Terry Riordan arranged an interview for Ruth with the Sunday editor of the Express, with the result that she found herself promised to do a weekly page of theatrical sketches, beginning the first of the year, and she discovered the unique joy of having real work which was wanted and for which she would receive money. Also she discovered that association with a newspaper and connection with a weekly stipend gave her a prestige with her fellow students which no amount of splendid amateur effort would have won for her. Dorothy and Nels told every one they knew about “Ruth Mayfield’s splendid success,” and Professor Burroughs congratulated her.

“It is always sad to see a student with a real gift neglecting it for a fancied talent,” he said, “and it is equally satisfying when any of our students wisely follow the line of work for which they are fitted. We don’t want to turn out dabblers, and too often that’s what art students become.”

Ruth would have looked forward to the beginning of the next year eagerly, had she been thinking only of herself, for her new work was throwing her much in the company of Terry Riordan, who was taking her to the theatre every night, so that she would become familiar with the appearance and mannerisms of the popular actresses and actors. Of course he was doing it only because he was such a kind-hearted man and because he wanted to help her, but even Ruth knew that if she had not been a rather pleasant companion he would not have taken so much interest in helping her. His cheerfulness puzzled her. He seemed so brave and happy—but perhaps it was merely the forced gaiety of a man who is trying to forget.

It was not, however, her own affairs that interested her most. Terry had found a producer for his play and despite the lateness of the season, rehearsals for it were to begin in January. Gloria had been offered the leading rÔle, and with characteristic perverseness had said that she was not at all sure that she wanted it, information that Terry refused to convey to the manager. This, coupled with the fact that Gloria was now constantly in the company of Prince Aglipogue, made Ruth remember vividly her conversation with George. Her beauty, her restlessness, her changeful moods seemed to increase from day to day. She was always kind to Ruth, but she was very seldom with her. Invitations that a month before would have been thrown away unread were now accepted and Gloria dashed about from one place to another, always with Prince Aglipogue in her wake. His ponderous attentions seemed to surround her like a cage and she, like a darting humming-bird, seemed ever to be struggling to escape and ever recognizing the bars that enclosed her.

Terry and Ruth, returning very late from supper after the theatre, would sometimes find her sitting in semi-darkness, while the Prince sang to her, but in such brief glimpses there was no chance for intimate conversation between the two women. Alone with Terry at the theatre or in some restaurant, Ruth almost forgot the shadow hanging over the house on Gramercy Park. Terry was so gay and amusing, so healthful and normal in his outlook, and wherever they went they met his friends, until Ruth began to feel like a personage. It was all very pleasant. Late hours had forced her to appear less and less often at the morning class, but she was always at the League in the afternoon and she began to wonder whether she would not give it up altogether as soon as she actually began her work for the Express. She had tried to tell Terry about her talk with George; but a few hours away from George and his snake worship and the sight of George in his rÔle of servant had restored what Terry called his mental balance, and he no longer regarded him as dangerous. He was beginning to be a bit ashamed of even listening to Ruth’s fears.

“It’s only natural that you should be nervous—that we should both have been a bit impressed, it was so weird and unexpected, but after all George is just a servant, and the snake is probably a harmless reptile, such as one sees in any circus. I do not think that he is a bad servant and that he does not regard Gloria as a servant should; he’s impertinent and disagreeable, if you like, but I don’t believe he has the slightest thing to do with Professor Pendragon’s illness. How could he?”

He talked thus until Ruth despaired of securing his assistance. Terry had given Gloria a contract to sign, which she persistently refused to consider. Finally he appealed to Ruth about it.

“Can’t you make Gloria sign it?” he said. “She seemed keen enough before we found a producer and before the thing was cast, and now that she has the contract before her, she seems to have lost all interest. I can’t imagine what’s wrong. Of course temperament covers a multitude of sins, but she never was temperamental about her work.”

“Perhaps she’s decided to really abandon the stage,” said Ruth.

They were having supper together—Ruth didn’t know where. One of the delightful things about Terry was that he never asked her where she wanted to go. He didn’t even tell her where they were going. He just took her.

Terry looked at her in amazement. “Leave the stage?”

“Did it ever occur to you that Gloria might marry Prince Aglipogue?” she asked.

Terry answered with a laugh:

“My dear child, you’ve thought so much about Gloria and George that you’re beginning to think of impossibilities. Gloria wouldn’t marry a man like that, and if she did she’d have to stay on the stage to support him. The house, of course, belongs to her, but the income from her other husband—I forget his name—would certainly stop if she remarried.”

“I know; I thought it was preposterous too, but she’s always with him, and George told me that Gloria would marry Aglipogue.”

“Servants’ gossip, or perhaps he did it to annoy you. Did you tell Gloria?”

“No; I never get a chance to talk to her any more.”

“If you told her it might make her angry enough to dismiss him. Gloria hates being discussed. Is the Prince going to the Christmas party?”

“Of course; he goes everywhere that Gloria goes. I know you think that I am foolish and superstitious, but I can’t help thinking that George has some power over Gloria—that what he says is true—that he’s forcing her to marry Prince Aglipogue and that he is responsible for Professor Pendragon’s strange illness. The first time I saw George with the snake was almost three months ago—that same night Professor Pendragon became paralysed; the next time was just a month later and at the same time Professor Pendragon’s paralysis became suddenly worse. It was at the dark of the moon—”

The last words were spoken almost in a whisper and when she paused Terry did not speak, but sat waiting for her to go on.

“I know George hasn’t worshipped the snake since that time, for I’ve been in the house every night and you can always tell because of the incense that fills the hall and lingers there for hours. Christmas Eve will be the next dark of the moon. I know, for I’ve looked it up. We’ll all be in the Berkshires then, at the Peyton-Russells’. George will be there, too—and I’m afraid—I’m afraid.”

Terry still sat silent looking at her with an expression of helpless amazement. His blue eyes were troubled and doubting and she knew that while he did not quite disbelieve her, he was by no means convinced, that her fears were justified. It was all too bizarre and unusual. The only trace of fear in his eyes was for herself, not for Gloria, or Professor Pendragon. She had been bending eagerly toward him. Now she sank back with a little helpless sigh. Instantly Terry’s hand reached across the table and caught her own in a comforting grip.

“Tell me what you want me to do, Ruth; I’ll do anything. I’ll do anything for you—anything in or out of reason. I don’t understand all this talk about snakes and black magic, but whatever you want done, you can depend on me.”

The blood rushed into Ruth’s cheeks in a glow of happiness. Something deeper than friendship thrilled in his voice. For a moment she forgot Gloria, and believed that she was looking into the eyes of her own acknowledged lover. Then she remembered. His words, even his eyes told her that he did, but it could not be true. For a moment she could not speak. She must think of Gloria first and herself afterward, but she wanted to prolong her dream a little while. Finally she told him what she had decided in her own mind was the only thing that Terry could do for her. She knew that he did not believe that George was menacing the life of Professor Pendragon, or that he was influencing Gloria to marry Prince Aglipogue, but even though he did not love her, he would do whatever she asked.

“I want you to get me a revolver, Terry; I want a revolver—one of those little ones—before we go to the Christmas party.”

She did not quite understand the curious “let down” expression on Terry’s face, when she made her request.

“You don’t want to shoot George or the snake?” he asked, smiling.

“I don’t want to shoot any one or any thing unless—anyway I’d feel much more comfortable if I had a little revolver.”

“You shall have one; I’ll call it a Christmas present; but can you shoot?”

“I don’t know. I suppose I could hit things if they weren’t too far away or too small.”

“If you accidentally kill any of your friends I shall feel morally responsible, but I suppose I’ll just have to take a chance. Do you by any chance want the thing to be loaded?”

“Of course,” said Ruth, ignoring his frivolous tone.

They went home together almost in silence. Ruth did not know what occupied Terry’s thoughts, but she herself was wondering if she could find the courage to ask Terry to save Gloria from George and Aglipogue, by marrying her himself. It was all very well to be unselfish in love, but for some weeks at least it seemed to her that Terry had given up all effort to interest Gloria. If he would only make an effort he might save Gloria from the Prince and win happiness for himself, but despite her generous resolves, she could not bring herself to advise him to “speak for himself.”

They could hear Prince Aglipogue singing as she unlocked the door of the house on Gramercy Square. The sound of his voice and the piano covered the opening and closing of the door, so that they stood looking in on Gloria and her guest without themselves being observed. The song was just ending—Prince Aglipogue at the piano, her eyes wide and if she heard the music she did not see the singer. There was a trance-like expression in her eyes and when, the song ending, they saw Aglipogue draw her to the seat beside him and lift his face to kiss her, with one movement Terry and Ruth drew back toward the outer door.

“Guess I’d better go,” whispered Terry.

“Yes; you saw George was right. They didn’t see us—don’t forget my revolver.”

She closed the door after Terry, this time with a loud bang that could not fail to be heard and as she turned back she saw, far down the hall, two red eyes gleaming at her, like the eyes of a cat. She wondered if George had been watching too, and if his quick ears caught her whispered words to Terry.

Gloria called her name before she entered the room, almost like old times, but Prince Aglipogue did not seem to be particularly pleased to see her.

“You were singing,” she said to him. “Please don’t stop because I’ve come. I love to hear you.”

“Thank you, but it is late for more music; and it is late, too, for little girls who study, to be up even for the sake of music.”

Even a week ago he would not have dared speak to her like that. He sat staring at her now, out of his insolent, oily black eyes, as if she were really a troublesome child. For a moment anger choked her voice and she half expected Gloria to speak for her, but Gloria was still looking at Aglipogue, the strange trance-like expression in her eyes, and Ruth became calm. If Prince Aglipogue chose to be rude she could be impervious to rudeness.

“I’m not trying to make the morning classes any more, Prince Aglipogue, so I can stay up as long as I like, but perhaps you’re tired of singing.”

It was Aglipogue who looked at Gloria now as if he expected her to send Ruth away, but she said nothing, sitting quite still with her long hands folded in her lap, a most uncharacteristic pose, and a faint smile on her lips. She seemed to have forgotten both of them. It seemed incredible that less than five minutes before Ruth had seen her bend her head to meet the lips of the fat singer—incredible and horrible.

“Yes, I’m tired—of singing,” said Aglipogue after a pause. He rose and lifted one of Gloria’s lovely hands and kissed it. Simultaneously George appeared at the door with his hat and stick. It seemed to Ruth that under his air of great deference and humility George was sneering at the Prince. Gloria, seemingly only half roused from her trance or reverie, rose also in farewell and seemed to struggle to concentrate on her departing guest.

“Tomorrow,” he said, bending again over her hand.

“Yes, tomorrow.”

He went out without again speaking to Ruth, who waited breathless until she heard the closing of the outer door. Gloria watched him disappear, and then lifted her arms high above her head, stretching her superb body up to its full length like a great Persian cat just waking from a nap.

“What are you doing up at this hour, Ruth?” She spoke as if seeing Ruth for the first time.

“I went to the theatre with Terry, you know, and then we went to supper afterward and I came in fifteen minutes ago. I’m not a bit tired.”

“I am, horribly, of everything.”

“It’s only Prince Aglipogue who’s been boring you. No wonder you’re tired of him. If he’d only sing behind a curtain so that one didn’t have to look at him, he would be quite lovely,” said Ruth. She spoke thus with the intention of making Gloria tell what she really thought of the Prince. Gloria sank back on her chair by the piano and rested her chin on her folded hands, her elbows on her knees. Unlike most large women she seemed able to assume any attitude she chose without appearing ungraceful.

“You don’t like Aggie, do you?”

She was looking at Ruth now with something of her normal expression in her eyes.

“I don’t exactly dislike him,” said Ruth. “He’s all right as a singer or a pianist or a painter, but as a man he is singularly uninteresting, isn’t he?”

“He is horribly stupid—I—” Suddenly her expression changed and she was on her feet again, walking restlessly up and down the room: “I’m going to marry him; he’s going to South America on a concert tour and I’ll go with him—I’m so tired of everything; I want to get away.”

Involuntarily Ruth had also risen, bewildered at the sudden change in Gloria’s manner. Through the open doorway she could see George standing in the dimly lighted hall beyond, his red eyes gleaming, fixed on Gloria’s moving figure. She thought she understood, at least in part, the reason for the sudden change and though she was trembling with the unreasoning fear that assails the bravest in the face of the mysterious and unknown, she forced herself to move across the room so that she stood between George in the hall, and Gloria. She could almost feel his malignant gaze on her back as she stood in the doorway, but she did not falter.

“If you do that, Gloria, it will mean that you can’t work in Terry’s play—It will mean giving up everything—your career and your income. Does Prince Aglipogue know that?”

Gloria paused in her restless walk and looked at her from beneath her troubled brows.

“I don’t care about the career; I’m tired of the stage, but what difference will the income make? It’s such a little one, you know.”

“Still it may make a difference with Aglipogue, and if you give up your career and your income you will be dependent on him. That should make a difference to you.”

Ruth wondered afterward where she got all this worldly knowledge and how she was able to say it, with George’s eyes burning into her back.

“What a practical child you are; but let’s not talk about it tonight. I’m awfully tired. We were going to announce our engagement Christmas Eve, but there’s no harm in your knowing.”

“Gloria, you can’t—you can’t marry him. He’s fat and selfish and horrid!” In her excitement she forgot George and moved to Gloria’s side. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”

Gloria’s eyes looked across her, over her head and the trance-like look came back into them.

“When you are as old as I you will know that physical appearance doesn’t matter much. I don’t know why I’m marrying Aggie, but it seems to be happening. So many things happen—I need a change; I want to travel in a new country. Besides it’s all fixed—it’s too late now—too late—”

She threw off Ruth’s detaining hands and swept past her through the hall and up the stairway, and Ruth did not try to follow her. Somewhere beyond the shadows she knew that George was still standing, his red eyes gleaming like those of a cat. She waited a few minutes to give Gloria time to go to her room and to give him time to retire to his own quarters. She did not want to pass him in the hall, and when at last she also went up, she thought she caught the sounds of suppressed sobs, coming from Gloria’s room. It would do no good to stop. In two days more they would be going to the Berkshires and there either George would win in his curious twisted plans or she would defeat him. If only she knew where to find Professor Pendragon. Terry could not help. He was too modern and practical. He couldn’t understand, his mind was fresh and clean and honest and western. If she could see Pendragon again she would tell him everything and he might help. She decided to telephone his hotel in the morning and find out, if possible, just where he had gone.