essence. He must not surrender to any passion his
dandihood. The dandy must be celibate, cloistral; is, indeed, but a monk
with a mirror for beads and breviary--an anchorite, mortifying his soul
that his body may be perfect. Till he met Zuleika, the Duke had not
known the meaning of temptation. He fought now, a St. Anthony, against
the apparition. He would not look at her, and he hated her. He loved
her, and he could not help seeing her. The black pearl and the pink
seemed to dangle ever nearer and clearer to him, mocking him and
beguiling. Inexpellible was her image.

So fierce was the conflict in him that his outward nonchalance gradually
gave way. As dinner drew to its close, his conversation with the wife
of the Oriel don flagged and halted. He sank, at length, into a deep
silence. He sat with downcast eyes, utterly distracted.

Suddenly, something fell, plump! into the dark whirlpool of his
thoughts. He started. The Warden was leaning forward, had just said
something to him.

"I beg your pardon?" asked the Duke. Dessert, he noticed, was on the
table, and he was paring an apple. The Oriel don was looking at him with
sympathy, as at one who had swooned and was just "coming to."

"Is it true, my dear Duke," the Warden repeated, "that you have been
persuaded to play to-morrow evening at the Judas concert?"

"Ah yes, I am going to play something."

Zuleika bent suddenly forward, addressed him. "Oh," she cried, clasping
her hands beneath her chin, "will you let me come and turn over the
leaves for you?"

He looked her full in the face. It was like seeing suddenly at close
quarters some great bright monument that one has long known only as a
sun-caught speck in the distance. He saw the large violet eyes open to
him, and their lashes curling to him; the vivid parted lips; and the
black pearl, and the pink.

"You are very kind," he murmured, in a voice which sounded to him quite
far away. "But I always play without notes."

Zuleika blushed. Not with shame, but with delirious pleasure. For that
snub she would just then have bartered all the homage she had hoarded.
This, she felt, was the climax. She would not outstay it. She rose,
smiling to the wife of the Oriel don. Every one rose. The Oriel don held
open the door, and the two ladies passed out of the room.

The Duke drew out his cigarette case. As he looked down at the
cigarettes, he was vaguely conscious of some strange phenomenon
somewhere between them and