Jane went home in such a stir of excitement that she could not sleep at all. The pageant and her success were merely the background for her conversation with Martin Christiansen. He had understood her, he had admired her, not because she looked well in the costume Jerry had designed, but because she had done her part with distinction, as he said. It delighted her to remember how frankly she had talked to him, even though she knew he was a most distinguished man of letters, critic and essayist. She had been used, in her mind, to set aside the great as a race apart from other humans, like the gods, and yet she, Jane Judd, had talked freely with one of them, told him her secret ambitions. She spent the night in happy waking dreams.

But in the morning she laid them away, with her Salome costume. In her brown dress, with her hair combed straight back, she was plain Jane Judd again. She had promised to go to Miss Roberts in time to get her breakfast, and help her dress. On the way she determined that the part she had played in Jerry's show must make no difference in her relations with any of them. If Bobs or Jerry tried to express their gratitude by any increase of friendliness, she would show them that she did not want it.

She came into Miss Roberts's studio with her costume in a big box.

"Is that you, Jane Judd?"

"Yes. Good-morning."

"Come here, quickly."

Jane hurried into the bedroom, in alarm.

"Sit down and tell me everything that happened last night. Was it a success?"

"Oh, yes. Everybody seemed to like it."

"Was Jerry repaid for his trouble?"

"I think so. I didn't talk to him about it."

"What did you think of Mrs. Abercrombie Brendon?"

"She is important, and has no manners."

"Did she snub you?"

"No. She wasn't aware of me. There was a Miss Morton, too, Miss Althea Morton, who seemed to be a great friend of Mr. Paxton's."

"Beautiful?"

"No, only pretty."

"Why didn't you talk to Jerry afterward?"

"I came home."

"Didn't Jerry look after you?"

"There was no need for him to look after me. He was busy. I just came home."

She began the preparations for breakfast.

"But Jane, did you get through your part all right?"

"Oh, yes."

"Did they like you?"

"I suppose so; they clapped."

"Jane, you clam, I'll wait for Jerry's version."

"Um-m."

When Jane brought in the tray with breakfast, Bobs looked at her closely.

"Jane, how can you let yourself be so plain, when you know now that you're good looking?"

"It's better for me to be plain," she answered simply.

"Better? Why?"

"I like to be inconspicuous."

"Daughters of Eve! Jane, you're not human."

Jane made no answer. She went about her work, as usual, and Bobs's various efforts to draw her out were vain. In the afternoon Jerry arrived.

"Hello, Jerry," Bobs called. "Sorry I'm not up to piping. 'Lo, the conquering hero comes.'"

"How's your health?"

"Hang my health! How was your show? I can't get a word out of Jane Judd."

"Is she here?"

"Yes."

"She was the big hit of the thing. Miss Jane Judd," he shouted.

She appeared at the door.

"Good-afternoon, Mr. Paxton. I have the costume in a box and I'll leave it at your studio."

"Why did you run away?"

"I had nothing more to do, so I went home."

"That line might be used as Jane's epitaph," laughed Bobs.

"But everybody wanted to meet you. I rushed about looking for you, until old Christiansen told me you had gone home."

"Martin Christiansen?" inquired Bobs.

"Yes. Mrs. Brendon said he laid the praise on thick. Not often you get him to say a decent thing. He raved about Jane Judd."

"You were flying high, Jane," Bobs commented.

"I can never thank you enough. It was bully of you to do it, and you gave a great performance. Would you mind telling me where you studied acting?"

"I haven't studied it. I'm glad I didn't mix things up for you," she replied, and went back to her work.

"I can't get her," Jerry remarked. "She was really immense, Bobs. Got more applause than any of them. Do you suppose she is an actress? Who the deuce is Jane?"

"I don't know and I can't find out. She is baffling. She will not talk about herself. I think she despises us all, rather. Think of knowing you were a beauty, and going back to looking as she does to-day. She says it's better for her to be plain."

"I don't know how her looks ever got by me. Old Christiansen sweetly suggested that it was because she was not the obvious type. He asked all about her."

"How exciting! Tell me about the whole thing, Jerry, from the very first."

He obeyed, making a good story of it, with thumbnail sketches of characters as he went along. Bobs was hugely amused. When he came to the supper which Mrs. Brendon gave after the performance to a chosen few, she interrupted him.

"Who is Althea Morton, Jerry?"

"She's a great friend of Mrs. Brendon's."

"Are you going to paint her, Jerry?"

"Probably. I begin on Mrs. Brendon's portrait very soon, and several other commissions will follow, I think."

"I told you that they would get you, that crowd."

"Don't worry, Bobs. This is my opportunity and I am going to grab it."

"Good luck, Jerry. Morituri Salutamus."

"Don't be a bally ass, Bobs. I've got to have a tea for the dear ladies next week. Will you and Jinny take charge?"

"Yes, if I can get down the hall to your door. I'm all in bits to-day."

"We'll manage it. Friday is the day."

"Going to have Jane?"

"Of course. How could any one have a party without Jane?"

"Doesn't it complicate it somewhat that she appeared in the pageant as one of them, as it were? Wouldn't it make the dear souls mad to find her acting as waitress at your party? They'd treat her like a dog."

"I hadn't thought of that. Would she understand, though, if I left her out?"

"She'll understand. I'll keep her here for the day, on some pretext."

So it appeared that, whether she would or not, there had come a change over her standing in the artist group. When Friday came, and Jerry's party was in progress, she sat darning in Bobs's room, thinking it over. She was not indignant at the situation; rather, it amused her. A knock came at the door. When she opened it, Martin Christiansen stood there.

"I want to see Miss Roberts," he began. "It is you, Miss Judd," he added delightedly.

"Good-afternoon, Mr. Christiansen. Mr. Paxton is having a tea, and Miss Roberts is pouring it."

"I thought she was still invalided."

"She is better."

"But are you not going to the tea of Mr. Paxton?"

"No."

"May I come in?"

"Yes, of course."

She admitted him, and when he was seated, she went on with her darning.

"I did not suppose I should find you so soon. This is my lucky day, Friday."

She smiled at him.

"Do you live here?"

"No."

"What are you doing, may I ask?"

"I am darning the stockings of Miss Katrina Roberts."

"Why does she not darn her own?"

"It is incompatible with the artistic temperament," laughed Jane.

"Humph, I am not so sure. What do you think of the artistic temperament?"

"I think it's a good excuse for egotists."

Christiansen's big laugh boomed forth.

"That's my own idea, too. Selfishness, bad temper, irresponsibility, all piled up at the door, with that label. Do these folk interest you?"

"Yes. They are very lovable. So gay or so sad. Generous when they have money; unconcerned when they have none."

"Do you write about them?"

"Sometimes."

"I'd like to see what you say."

"I do not write well yet. I am still amateur."

"How long have you been writing?"

"Five or six years."

"Were you in earnest when you said that you had not published anything?"

"Yes. I have never even offered anything."

"Why?"

She told him of her talk with the editor, when she came first to New York, of his advice, of his words of inspiration about the art to which she wished to devote herself. He listened with deep interest.

"Ah! that was good. That was sound idealism. And what have you done to prepare yourself?"

"Read much, tried to absorb the best styles; and I have written all the time."

"About what?"

"People."

"People you know, or people you create?"

"Both; but more of the ones I create."

"I wish you would let me see something. It would give me pleasure and it might help you."

"Of course it would, but I wouldn't dare show you my things," she began.

"My child, the time comes when the artist becomes too self-conscious, with no criticism, no audience as corrective. Suppose we make a compact of friendship together; then we can freely give and take from each other."

A sudden mist clouded her eyes. She let him see it, in the direct glance she gave him. It touched him deeply, it suggested so poignantly the woman's loneliness.

"You agree?" he asked gently.

"Oh, yes."

"The World and his Wife are my acquaintances, but of friends I have few. Is it so with you?"

"I have none."

"How can that be? I feel that you would have a talent for friendship."

"I believe I would have. But I am poor. The things I might offer would not interest the people I know."

"But these artists—aren't they congenial?"

"Miss Roberts would be, but you see I occupy an anomalous position here. I'm an upper servant, who is no servant. True to my group, I have my class distinctions," she smiled. "Miss Roberts ignores them. She would be my friend if I would let her. Some of the others would, too, I think."

"Pride is one of the strongest traits in human character, and one of the least desirable; don't you think so? Pride of possession, pride of class, of birth, of accomplishment; why do we build up these barriers between us, when the whole process of life should be to break them down, to get closer to one another, to understand and help?"

"You think pride is out of fashion?"

"Just that. We treasure so many outgrown virtues, which have become vices. Patriotism, for instance. The rulers of Europe crash half the world into war by decking out this old scarecrow. My country, right or wrong, better than your country: our citizens, better than your citizens. What nonsense! Europe fights to protect the fatherland. What, in fact, is Europe protecting? The greed of kings for power and territory?"

"I know, and the people who make the war, and who gain by it, are never the ones who fight it."

"Exactly. An Englishman said to me the other day: 'The British Government's idea of the way for a rich Briton to be a patriot is to induce the poor men who work for him to go to war.'"

"It isn't much of a national virtue, if it is confined to a class," Jane agreed.

"It won't do. If I thought that nationalism would go on to the scrap heap, at the end of the war, along with the power of kings, I'd believe that the whole holocaust was purposeful, not accident."

"But what are you going to do with patriotism, Mr. Christiansen?"

"Make it over. You can't psychologize it out of us, even if we admit that it is bad. It is an instinct, woven of many other instincts—pugnacity, group loyalty, egoism. But we can substitute the bigger group for the smaller; we can grow up to an international patriotism that shall be as fierce as that we know now, one that will conserve instead of destroy."

"But how can we educate people to your new sort?"

"They are educating themselves now. The capitalists and the workers begin to see that war does not pay. Women have always known it. When peace is declared we will organize that sentiment of intelligent selfishness into altruism."

"Can we make a new world, with only old human nature to build it with, do you think?"

"After all, old human nature is God-stuff, isn't it? We can do anything with it, if we can sweep out the old traditional beliefs, the bogus virtues, the Victorian moralities, and get a good twentieth-century fresh start."

"It frightens one, doesn't it? It's such a big job."

"So it is, and we can't more than start this afternoon," he laughed. "To come back to us, when may I have some manuscript?"

"I will choose some things to-night, thanks."

"Good. Here is a card with the address. Will you tell Miss Roberts that the man who picked her up after the accident came to inquire for her health?"

"She will be disappointed."

"As for me, I am well satisfied with the call I have made. I shall see you soon, my friend. Good-bye."

"Good-bye," said Jane.

Martin Christiansen startled pedestrians on the way uptown by the big boom of his humming, but in the shadowy studio Jane Judd sobbed her heart out for joy, because she had found a friend.