"Perry tells me that Mr. Trent has really read Laura's poems," she said now to Adams with an almost unconscious abandonment of her cynical manner. "Have you examined him and is it really true?"
"I didn't test him because I hoped the report was false," was Adams' answer. "He's welcome to the literary hash, but I want to keep the caviar for myself."
"Read them!" exclaimed Trent eagerly, while his blue eyes ran entirely to sparkles. "Why, I've learned them every one by heart."
"Then she'll let you in," responded Gerty reassuringly, "there's no doubt whatever of your welcome."
"But there is of mine," said Perry gravely, "so I guess I'd better quit."
He made a movement to turn away, but Gerty placing her gloved hand on his arm, detained him by a reproachful look.
"That reminds me of the mischief you have done to-day," she said. "I met Arnold Kemper as I left the house, and when I asked him to come with me what do you suppose was the excuse he gave?"
"The dentist or a twinge of rheumatism?" suggested Adams gravely.
"Neither." Her voice rose indignantly, and she enforced her reprimand by a light stroke on Perry's sleeve. "He actually said that Perry had told him Laura wasn't pretty."
"Well, I take back my words and eat 'em, too," cried Perry.
He broke away in affected terror before Trent's angry eyes, while Gerty gave a joyful little exclamation and waved her hand toward one of the lower windows in the house before which they stood. The head of a woman, framed in brown creepers, appeared there for an instant, and then, almost before Trent had caught a glimpse of the small dark eager figure, melted again into the warm firelight of the interior. A moment later the outer door opened quickly, and Laura stood there with impulsive outstretched hands and the cordial smile which was her priceless inheritance from a Southern mother.
"I knew that you were there even before I looked out of the window," she exclaimed to Gerty, in what Adams had once called her "Creole voice." Then she paused, laughing happily, as she looked, with her animated glance, from Gerty to Trent and from Trent to Adams. To the younger man, full of his enthusiasm and his ignorance, the physical details of her appearance seemed suddenly of no larger significance than the pale bronze gown she wore or the old coffee-coloured lace knotted upon her bosom in some personal caprice of dress. What she gave to him as she stood there, looking from Adams to himself with her ardent friendly glance, was an impression of radiant energy, of abundant life.
She turned back after the first greeting, leading the way into the pleasant firelit room, where a white haired old gentleman with an interesting blanched face rose to receive them.
"I have just proved to Mr. Wilberforce that I could 'feel' you coming," said Laura with a smile as she unfastened Gerty's furs.
"And I have argued that she could quite as well surmise it," returned Mr. Wilberforce, as he fell back into his chair before the wood fire.
"Well, you may know in either way that my coming may be counted on," said Gerty, "for I have sacrificed for you the society of the most interesting man I know."
"What! Is it possible that Perry has been forsaken?" enquired Adams in his voice of quiet humor. In the midst of her flippant laughter, Gerty turned on him the open cynicism of her smile.
"Now is it possible that Perry has that effect on you?" she asked with curiosity. "For I find him decidedly depressing."
"Then if it isn't Perry I demand the name," persisted Adams gayly, "though I'm perfectly ready to wager that it's Arnold Kemper."
"Kemper," repeated Laura curiously, as if the name arrested her almost against her will. "Wasn't there a little novel once by an Arnold Kemper—a slight but striking thing with very little grammar and a great deal of audacity?"
"Oh, that was done in his early days," replied Adams, "as a kind of outlet to the energy he now expends in racing motors. I asked Funsten, who does our literary notices, if there was any chance for him again in fiction, and he answered that the only favourable thing he could say of him was to say nothing."
"But he's gone in for automobiles now," said Gerty, "they're so much bigger, after all, he thinks, than books."
"I haven't seen him for fifteen years," remarked Adams, "but I recognise his speech."
"One always recognises his speeches," admitted Gerty, "there's a stamp on them, I suppose, for somehow he himself is great even if his career isn't—and, after all," she concluded seriously, "it is—what shall I call it—the personal quantity that he insists on."
"The personal quantity," repeated Laura laughing, and, as if the description of Kemper had failed to interest her, she turned the conversation upon the subject of Trent's play.
CHAPTER II
TREATS OF AN ECCENTRIC FAMILY
When the last caller had gone Laura slid back the folding doors which opened into the library and spoke to a little old gentleman, with a very bald head, who sat in a big armchair holding a flute in his wrinkled and trembling hand. He had a simple, moonlike face, to which his baldness lent a deceptive appearance of intellect, and his expression was of such bland and smiling goodness that it was impossible to resent the tedious garrulity of his conversation. In the midst of his shrivelled countenance his eyes looked like little round blue buttons which had been set there in order to keep his features from entirely slipping away. He was the oldest member of the Wilde family, and he had lived in the house in Gramercy Park since it was built by his father some sixty years or more ago.
"Tired waiting, Uncle Percival?" asked Laura, raising her voice a little that it might penetrate his deafened hearing.
As he turned upon her his smile of perfect patience the old gentleman nodded his head quickly several times in succession. "I waited to play until after the people went," he responded in a voice that sounded like a cracked silver bell. "Your Aunt Angela has a headache, so she couldn't stand the noise. I went out to get her some flowers and offered to sit with her, but this is one of her bad days, poor girl." He fell silent for a minute and then added, wistfully, "I'm wondering if you would like to hear 'Ye Banks and Braes o' Bonnie Doon'? It used to be your mother's favourite air."
Though he was an inoffensively amiable and eagerly obliging old man, by some ironic contradiction of his intentions his life had become a series of blunders through which he endeavoured to add his share to the general happiness. His soul was overflowing with humanity, and he spent sleepless nights evolving innocent pleasures for those about him, but his excess of goodness invariably resulted in producing petty annoyances if not serious inconveniences. So his virtues had come to be regarded with timidity, and there was an ever present anxiety in the air as to what Uncle Percival was "doing" in his mind. The fear of inopportune benefits was in its way as oppressive as the dread of unmerited misfortune.
Laura shook her head impatiently as she threw