturally; "I am

unintentionally funny. And I really didn't know it--didn't suspect

it--until this moment."

"Oh," she said quickly. "I didn't mean--I know you are often

unhappy--"

"Nonsense!"

"You are! Anybody can see--and you really do not seem to be very

old, either--when you smile--"

"I'm not very old," he said, amused. "I'm not unhappy, either. If I

ever was, the truth is that I've almost forgotten by this time what

it was all about--"

"A woman," she quoted, "between friends"--and checked herself,

frightened that she had dared interpret Quair's malice.

He changed countenance at that; the dull red of anger clouded his

visage.

"Oh," she faltered, "I was not saucy, only sorry. . . . I have been

sorry for you so long--"

"Who intimated to you that a woman ever played any part in my

career?"

"It's generally supposed. I don't know anything more than that.

But I've been--sorry. Love is a very dreadful thing," she said under

her breath.

"Is it?" he asked, controlling a sudden desire to laugh.

"Don't you think so?"

"I have not thought of it that way, recently. . . . I haven't

thought about it at all--for some years. . . . Have you?" he added,

trying to speak gravely.

"Oh, yes. I have thought of it," she admitted.

"And you conclude it to be a rather dreadful business?"