walked haughtily past the groups of untrained and awkward beginners who had registered—as Don had—with the agent who engaged "supers." And they all passed and repassed, met and nodded, bowed and shook hands effusively, in a way that reminded Don of the students in the college corridors, meeting after their Christmas holidays, hailing friends and acknowledging acquaintances. There was the same air of camaraderie, tempered by the same marked distinction of distance in the manner of the upper years to the lower ones; there was the same tone of social irresponsibility in the circle of a privileged life; and there was the same note of unreality and evanescence—derived, in this case, from the exaggerated manner of these Bohemians who "made up" for the street as if for a stage entrance, and walked in the sunshine as if it had been a calcium light.
But though they reminded him of his college days, it was only to make him happy that he had left those days behind him. His last letter from his mother had brought him word that Frank had passed his "matriculation" with honours, at the head of his school; and Don was glad of the fact that his brother's rivalry could not pursue him to the Rialto. He contrasted this street with the streets of Coulton, and his liberty here with the life which he might have led at home. The difference for him was all the difference between romantic adventure and drab matter-of-fact. The catchwords of greeting which he heard in the waiting-rooms of the agencies —"Hello! What luck?"—came to him like the croupier's call to a gambler. Youth pursued opportunity in a game of chance in which futures were at stake, and every turn of the
