rself will be provided with means of self-protection by
Sturm."

"And Karslake?"

"I have not yet made up my mind."

"Hearing is obedience."

Victor relapsed into another reverie which lasted so long that even the
patience of Shaik Tsin bade fair to fail. In the end the silence was broken
by two words:

"The crystal."

From a cabinet at the end of the room Shaik Tsin brought a crystal ball
supported on the backs of three golden dragons standing tail to tail,
superbly wrought examples of Chinese goldsmithing. This he placed carefully
on the black teakwood surface at Victor's elbow.

"And now, inform the girl Sofia I wish to see her."

"And if she again sends her excuses?"

"Say, in that event, I shall be obliged to come to her room."

XV

INTUITION

She had not thought, of course, of going down to dinner; she had, instead,
sent Victor word simply that she begged to be excused from joining him for
that meal. Then, unable longer to endure Chou Nu's efforts to comfort or
distract her, Sofia had stepped out of her street frock and into a negligee
and, dismissing the maid, returned to the chaise-longue upon which, in vain
hope of being able to cry out the wretchedness of her heart, she had thrown
herself on first gaining the sanctuary of her room.

For hours, she did not guess how many, she scarcely stirred. Neither was
the blessed boon of tears granted unto her. Alone with her immense and
immitigable misery, she lay in darkness tempered only by the dim skyshine
that filtered through the window draperies; hating life, that had no mercy;
hating the duplicity that had led Karslake into making untrue love to her,
but inexplicably not hating Karslake himself, or the enshrined image that
wore his name; hating herself for her facile readiness to give love where
all but the guise of love was lacking, and for knowing this deep hurt
where she should have felt only scorn and anger; but hating, most of all,
or rather for the first time discovering how well she hated, him to whom
unerring intuition told her she owed this brimming measure of heartbreak
and humiliation, the man who called himself her father.

For if Karslake had done her a cruel wrong in winning her avowal of the
love that had been growing in her heart these many weeks, while he was
merely amusing himself or serving a secret purpose--whose was the initial
blame for that?

Who had egged Karslake on, as he had asserted, "to win her confidence,"
leav