though each
one were addressed to himself. Three times did Lady Chandos address him
without any response, a thing which in her eyes was little less than a
crime.

"How you watch La Vanira," she said. "I am sure you admire her very
much."

He looked at her with eyes that were dazed--that saw nothing; the eyes
of a man more than half mad.

"And now look," she said. "Why, Lance, La Vanira is looking at me. What
eyes she has. They stir my very heart and trouble me. They are saying
something to me."

"Marion, hush! What are you talking about?" he cried.

"La Vanira's eyes--she is looking at me, Lance."

"Nonsense!" he said, and the one word was so abruptly pronounced that
Lady Chandos felt sure it was nonsense and said no more.

But after that evening he said no more about going to the opera. If he
felt any wish to go, he would go; it would be quite easy for him to make
some excuse to her.

And those evenings grew more and more frequent. He did not dare to
disobey Leone; he did not dare to go to her house, or to offer to see
her in the opera house. He tried hard to meet her accidentally, but that
happy accident never occurred; yet he could not rest, he must see her;
something that was stronger than himself drew him near her.

He was weak of purpose; he never resolutely took himself in hand and
said:

"I am married now. I have a wife at home. Leone's beauty, Leone's
talents, are all less than nothing to me. I will be true to my wife."

He never said that; he never braced his will, or his energies to the
task of forgetting her; he dallied with the temptation as he had done
before; he allowed himself to be tempted as he had done before; the
result was that he fell as he had fallen before.

Every day his first thought was how he could possibly get away that
evening without drawing particular attention to his movements; and he
went so often that people began to laugh and to tease him and to wonder
why he was always there.

Leone always saw him. If any one had been shrewd and quick enough to
follow her, they would have seen that she played to one person; that her
eyes turned to him continually; that the gestures of her white arms
seemed to woo him. She never smiled at him, but there were times, when
she was singing some lingering, pathetic notes, it seemed as though she
were almost waiting for him to answer her.

He did not dare to go behind the scenes, to linger near the door, to
wait for her carriage, but his