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Show BRANDING fBto Katharine COriKIUUT BY k.A THAH1.NE MtMUS Bl'BT. the door of her motor drawn op by' the curb. She saw him Instantly and from the first their eyes met It was a horrible moment for Joan. What it was for him she, could tell by the tense pallor of his keen, bronzed face. Tba eyes 6he had not seen for such an agony of years, the strange, deep, iris-colored iris-colored eyes, there they were now searching her. She stopped her heart ta its beating, she stopped her breath, stopped her brain. She became for( those few seconds Just one thought "I have never seen you. I have never seen you." She passed so close to him that her fur coat touched his hand, and she looked Into his face with a cool, half-dlsdatnful glitter of a smile. "Step aside, please," she said; "I must get In." Her voice was unnntu rally high and quite unnaturally precise. pre-cise. Pierre said one word, a hopeless CHAPTER X Continued. 23 lie found her done up In an apron and a dust-cap cleaning house with astonishing as-tonishing spirit. She and the Bridget, who had recently been substituted for Mathllde, were merry. Bridget was sitting on the sill, her upper half shut out, her round, brick-colored face laughing through the pane she was polishing. Jane was up a ladder, dusting dust-ing books. She came down to greet Morena, and he suw regretfully the sad change in her face and bearing which his arrival ar-rival caused. Bridget was sent to the kitchen. Jane made apologies,' and sitting sit-ting on the ladder step she looked up at hira with the look of some one who expects a blow. "What Is it now, Mr,. Morena? Have the lawyers begun to " He had purposely kept her in the later he said doubtfully, "Then youll carry through your purpose of not letting let-ting Pierre know you?" "Yes. I've made up my mind to that That's what I've got to do. He mustn't find me. We can't meet here In this life. That's certain. There are things that come between, things like bars." She made a strange gesture ges-ture as f a prisoner running his fingers fin-gers across the barred window of a cell. "Thank you for warning me. Thank you for telling me what to do." She smiled faintly. "I think he will know me, anyway," she said, "but I won't know him. Never, never!" That night the theater was late In emptying Itself. Jane West had acted with especial brilliance and she was called out again and again. When she came to her dressing-room she was flushed and breathless. She did not change her costume, but drew her fur word "Joan." It was a prayer. H should have been, "lie Joan." Then he stepped buck and he stumbled Into shelter. At the same InRtant another mnn a man In evening dress hastily prevented prevent-ed her mnn from closing the door. ' "Miss West, may I see you home?" Before she could speak, could do more than look, Prosper Gael had Jumped In, the door slammed, the car began Its whirr, and they were gliding glid-ing through the crowded, brilliant streets. Joan had bent forward and was rocking to and fro. "He called me Jonn'," she gasped over and over. "He called me 'Joan.' " "That was rierre?" Prosper ha(5 been forewarned by Jasper and hnd planned his part. "I must go away. If I see him again I shall die. I could never do dark, purposely neglected her, left her to loneliness In the hope of furthering the purposes of Prosper Gael. "I haven't come to discuss that, Jane. Soon I hope to Have good news for you. But today Tve come to give you a hint a warning, In fact to prepare you for what I am sure will be a shock." "Yes?" She was flushed and breathing breath-ing fast. Her fingers were busy with the feather-duster on her knee and her eyes were still waiting. "I had a visitor this morning rierre Lnndis of Wyoming." She rose, came to him and clutched his arm. "Pierre? Plerrer She looked around her, wild as a captured bird. "Oh, I must go I I must go !" "Jane, my child" he put his arm about her. held her two hands In his "you must do nothing of the kind. If you don't want this Pierre to find you, if you don't want him to come into coat on over the green evening dress she had worn In the last scene. Then she stood before her mirror, looking herself over carefully, critically. Now that the paint was washed off, and the flush of excitement faded, she looked haggard and white. Her face was very thin, its beautiful bones long sweep of jaw, wide brow, straight, short nose sharply accentuated. The round throat rising against the fur collar looked unnaturally white and long. She sat down before her dressing-table dressing-table and deliberately painted her cheeks and lips. She even altered the outlines of her mouth, giving It a pursed and doll-like expression, so that her eyes appeared enormous and her nose a little pinched. Then she drew a lock of waved hair down across the middle of her forehead, pressed another at each side close to the corners of her eyes. This took from the unusuul breadth of brow and gave her a much that another time. O God I His Hand touched me. He called me 'Joan' . . . I must go . . Prosper did not touch her, but his voice, very friendly, very calm, hud an Instantaneous effect "I will take you away." She laughed shakily. "Again?" she asked, and shamed him Into silence. But after a while he began very reasonably, very patiently: "I can take you away so that you need not be put through this unneces sary pain. I can arrange it with Morena. Mo-rena. If Pierre sees you often enough he will be sure to recognize you. Joan, I did not deserve that 'again' and you know It. I am a changed man. If you don't know that now I have the heart of of devotion, of service toward you, you are Indeed a blind and stupid womnn. But you do know It You must." She sat silent beside him, the long more ordinary look. A coat of powder, pow-der, heavily applied, more nearly produced pro-duced the effect of a plnk-and-whlte, glassy-eyed doll-baby for which she was trying. Afterwards she turned and smiled doubtfully at the' astonished aston-ished dresser. "Good gracious, Miss West! You don't look like yourself at all 1" "Good l" She said goodnight and went rapidly down the drafty passages and the con- your life, there's an easy, a very simple way to put an end to his pursuit. pur-suit. Don't you know that?" She stared up at him, quivering In his arm. "No. What Is It? How can I? Oh, he mustn't see me! Never, never, never! I made that promise to myself." "Jane, you say yourself thnt you are changed, that you are not the girl he wants to find." She shook her head desolately enough. "Oh, no, I'm not." "He Isn't sure that Jane West Is the woman he's looking for. He's following fol-lowing the faintest, the most doubtful doubt-ful of trails. He heard of you from YarnaH ; the description of you and your sudden flight made him fairly sure that It must be you" Jasper laughed. "I'm talking quite at random ran-dom In a sense, because I haven't a notion, my dear, who you are nor what this Pierre has been In your life. If you could tell me " She shook her head. "No," she said ; "no." "Very well. Then I'll have to go on talking at random. Jane at the Lazy-Y ranch was a woman who had deliberately deliberate-ly disguised herself. Jane West In New York Is a different woman altogether; but, unless I'm very wrong, she Is even more completely -dlRgulsed from rierre Landls. - If you can convince rierre that yon are Jane West, not any other woman, certainly not the woman he once knew, arent you pretty safely rid of hlru for always?" She stood still now. He felt that ber fingers were cold. "Yea. For al and slender hand between her race and him. "I can take you away," he went on presently, "und keep you from Pierre until he has given op his search and has gone west again. And I can take you at once In a day or two. Your understudy can (111 the part. This engagement en-gagement Is almost nt an end. I can make It up to Morena. After all. If we go, we shiill be doing Betty and' him a service." Joan flung out her hands recklessly. "Oh," she cried, "what does It matter? Of course I'll go. I'd run Into the sea to escape Pierre " She leaned back against the cushioned seat, rolled her head a little from side to side like a person In pain. "Take me away," she repeated. "I believe that If I stay I shall go mad. I'll go anywhere with anyone. Only take me away." CHAPTER XI The Leopardess. Pierre stood before the cheap bureau bu-reau of bis ugly hotel bedroom turning turn-ing a red slip of curdhoard about In his fingers. The gas-jet sputtering above his head threw heavy Bhadows down on his face. It was the face of hopeless, heartsick youth, the muscles sagging, the eyes dilll, the lips tight and pale. Since last night when the contemptuous glitter of Joan's smile had fallen upon him, he had neither slept nor eaten. Jasper had Joined him at the theater exit, had walked home with him, and, while he was with the manager, Pierre's pride and a j t a li a -. ways. I suppose so. lint how can I I do that, Mr. Morena?" "Nothing easier. You're an actress, aren't you? I advised Pierre Landls to stand near the stage exit tonight nnd watch yon get Into your motor." Again she clutched at him. "Ok, no. Don't don't let him do that!" "Now, If you will make an effort, look him In the eyes, refuse to show a single quiver of recognition, speak to someone In the most artificial tone you can Imagine, pass him by, and drive away, why, wouldn't thnt convince con-vince him you aren't his quarry eh?" She thought! then slowly drew herself her-self away and stood, her head bent, her brows drawn shnrply together. "Yes. I suppose so. I think I can do It. That Is the best plan." She looked at him wildly again. "Then It will be over for always, won't It? He'll go away?" "Yes, my poor child. He will 'go away. lie told me so. Then, will you try to forget him, to live your life for Its own beautiful suke? I'd like to see you happy, Jane." "Would you?" She smiled like a pitying mother. "Why, I've given up even dreaming of that. That Isn't what keeps me going." "What ix it. June?" "Oh, a queer notion." She laughed sadly. "A kind of klO's tint on, I guess, that If you live along, some way, some time, you'll he nble to iimke up for things you've done, and tluit perhaps tliere'il he another meeting-place meeting-place a kind of a round up where you'll he ht to forgive those you love and to be forgiven by them." Jasper walked about. Me wiis touched and troubled. Rome minutes reserve nuu nem nun up. Aiierwnru he had ranged the city like a prairie wolf, ranged It as thorigh It had been an unpeopled desert, free to his stride. He had fixed his eyes above and be yood and walked alone In pain. Dawn found him again In his room. What hope had sustained him, what memory of Joan, whnt purpose of tenderness ten-derness toward her these hopes and memories and purposes now choked and twisted him. He might have found her, his "gel," his Joan, with her dumb, loving guze; he might have told her the story of his sorrow In such s way that she, mho forgave so easily, would have forgiven even him, and he might huve comforted her, holding hei so and so, showing her utterly tlx true, unchanged, g.'eatly changed love of his chastened heart. This girl, thlt love of his, whom, In his drunken, jealous jeal-ous madneHs, he had branded and driven away, he would have brought her buck and tended her and mude It up to her In a thousand, In ten thou sand, ways. Pierre knelt by his bed, his black head burled in the cover, hit arms bent above It, his hands clenched. Out there he had never lost hope of finding her, but here, In this peopled loneliness, with a memory of thnt worn im's heartless smile, he did at least de spnlr. In a strange, torturing way she had been like Joan. His heart had Jumped to his mouth at first sight of her. And Just there, to his shouldei where her head reached, had Joan'r dear black head reached, too. Pierre groaned aloud. The picture of her wn so vivid. Not In moatus had the renl Ity of his "gel" come so close to hh Imagination. He could feel her fee her! O Cod" m nn rnNTiMiisrn "But Today I've Come to Give You a Hint-a Warning." Crete atslrs. Jasper was standing Inside In-side the uter door and applauded her. "Well done. If It weren't for your pose and walk, ray dear, I should hardly have known yon myself." Joan stood beside him, holding her furs close, breathing fust through the parted, painted lips. "Is he here, do you know?" "Yes. He's been waiting. I told him you might le late. Now, keep your head. Everything dependa upon that. C'n jou do It?" "Oh, yes. Is the car there? I won't have to stop?" "Not an Instant. Put give him a good looklng-over so that he'll be sure, and don't change the expression of your eyes. Feel, make yourself fuel Inside, that he's a stranger. You know what I mean. Goodnight, my dear. Oood luck. I'll call you up as soon us you got home that Is, after I've seen your pursuer safely bnok to his rooms." Put this lust sentence was addressed to himself. Joan opened the door and stepped out Into the chill dampness of the April night. The white arc of electric light beat down upon her as she cume forward and It fell as glaringly upon the figure of Pierre. He had pushed Vrwnrd from the little crowd of non-lescrlpts non-lescrlpts always waiting at a stage I'xlt. and stoofl. bareheaded, just at |