It was past the middle of the day, before Mr. Le Frank paid his promised visit to Mrs. Gallilee. He entered the room with gloomy looks; and made his polite inquiries, as became a depressed musician, in the minor key.

“I am sorry, madam, to find you still on the sofa. Is there no improvement in your health?”

“None whatever.”

“Does your medical attendant give you any hope?”

“He does what they all do — he preaches patience. No more of myself! You appear to be in depressed spirits.”

Mr. Le Frank admitted with a sigh that appearances had not misrepresented him. “I have been bitterly disappointed,” he said. “My feelings as an artist are wounded to the quick. But why do I trouble you with my poor little personal affairs? I humbly beg your pardon.”

His eyes accompanied this modest apology with a look of uneasy anticipation: he evidently expected to be asked to explain himself. Events had followed her instructions to Mr. Null, which left Mrs. Gallilee in need of employing her music-master’s services. She felt the necessity of exerting herself; and did it — with an effort.

“You have no reason, I hope, to complain of your pupils?” she said.

“At this time of year, madam, I have no pupils. They are all out of town.”

She was too deeply preoccupied by her own affairs to trouble herself any further. The direct way was the easy way. She said wearily, “Well, what is it?”

He answered in plain terms, this time.

“A bitter humiliation, Mrs. Gallilee! I have been made to regret that I asked you to honour me by accepting the dedication of my Song. The music-sellers, on whom the sale depends, have not taken a tenth part of the number of copies for which we expected them to subscribe. Has some extraordinary change come over the public taste? My composition has been carefully based on fashionable principles — that is to say, on the principles of the modern German school. As little tune as possible; and that little strictly confined to the accompaniment. And what is the result? Loss confronts me, instead of profit — my agreement makes me liable for half the expenses of publication. And, what is far more serious in my estimation, your honoured name is associated with a failure! Don’t notice me — the artist nature — I shall be better in a minute.” He took out a profusely-scented handkerchief, and buried his face in it with a groan.

Mrs. Gallilee’s hard common sense understood the heart-broken composer to perfection.

“Stupid of me not to have offered him money yesterday,” she thought: “this waste of time need never have happened.” She set her mistake right with admirable brevity and directness. “Don’t distress yourself, Mr. Le Frank. Now my name is on it, the Song is mine. If your publisher’s account is not satisfactory — be so good as to send it to me.“ Mr. Le Frank dropped his dry handkerchief, and sprang theatrically to his feet. His indulgent patroness refused to hear him: to this admirable woman, the dignity of Art was a sacred thing. “Not a word more on that subject,” she said. “Tell me how you prospered last night. Your investigations cannot have been interrupted, or I should have heard of it. Come to the result! Have you found anything of importance in my niece’s room?”

Mr. Le Frank had again been baffled, so far as the confirmation of his own suspicions was concerned. But the time was not favourable to a confession of personal disappointment. He understood the situation; and made himself the hero of it, in three words.

“Judge for yourself,” he said — and held out the letter of warning from Father Patrizio.

In silence, Mrs. Gallilee read the words which declared her to be the object of Teresa’s inveterate resentment, and which charged Carmina with the serious duty of keeping the peace.

“Does it alarm you?” Mr. Le Frank asked.

“I hardly know what I feel,” she answered. “Give me time to think.”

Mr. Le Frank went back to his chair. He had reason to congratulate himself already: he had shifted to other shoulders the pecuniary responsibility involved in the failure of his Song. Observing Mrs. Gallilee, he began to see possibilities of a brighter prospect still. Thus far she had kept him at a certain distance. Was the change of mind coming, which would admit him to the position (with all its solid advantages) of a confidential friend?

She suddenly took up Father Patrizio’s letter, and showed it to him.

“What impression does it produce on you,” she asked, “knowing no more than you know now?”

“The priest’s cautious language, madam, speaks for itself. You have an enemy who will stick at nothing.”

She still hesitated to trust him.

“You see me here,” she went on, “confined to my room; likely, perhaps, to be in this helpless condition for some time to come. How would you protect yourself against that woman, in my place?”

“I should wait.”

“For what purpose?”

“If you will allow me to use the language of the card-table, I should wait till the woman shows her hand.”

“She has shown it.”

“May I ask when?”

“This morning.”

Mr. Le Frank said no more. If he was really wanted, Mrs. Gallilee had only to speak. After a last moment of hesitation, the pitiless necessities of her posit............