rose for the ballet. I made the best excuse I could to my
friends, and instantly left the box.

It was useless to attempt to purchase my admission to the gallery. My
money was refused. There was not even standing room left in that part of
the theater.

But one alternative remained. I returned to the street, to wait for Mrs.
Van Brandt at the gallery door until the performance was over.

Who was the man in attendance on her--the man whom I had seen sitting
behind her, and talking familiarly over her shoulder? While I paced
backward and forward before the door, that one question held possession
of my mind, until the oppression of it grew beyond endurance. I went
back to my friends in the box, simply and solely to look at the man
again.

What excuses I made to account for my strange conduct I cannot now
remember. Armed once more with the lady's opera-glass (I borrowed it and
kept it without scruple), I alone, of all that vast audience, turned my
back on the stage, and riveted my attention on the gallery stalls.

There he sat, in his place behind her, to all appearance spell-bound
by the fascinations of the graceful dancer. Mrs. Van Brandt, on
the contrary, seemed to find but little attraction in the spectacle
presented by the stage. She looked at the dancing (so far as I could
see) in an absent, weary manner. When the applause broke out in a
perfect frenzy of cries and clapping of hands, she sat perfectly
unmoved by the enthusiasm which pervaded the theater. The man behind her
(annoyed, as I supposed, by the marked indifference which she showed
to the performance) tapped her impatiently on the shoulder, as if he
thought that she was quite capable of falling asleep in her stall. The
familiarity of the action--confirming the suspicion in my mind which had
already identified him with Van Brandt--so enraged me that I said or did
something which obliged one of the gentlemen in the box to interfere.
"If you can't control yourself," he whispered, "you had better leave
us." He spoke with the authority of an old friend. I had sense enough
left to take his advice, and return to my post at the gallery door.

A little before midnight the performance ended. The audience began to
pour out of the theater.

I drew back into a corner behind the door, facing the gallery stairs,
and watched for her. After an interval which seemed to be endless, she
and her companion appeared, slowly descending the stairs. She wore a
long dark cloak;