Nice Friends

ECHO ANSWERS--Elswyth Thane --Stokes ($2). The story is of love in a May orchard and how the lovers parted; she to marry an earl and be ashamed that she had not risked poverty; he, an artist, to paint without his heart, growing stronger, kinder but greyer with loneliness. And of his vivid friend, Stephen Cole, and his devoted friend, Cyril Beauchamps; how they bucked him up and kept him going for 20 years. And then of how she came back, Lady Eve, a widow with a reputation, to beg the dream she had once betrayed, to Anthony Stuart, always their love's true knight, who was glad at last. And then of how it was discovered, in another May, what the years, had done to the girl of the May orchard--driven her out and brought in a woman spoiled for her rare beauty. . . . Much depended, of course, on how rare Miss Thane could make that beauty. She made it rare enough. And much depended on the quality of Anthony Stuart. She made him brave without heroics; sensitive but never frail or obvious. More still depended on the exposure of fallen Lady Eve. And that too is accomplished surely, through as fine a touchstone as one could wish, Maida Cole, constant nymph, elfish daughter of Anthony Stuart's dead friend. . . . All the evidence convicts Miss Thane, who is young, pretty and lowan, of having perpetrated a novel of irresistible sentiment; a novel of charm, finesse, distinction. Miss Thane must have nice friends.