," said Barres.

"If you think it necessary."

"I'll tell him. Miss Dunois was the most celebrated entertainer in
Europe when this happened. Since she came here the man she has
mentioned has, somehow, managed to interfere and spoil every business
arrangement which she has attempted." He looked at Thessa. "I don't
know whether, if Thessalie had cared to use the name under which she
was known all over Europe----"

"I didn't dare, Garry. I thought that, if some manager would only give
me a chance I could make a new name for myself. But wherever I went I
was dogged, and every arrangement was spoiled.... I had my jewels....
You remember some of them, Garry. I gave those away--I think I told
you why. _But_ I had other jewels--unset diamonds given to my mother
by Prince Haledine. Well, I sold them and invested the money.... And
my income is all I have--quite a tiny income, Mr. Westmore, but
enough. Only I could have done very well here, I think, if I had not
been interfered with."

"Thessa," said Barres, "why not tell us both a little more? We're
devoted to you."

The girl lifted her dark eyes, and unconsciously they were turned to
Westmore. And in that young man's vigorous, virile personality perhaps
she recognised something refreshing, subtlely compelling, for, still
looking at him, she began to speak quite naturally of things which
had long been locked within her lonely heart:

"I was scarcely more than a child when General Count Klingenkampf
killed my father. The Grand Duke Cyril hushed it up.

"I had several thousand roubles. I had--trouble with the Grand
Duke.... He annoyed me ... as some men annoy a woman.... And when I
put him in his place he insulted the memory of my mother because she
was a Georgian.... I slapped his face with a whip.... And then I had
to run away."

She drew a quick, uneven breath, smiling at Westmore from whose intent
gaze her own dark eyes never wandered.

"My father had been a French officer before he took service in
Russia," she said. "I was educated in Alsace and then in England. Then
my father sent for me and I returned to St. Peters--I mean Petrograd.
And because I loved dancing my father obtained permission for me to
study at the Imperial school. Also, I had it in me to sing, and I had
excellent instruction.

"And because I did such things in my own way, sometimes my father
permitted me to entertain at the gay gatherings patronised by the
Grand Duke Cyril."

She smiled in rem