in. Probably in all the annals of artistic
snobbery, no cultured cosmopolitan had ever been made to suffer a more
exquisite moral torture of humiliation than Musa had contrived to inflict
upon Mr. and Mrs. Spatt in return for their hospitality. Their sneaped
squirmings upon the sofa were terrible to witness. But Mr. Ziegler's
sensibility was apparently quite unaffected. He continued to smile, to
drink, and to smoke. He seemed to be saying to himself: "What does it
matter to me that this miserable Frenchman has caught me in a mistake? I
could eat him, and one day I shall eat him."

After a little while Musa snatched out of his right-hand lower waistcoat
pocket the tiny wooden "mute" which all violinists carry without fail upon
all occasions in all their waistcoats; and, sticking it with marvellous
rapidity upon the bridge of the violin, he entered upon a pianissimo, but
still lively, episode of the Toccata. And simultaneously another melody
faint and clear could be heard in the room. It was Mr. Ziegler humming "The
Watch on the Rhine" against the Toccata of Debussy. Thus did it occur to
Mr. Ziegler to take revenge on Musa for having attempted to humiliate him.
Not unsurprisingly, Musa detected at once the competitive air. He continued
to play, gazing hard at his violin and apparently entranced, but edging
little by little towards Mr. Ziegler. Audrey desired either to give a cry
or to run out of the room. She did neither, being held to inaction by the
spell of Mr. Ziegler's perfect unconcern as, with the beer glass lifted
towards his mouth, he proceeded steadily to work through "The Watch on the
Rhine," while Musa lilted out the delicate, gay phrases of Debussy. The
enchantment upon the whole room was sinister and painful. Musa got closer
to Mr. Ziegler, who did not blench nor cease from his humming. Then
suddenly Musa, lowering his fiddle and interrupting the scene, snatched the
mute from the bridge of the violin.

"I have put it on the wrong instrument," he said thickly, with a very
French intonation, and simultaneously he shoved the mute with violence into
the mouth of Mr. Ziegler. In doing so, he jerked up Mr. Ziegler's elbow,
and the remains of the beer flew up and baptised Mr. Ziegler's face and
vesture. Then he jammed the violin into its case, and ran out of the room.

"_Barbare! Imbecile! Sauvage!_" he muttered ferociously on the threshold.

The enchantment was broken. Everybody rose, and not the least precipita