Ordham, having felt himself expelled from those orderly conditions in which so many men dwell for a lifetime with only an occasional abortive protest, shot out by the dynamic power of angry human forces too long accumulating, had no mind to indulge in futile regrets. He did not pretend to assert that his will was too weak to continue its inhibitions had he chosen, but he had suddenly realized that he did not choose, and that was the end of it. Accordingly, he banished the very memory of Mabel, declared war on menacing fingers shaking over the ramparts still erect to protect his future, and untormented for the first time in many weeks, inveigled sleep the moment his head touched the pillow of his berth. The passage was quiet and he slept until the boat reached Flushing. He slept again in the train, and, upon being informed in Cologne that the Munich express was an hour late, he sensibly went to a hotel and took a bath. The rest of the journey seemed interminable. It was the season for tourists, the dust and heat were insufferable. But as the train ambled into the great dép?t of Munich, he forgot discomforts, and, all his being quivering, he suddenly felt that this beautiful city of beautiful memories would give him back his youth; he had even a whimsical idea that he had left it there and she was holding it for him intact; he had but to ask for it.

He sprang from the carriage almost before the train halted, and without waiting for Hines to do all the work, walked rapidly up the platform to secure a cab. He actually had his ticket ready as he passed through the gate, instead of keeping the mob cursing behind him after his usual fashion. His head was in the air, he saw no one in the waiting crowd, until he almost ran over a tall footman who planted himself directly in his path.

“Sir,” began this person. “I beg your pardon—” He almost fell back, for the eyes he encountered were like those of a wild beast at bay. Ordham had recognized the man at once as one of the servants of the British Legation, and for the first time in his life was possessed with the lust to slay. But he recovered himself instantly, and although he felt as if the sudden fire in his veins were falling to ashes with youth and hope and life itself, he asked the man calmly enough what he wanted.

“Mr. Trowbridge sent three of us, sir, to stand at different points. Six telegrams have come for you to-day. Thomas has them. He is outside by the cabs, sir.”

Ordham followed the man, half resolving to tear up the telegrams and scatter them over the stones of Munich. There was neither pity nor sympathy in him. He felt pure flint, and had he been suddenly translated into Mabel’s presence, she would have been welcome to the discovery that he hated her. But, automatically, noblesse oblige did its work. When the telegrams were handed to him, he arranged them methodically in the order of their dates, and read them through. From them he learned that Mabel’s self-control had deserted her even in the moment of his departure. She had sent a servant to follow his cab and had discovered that he had taken the train for the Continent. She had governed her agitation in a degree until her suspicions were confirmed, but it then had become uncontrollable, and a somewhat premature confinement was the result. Then he read that the child was dead, and that, her excitement resisting all attempts to alleviate it, there was practically no question of her death unless she could be assured that he would return at once. In the final telegram Mrs. Cutting humbled herself to the dust. The doctor also had telegraphed.

Ordham, still acting under the compulsion of that little engine which civilization has attached to the modern brain, and which so often, automatically, gets up steam and keeps the track no matter how palsied the hand or blinding the mists, turned to Hines and told him to send a telegram to London and reserve a compartment for the train that left at eleven o’clock. Then he went to a hotel and took another bath and changed his linen, almost grateful to the grime of the hot and dusty day which forced him to observe these commonplace formalities. Resolving to walk to Schwabing, as much to settle his nerves as to avoid Styr’s supper hour, he left his hotel, which was in the Dinerstrasse, and strolled along endeavouring to adjust himself to the present. He had enough to agitate him, aside from the fact that he must leave Munich that night. As Styr had not sent him a line since her departure, he was convinced that her frame of mind had been no more enviable than his. He had subscribed for the principal daily newspapers of Munich and knew that she had, as ever, compelled the admiration of those critics not in league with the cabal; but since the first of July the opera house had been closed and he could appreciate how the sudden idleness must afflict her. He was not even sure that she was in Munich. She might already have gone on a Gastspiel. If that were the case, he must wait another month at least—he wondered if he should!

He sauntered along, pausing deliberately to look at the beautiful opera house, a wing of the Residenz, but dominating the square before it with its noble proportions, its brilliant blue and gold fresco of Apollo among the Muses above the portico. His heart beat thickly, and not alone for Margarethe Styr. How many times had his cab passed the mounted guard, rolled up the steep incline to the entrance where he was ever obsequiously received by the tall doorkeeper in livery (with his palm out)—and then the wide lobby full of late comers, the crush at the garde robes, the big chief of all the important little officials, in his gorgeous white and blue uniform, his cocked hat and mace, the gay foyer, and then, and then,—he came to the present abruptly. He wondered at the fluidity of youth that lingered in him, and walked more quickly down Perusastrasse.

He saw that the narrow pavements of Theatinerstrasse were crowded, as was usual at this hour, many, indeed, walking in the street itself. From five to seven was the fashionable hour for shopping and displaying one’s best frocks, and although most of the smart people were away, many remained in that salubrious city the year round, save for brief visits to Italy or neighbouring points of interest. He, too, had been accustomed to stroll in Theatinerstrasse at this hour, and he approached it with some eagerness, hoping that it would banish the present for another moment. But as he reached the corner he came to an abrupt halt and nearly lost his breath. Sailing toward him, her plump figure sheathed and swaddled in crêpe, her head, nay her nose, in the air, her crêpe veil trailing on the pavement behind her, handsome, insolent, radiant, was Frau von Wass. Ordham fled into the English drug-store, and even although he could not be sure that he had escaped the manubial eye of a lady who looked more bent upon game and conquest than ever before,—refreshed, rejuvenated, and hungry, after her long seclusion,—he could not, at a safe distance, resist staring through the glass of the door. But Frau Hélène had not seen him. She crossed Theatinerstrasse, not deigning to lift the train of skirt or veil, and entered a milliner’s shop. Ordham hastily retreated up Perusastrasse, and took a cab at the post-office. He had no desire to meet and exchange words with any chance acquaintance, however harmless, and as the cab sauntered up the Ludwigstrasse he kept his eyes averted from the pavements and reflected upon the banalities of life, its merciless anti-climaxes. Apparently there was no such thing as pure tragedy.

He looked at his watch. It was but seven o’clock, Styr’s supper hour. He told the kutscher to drive in the Englischergarten. Half an hour’s further respite—he was not averse! He felt dull, hard, nervous. His head was hot, his hands cold. In the deserted driveway of the park he took off his hat and leaned back with closed eyes. But the telegrams in his pocket did not burn him; his mind was on the approaching interview. He was quite aware that if Styr were in the villa the next hour would be far more portentous than that of his marriage, and although it never occurred to him to turn back, he faltered a bit.

But at half-past seven he presented himself at the gate of the villa. Old Kurt answered his ring and kissed his hand effusively. When told that the Frau Gr?fin was in the gallery, Ordham motioned the man aside and went rapidly down the hall and opened the door. As he saw the familiar room in the lamplight, with Styr seated at the farther end before a table, writing, his head swam, and he hardly noticed that she almost stumbled to her feet and stood staring at him.

But all she said was, “Oh!”

He cast his hat on one chair, his gloves on another, almost revolved on his heel, and then went slowly forward. But she held a cold hand across the table and motioned him to a chair. “Sit down—please. You might have telegraphed.”

She almost fell into her own chair, and he saw that her face was thin, her skin dull, her eyes in dark orbits. He had never seen her look less handsome or more alluring. But he took the chair, as she desired it. He had known that many things must be said before the last barrier went down, that she would never rush into his arms even if taken by surprise. But he was far from guessing the new barrier she had been educating her courage to erect in case he came, although she had no mind for it save as a last resource.

She realized, however, that it would be a waste of time to beat about the bush, and said, “I fancied that you would either come within a month or two or not at all.” She spoke coldly, while they eyed each other like enemies, but he observed that her breath was short.

“I came on a sudden impulse, having quite made up my mind to wait until Mabel was well again. I must return—very shortly. I arranged matters so that she would think I had gone north with my mother. But although I mechanically took every precaution to spare her, no doubt I should have come if I had been obliged to walk over her dead body.”

“What have you come for?”

“To claim you. To bind you to me forever. I have no longer the least intention of attempting to live without you. Some way it must be arranged.”

“It cannot be arranged.”

“It shall be.”

“Do you remember the promise you made me on Stanmore Heath?”

“I remember every word that has passed between us.”

“You cannot have me and your career too.”

“I shall make the attempt. If I fail, the career will have to go.”

“Do you hope for satiety before the end of the period during which a love affair may, with due precautions, be kept secret—”

“No!” he said violently. “I neither hope nor wish for anything of the sort. If I could have put you out of my mind, as I have always been able to banish other memories, I am free to confess that I should have done so. But I could as easily cease to breathe, and live. I refuse to contemplate life without you, and have come here sooner than I intended, because I cannot—will not—wait any longer to enter upon a complete understanding with you. It took me a long time to wake up; I hesitated longer than many men would have done. I am almost ashamed that I hesitated at all. It makes me seem to myself a monster of calculation. But you stood me off in the first place, and in the second,—well, aside from my career, I recognized that I had voluntarily assumed responsibilities that must bind me to a certain extent. With those I shall compromise as far as possible, but my career, I fancy, will take care of itself. If you have useful gifts and are willing to exercise them, life is only too ready to wring the last drop of blood out of your brain.”

“And do you fancy,” she cried harshly, “that I shall renounce my own career in order to follow you about and hide in back streets to be always at your beck and call? The egoism of man passes comprehension!”

But he neither coloured nor turned pale. He looked at her steadily. “Of course I expect you to do nothing of the sort. As I am not, thanks to my stupidity, in a position to marry you, as we are both too proud and ambitious deliberately to renounce the world after the fashion of those that have nothing worth speaking of to sacrifice, and as a possibly long life on this planet apart is unthinkable, we must resort to compromise. Europe is a small place and I shall see that I am not sent out of it. We can meet constantly. An attaché has little to do—it will be several years before I shall be anything more. I have much influence, I can obtain many leaves of absence. You can gast where I am accredited. I understand that I am to go to Paris. It is not a day’s journey from Munich. You could spend at least one week in every month there, and no one would think of asking what took a prima donna to Paris—any woman, for that matter!”

“And my New York season?”

“I hope you will go to New York only once. Three months will be an eternity, but I should be the last to deprive you of that supreme triumph. I wish it were over—but—well, there will be the long summers which we shall manage to spend together somewhere.”

“We should be the scandal of Europe in six months. Lord Bridgminster will not live long. Your inheritance will make you more conspicuous than ever. All the bishops in England would be writing to the Times protesting against your employment by a virtuous government. A love affair here, and every servant in Munich would know it. In great cities I should be watched by more than servants. American correspondents would sit on my doorstep. Your wife—”

“My wife, when she is well, will, in any case, learn that I shall never live with her again. She will also learn that to criticise any act of mine would be as great an impertinence as if she were one of my relations. She will have everything else that she married me for. In time she must cease to care for a man that will have none of her.”

“Poor thing!” The pity was involuntary and sincere. “How she will suffer!”

“Who does not suffer? Let her be thankful that she is made of thistle-down that any strong wind may blow about, but only from one pleasant place to another.”

“Thistle-down has been known to scatter in winds too strong. You might kill her.”

“The fit survive.”

“Oh, you are hard! You are man epitomized.”

“I have put a temporary lid on a devil’s brew. Who has not iron and steel in his nature if he amounts to anything? It comes out in one fashion and another. I am showing you my naked soul. I shall never do that to the child I married—to any one else on earth, for that matter. Mabel will be let down as easily as possible. I have every wish to spare her, and she gains in acuteness. Possibly she will let me alone at first in the hope of slowly winning me back, and meanwhile learn to do without me.”

“You should not have left her now. There is always the possibility of death in childbirth.”

She saw him turn a shade paler and stir uneasily, but his gaze did not soften nor waver. She said abruptly:

“How can you tell that were you suddenly free, I should not expect you to marry me?”

“I should certainly marry you.”

“And what compromise then? Not a woman in diplomatic society would receive me. I can see them! To shake hands with a famous artist at a reception and go away and talk about it is one thing; to receive her as an equal, to forget her scandalous history as well as her public career—why discuss the obvious? Even were I willing to renounce my career, you never could stand the position. Loyalty to me and your own pride would force you to give up the service.”

“Not now. You forget your conquest of London; its conclusion to believe none of those stories.”

“London felt quite safe in permitting itself to be captivated by the celebrity of the moment; I asked nothing further of it, encouraged none of its marriageable men, my stay was brief. If I invaded one of those Londons in petto, a British embassy, demanding to be received as an equal, do you believe that they would guilelessly accept me? They would immediately investigate and learn the truth.”

“Anything can be lived down—”

“Not a past like mine.”

“I don’t believe that there would be any investigation, if only because London first believed those outrageous stories of Levering’s, and then reacted from them. He overreached himself—”

“Levering was extraordinarily moderate. No doubt it would be as you say, as long as I remained a mere prima donna, for people are only too anxious there should be no obstacle between their conscience and the pleasure of lionizing: but the moment I gave up the stage, married one of their own—I should be stoned out of the gates and you with me.”

Ordham sprang to his feet, overturning his chair. “Enough of improbabilities. Mabel has no intention of dying. We have only the present to consider and we have wasted too many words already. You and I exist in a void. We have been driven straight toward each other for the last fourteen months. As well try to escape the morrow’s sun—”

She too had risen and pushed back her chair, but she kept the table between them. Her face flushed almost black, then turned so white that he thought her about to faint. But something in her eyes arrested him. He held his breath. Once more he almost turned on his heel.

“Then listen to the whole story,” she cried, with that hoarse muddle of accents that banished the very memory of her gift of song. “God! how am I to say it all? And is it for your sake alone? I wonder? I have vowed to save you from yourself, give you to public life; but I doubt if I could bring myself to rip the grave-clothes and show the corpse, if my own career were not so dear to me, the delight in song, in art, in holding great publics spellbound, in reigning a queen of sorts—and a singer’s time is brief enough! I have asked—oh, many times—whether I loved you or my art most, and the answer has not always been the same, not by any means. I don’t know! I don’t know!

“But not for a moment do I believe that we could compromise with the world as you have arranged in your royal manner. It would mean that one of us would have to go into obscurity, be forgotten by the world, and that would be my part. You would never give way, and I should hate you if you did. Good God! Do you think I have thought of anything else since my return to Munich?............