Sheila wept more as Pennock helped her to undress and drew the sleeve tenderly over the invincible elbow. She wept into the bath and she wept into her pillow. She ran   
a gamut of emotions from self-pity to self-contempt for so unlady-like a method of extricating herself from a predicament that no lady would have got into. She 
 
reproached herself for being some kind of miserable reptile to have inspired either the affection or the insolence of so loathsome another reptile as Reben.
 
Then she bewailed the ruin of her career. That was gone forever. She bewailed the destruction of Vickery’s hopes—such a nice boy! If she had not permitted Reben to 
 
be so rude to Vickery he never would have been so rude to her. She would give up the stage and go live at her father’s house, and die an old maid or marry a preacher 
 
or a milkman or something.
 
She wept herself out so completely that she slept till one o’clock the next afternoon. When she was up she stood at her window and gazed ruefully across the city. On 
 
a distant roof she could just see the tall water-tanks marked “Odeon Theater,” and a wall of the theater carrying an enormous blazon of the play with Tom Brereton’s 
 
name in huge letters and hers in large. She would never appear there again. She supposed Reben would send her understudy on to-night. Of course the reading of Vickery
 
’s play at three o’clock was all off.
 
It would be of no use to go to the office. Reben wouldn’t be there. He would doubtless be in a hospital with his face in splints.
 
She wondered if she had fractured his skull—and how many years they gave you for doing that to a man. She could claim that she did it in self-defense, of course, but 
 
she had no witnesses to prove it.
 
She spent hours in putting herself into all imaginable disasters. The breakfast Pennock commanded her to eat she only dabbed at.
 
At half past three the telephone rang. The office-boy at Reben’s hailed her across the wire:
 
“That choo, M’Skemble? This is Choey. Say, M’Skemble, Mis’ Treben wantsa speak choo. Hola wire a min’t, please.”
 
Sheila reached out and hooked a chair with her foot and brought it up to catch her when the blow fell. Reben’s voice was full of restrained cheerfulness:
 
“That you, Sheila? Are you ill?”
 
“Why, no! Why?”
 
“You had an appointment here at three. We’re still waiting.”
 
“But you don’t want to see—me, do you?”
 
“And why not?”
 
“But last night you said—”
 
“Last night I was talking to you about personal affairs. This is business. That was at your home. This is my office. Hop in a cab and come on over. I’ll explain.”
 
She was in such a daze as she made ready to go that when she had her hat on she could not find it with her hat-pin. Pennock performed the office for her. When she 
 
reached Reben’s office she meekly edged through the crowd of applicants waiting like the penniless souls on the wrong side of the River Styx. She thought that Eldon 
 
must have been one of these once. Some of these were future Eldons, future Booths.
 
Joey, the office-boy, hailed her with pride, swung the gate open for her, and led her to Reben’s door. He did that only for stars or managers or playwrights of recent 
 
success.
 
Reben was alone. He was dabbing his mumpsy cheek with a handkerchief he wet at a bottle. He smiled at her with a mixture of apology and rebuke.
 
“There you are! the suffragette that took my face for a shop window. I told everybody I stumbled and hit my head on the edge of a table. If you will be kind enough 
 
not to deny the story—”
 
“Of course not! I’m so sorry! I lost my head!”
 
“Thank you. So did I. Last night I made a fool of myself. To-day I’m a business man again. I made you a proposition or two. You declined both with emphasis. I ought 
 
not to have insisted. You didn’t have to assassinate me. I’ll forgive you if you’ll forgive me.”
 
“Of course,” said Sheila, sheepishly.
 
Reben spoke with great dignity, yet with meekness. “We understand each other better now, eh? I meant what I said about being crazy about you. If you’d let me, I 
 
could love you very much. If you won’t, I’ll get over it, I suppose. But the proposition stands. If you would marry me—”
 
“I’m not going to marry anybody, I tell you.”
 
“You promise me that?”
 
Sheila felt it safer not to promise forever, but safe enough to say, “Not for a long time, anyway.”
 
Reben stared at her grimly. “Sheila, I’m a business man; you’re a business woman. I’ll play fair with you if you’ll play fair with me. I’ll make a star of you if 
 
you’ll do your share. You wouldn’t flirt with me or let me make a fool of you. Then be a man and we’ll get along perfectly. If you’ll stick to me, not quit me, not 
 
hamper me, not play tricks on me, and abide by your contract, I’ll do the same for you. I’ll put you up in the big lights. Will you stand by me, Sheila, as man to 
 
man—on your honor as a gentleman?”
 
She repeated his words with a kind of amused solemnity: “As man to man, on my honor as a gentleman, I’ll stand by you and fulfil my contract.”
 
“Then that’s all right. Shake hands on it.”
 
They shook hands. His grasp was hot and fierce and slow to let go. His eyes burned over her with a menace that belied his icy words.
 
When the bond was sealed with the clasp of hands Reben breathed heavily and pressed a button on his desk. “Now for the young Shakespeare. We’ve kept him waiting long 
 
enough. He’s cooled his heels till he must have cold feet by now. Joey, show Mr. Vickery in; and then I don’t want to be disturbed by anybody for anything. I’ll 
 
wring your neck if you ring my telephone—unless the building catches on fire.”
 
&l............