these unfortunate derelicts to
shift for themselves. It was not fair that they should be made to suffer
for her mad caprices. She must play it out boldly to the final line,
come evil or not.... Love! She laughed brokenly and struck her hands in
suppressed fury. A fitting climax, this! All the world was mad and she
was the maddest in it.

Some one was coming along the path. She wheeled impatiently. She wanted
to be alone. And of all men Worth was not the one she cared to see. But
the sight of his pale face and set jaws stayed the words she was
inclined to speak. She waited restlessly.

"I realize that my presence may be distasteful to you," he began, not
without some minor agitation. It was the first time in days that he had
stood so near to her or had spoken while alone with her. "But I have
something to say to you upon which your future welfare largely depends."

"I believed that we had settled that."

"I am not making any declaration of love, madame," he said.

"I am listening." This prelude did not strike her favorably.

"There has been a tremendous wonder, as I understand, about this ball."

"In what way?" guardedly.

"In regard to the strange manner in which the invitations were issued."

"Have you found out who did it?" she demanded.

"Yes." The light in his eyes was feverish despite the pallor of his
face.

"Who was it?" fiercely. Oh, but she would have revenge for this
miserable jest!

"I issued those invitations--with a definite purpose."

"You?" Her eyes grew wide and her lips parted.

"I!" a set defiance in his tone.

"It is you who have done this thing?"

"Yes. I am the guilty man. I did the work well, considering the
difficulties. The list was the main obstacle, but I overcame that. I
represented myself as secretary to her Highness, which, when all is
said, was the very thing agreed upon in Venice. I am the guilty man;"
but he spoke like a man who was enjoying a triumph.

"And you have the effrontery to confess your crime to me?" her fury
blazing forth.

"Call it what you please, the fact remains."

"What purpose had you in mind when you did this cowardly thing? And I
had trusted you and treated you as an equal! And so it was you who
perpetrated this forgery, this miserable jest?"

"Forgery, yes; jest, no." Her anger did not alarm him; he had gone too
far to be alarmed at anything.

"Why did you do it?"

"I did it as a man who has but a single throw left. One chance in a
thousan