Occasionally she had callers, men she had met or who were brought to
see her. She saw them over a tea-table, judged them remorselessly, and
eliminated gradually all but one or two. She watched her dignity and her
reputation with the care of an ambitious woman trying to live down the
past, and she succeeded measurably well. Now and then a critic spoke of
her as a second Maude Adams, and those notices she kept and treasured.

But she was always uneasy. Never since the night he had seen Judson
Clark in the theater had they rung up without her brother having
carefully combed the house with his eyes. She knew her limitations; they
would have to ring down if she ever saw him over the footlights. And
the season had brought its incidents, to connect her with the past. One
night Gregory had come back and told her Jean Melis was in the balcony.

The valet was older and heavier, but he had recognized him.

"Did he see you?" was her first question.

"Yes. What about it? He never saw me but once, and that was at night and
out of doors."

"Sometimes I think I can't stand it, Fred. The eternal suspense, the
waiting for something to happen."

"If anything was going to happen it would have happened months ago.
Bassett has given it up. And Jud's dead. Even Wilkins knows that."