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He watched with more .eagerness that he would have cared to admit for Tilly. With the informality of the cabaret, the performers lounged around the doorways. or mixed with the crowd. j The Apache dancers did their turn, Ayith muph pulling and twisting, much flying of skirts and revealing of hideous lingerie and thick cotton stockings. A colored boy, fresh from Georgia, sang ragtime to the mad enthusiasm of the crowd, but Tilly did not appear. Sullivan ordered to bacco, another pint of white wine. The atmosphere was reeking; the in cessant uproar of the orchestra got on his nerves. When it became clear that the program' had reached its end, and was about to repeat, Sulli van' got up and sauntered to the bar. He had seen Tilly talking to the bar maid the night before. But the barmaid was a different one, a black-haired French girl. She said with a shrug of her shoulders, that the Praulein was krank, and was not there tonight. She knew nothing of Tilly, and made poor work of un derstanding him. In a sort of rage of. disappointment he got his hat and overcoat, and left the building. He refused a cab. A fine" white snow was falling in the narrow streets. At the corner, a woman was standing, head bent to the storm, looking, in the wind, like some gray night bird, waiting and ominious. With a shudder of disgust, Sullivan buttoned up his coat and turned to start. He had taken perhaps a dozen steps when a slim figure stepped out from the shadow of the building, and put a timid hand on his arm. Sulli van stopped sharply and shook off the hand. The light from a street lamp, at that moment, by some caprice of the wind, cleared of snow, fell on the girl's face. It was Tilly, Tilly, quivering, as white as chalk. Sullivan faced her, almost as white as she. When she saw him, or per haps before she saw him, the horror oi what she was doing came over the girl like a cloud. "Mother of God!" she gasped, and turning, ran with all the speed of her cold limbs and aching feet, down the street, with Sullivan after her. He overtook her in a dozen strides, caught her by the shoulder and wheeled her about to face him. Even in that instant, his anger had turned to pity. "I'm not going to hurt you, child," he said. "I am only what are you doing out here in the storm?" Tilly swayed somewhat, and closed her eyes. Desperate as she was, she felt the shaken depths in the man's voice. "I am going to take you home." Tilly stirred at that. "Home!" The word brought bit terness with it. She jerked her arm free. "You let me go!" she cried, shrilly. "If I want to go to the devil, it's my business, isn't it? I don't want pity. I only want to be let alone." Sullivan looked down at her. His eyes were still kind, but something had faded out of them; perhaps it was faith that had gone. "To think," he said slowly, "that last night I thought I would have sworn that you " And at that, without warning, Tilly burst into loud, hysterical sobbing. "I never did it in my life before!" she choked. "Never! Never!" The snow was falling heavily now. Out of the white wall an occasional cab emrged to lose itself a moment later. Laughter and music, and the rhythm of dancing feet, came through doors that opened and shut. In the night city, no one is curious; each is intent on his own affairs. And so, undisturbed, Sulilvan let Tilly cry out her tortured young soul on his shoulder. After a time she grew quieter. He hardly knew what to do. He could take her to his sister meant to, of course--but not at that hour of the night He must get her under shel-s