."

Eveline fell back upon the sofa and hid her face in her hands.

"If you wish to shed a few tears to the memory of Kaulmann I will
retire to the window," remarked Prince Waldemar, with ironical
courtesy.

Eveline made him no answer. In her mind everything was in confusion;
she could think of nothing. Let everything go; what did it matter?
Should she institute a law-suit to recover her property? Should she
bring witnesses to prove that this ornament, these costly hangings,
these rich carpets were not the property of her husband, but the gifts
to her from a gray-beard--the most upright, the dearest of men, a
Hungarian magnate, who had adopted her, an actress, to be his own
child, with no self-seeking, no sinful gratification, but out of pure
affection? No one would credit her story. She would tell it to no one.
She would not subject the name of her benefactor to the jeers and
laughter of the incredulous. Sooner let everything go.

"I am not weeping, sir," she said to the prince. "If you have anything
further to tell me I am ready to listen."

"I could tell you many other unfortunate circumstances," returned
Waldemar, leaning against the fireplace with the silver grate. "For
one thing, Prince Theobald, your former patron, has been placed by his
family under legal restraint, and cannot take any active part in the
affairs of this world."

"I know that."

"The shares which he took as a provision for you in the Bondavara
Company have been also sequestrated by law."

"That has been told to me already."

"This loss, however, has a compensation: those shares are now almost
worthless. Since the colliery explosion, and the impossibility of
extinguishing the fire in the mine, they have fallen to nothing."

"That does not concern me."

"I have not quite finished. The clergyman who was your friend, whose
dreams were of a bishop's mitre, has returned to his monastery."

"I have known that some time."

"You seem to have learned everything. Perhaps you know also that your
manager has cancelled your engagement and given your part to another
actress?"

"Here is the letter," answered Eveline, drawing a crumpled paper from
her pocket. And then she looked at the prince with proud contempt. She
was wondrously beautiful. "Have you taken the trouble to come here to
tell me all this?" she asked, her eyes gleaming not through tears but
with indignation.

"I did not come here on that account," answered the prince, sitting
do