But, known only to Merton, her real life was one of terrific adventure, involving crime of the most atrocious sort, and contact not only with the great and good, but with loathsome denizens of the underworld who would commit any deed for hire.

Some of her scenarios would have profoundly shocked the good people of Simsbury, and she often suffered tremors of apprehension at the thought that one of them might be enacted at the Bijou Palace right there on Fourth Street, with her name brazenly announced as author.

Suppose it were Passion's Perils! She would surely have to leave town after that! She would be too ashamed to stay.

Still she would be proud, also, for by that time they would be calling her to Hollywood itself.

Of course nothing so distressing--or so grand--had happened yet, for none of her dramas had been accepted; but she was coming on.