warm supporter of his cause. Not that all this was accomplished at a single sitting. It required many interviews, interviews which Barry not only freely granted, but, if the truth must be told, interviews which he diligently sought. He was no stranger at socialistic headquarters in the Potter Building. Twice, at least, he had been seen walking on the street with the handsome secretary. He made no concealment of his admiration for her. It was not his nature to conceal anything. But, when his friends rallied him on his apparent conquest, he admitted that as yet the affair was a mere matter of personal friendship, and was largely due to a common interest with Mrs. Bradley in certain social problems. No one attributed to him any improper motive. He had the cleanest of minds. He was the farthest of any man in the city from being a rake. That was why the public regarded the situation so seriously. That was why certain mothers with marriageable daughters, who preferred wealth and social standing to brilliancy of intellect, deprecated, in sorrowful if not severe terms, the young man's apparent infatuation. As for Miss Chichester, she was inconsolable. She had tried suggestion, persuasion, intimidation, in turn; but all in vain. Barry was good-naturedly obstinate. Even in the face of the most dreadful prognostications as to what might happen if he should continue his relations with the widow, he persistently declined to break them off. Yet, in reality, Barry had not begun to reach that stage in his siege of Mrs. Bradley's heart which his friends gave him credit for having reached. He had spoken no word of love to her. He realized that her late consort had departed this life so recently as the last September, and that the first snow of winter had but lately fallen. And Barry was a gentleman. Morever he had not yet been able to overcome a certain diffidence, a slowness of thought, a lack of fluency of speech while in her presence. He felt that this might be a serious drawback when the
