would have been.

"I will send the same man to you to-morrow evening, and let you know
what is possible," she said. "And now I will show you the way out of
my house," she added, with the first faint shadow of a smile. With the
slight gilt lamp in her hand she went out of the little rock chamber,
listened a moment, and began to descend the steps.

"But the key?" I asked, following her light footsteps with my heavier
tread.

"It is in the door," she answered, and went on.

When we reached the bottom we found it as she had said. The servant
had left the key on the inside, and with some difficulty I turned the
bolts. We stood for one moment in the narrow space, where the lowest
step was set close against the door. Her eyes flashed strangely in the
lamplight.

"How easy it would be!" I said, understanding her glance. She nodded,
and pushed me gently out into the street; and I closed the door, and
leaned against it as she locked it.

"Good-night," she said from the other side, and I put my mouth to the
key-hole. "Good-night. Courage!" I answered. I could hear her lightly
mounting the stone steps. It seemed wonderful to me that she should
not be afraid to go back alone. But love makes people brave.

The moon had risen higher during the time I had been within, and I
strolled round the base of the rock, lighting a cigar as I went. The
terrible adventure I had dreaded was now over, and I felt myself
again. In truth, it was a curious thing to happen to a man of my years
and my habits; but the things I had heard had so much absorbed my
attention that, while the interview lasted, I had forgotten the
strange manner of the meeting. I was horrified at the extent of the
girl's misery, more felt than understood from her brief description
and passionate outbreaks. There is no mistaking the strength of a
suffering that wastes and consumes the mortal part of us as wax melts
at the fire.

And Benoni--the villain! He had written to ask Hedwig in marriage
before he came to see me in Rome. There was something fiendish in his
almost inviting me to see his triumph, and I cursed him as I kicked
the loose stones in the road with my heavy shoes. So he was a banker,
as well as a musician and a wanderer. Who would have thought it?

"One thing is clear," I said to myself, as I went to bed: "unless
something is done immediately, that poor girl will consume herself and
die." And all that night her poor thin face and staring eyes were in
my dr