he
fragrance of the roses came heavily to Antony's nostrils.

His aunt, the Comtesse Potowski, sat at his right. She was saying--

"My dear boy, when are you going to be married? There is nothing like a
happy marriage, Tony. A woman may have children, you know, and be
miserable; she has not found the right man. I hope you will be very
happy, Tony."

Some one asked her to sing, and Madame Potowski, languid, slim, with
unmistakable distinction, rose to play. She suggested his mother to
Antony. She sang selections from the opera then in vogue. Tony stood
near the piano and listened. Her voice always affected him deeply, and
as he had responded to it in the old days in New York he responded now,
and there was a sense of misery at his heart as he listened to her
singing the music of old times when he had been unable to carry out his
ideals because of his suffering and poverty.

There was now a sense of soul discontent, of pitiless remorse. As if
again to disenchant himself, he glanced at Mary as she, too, listened.
Back of her in the vases were high branches of lilac, white and
delicate, with the first beauty of spring; she sat gracefully indolent,
smoking a cigarette, evidently dreaming of pleasant things. To Antony
there was a blank wall now between him and his visions. How unreal
everything but money seemed, and his soul stifled and his senses numbed.
In this atmosphere of riches and luxury what place had he? Penniless,
unknown, his stature stunted--for it had been dwarfed by his idleness.
Again he heard Barye say, "_C'est dommage_."

His aunt's voice, bright as silver, filled the room. He believed she was
singing for him expressly, for she had chosen an English ballad--"Roll
on, silvery moon." Again, with a sadness which all imaginative and
poetic natures understand, his present slipped away. He was back in
Albany in the cab of his engine; the air bellied in his sleeve, the air
of home whipped in his veins--he saw the fields as the engine flashed by
them, whitening under the moonlight as the silvery moon rolled on! How
he had sweated to keep himself a man, how he had toiled to keep his hope
up and to live his life well, what a fight he had made in order that his
visions might declare themselves to him!

When his aunt ceased to sing and people gathered around her, Tony rose
and limped over to Mrs. Faversham. He put out his hand.

"I must go, Mary," he said. "I have some work to do this afternoon."

She smiled at