us
and unnatural. Wilhelmine gave him her hand and inquired his name.

'Joseph Suess Oppenheimer, musician,' he replied gravely.

'Indeed? Musician!' she said, laughing. 'Thy profession already fixed and
entitled.'

'My father is a musician; he sings before courts, and I shall do the
same,' he added proudly.

Wilhelmine laughed. The boy's calm assurance of success pleased her, and
his unusual beauty attracted her, as all personal comeliness invariably
did.

'He knows what he wants, this Joseph Suess,' she said; 'and to know what
one wants, to know it decidedly, is the first step to achievement. Grasp
success firmly and it is yours!'

The boy looked at her, fascinated by her loveliness, dominated by her
voice and the creed which she enunciated. The old Jewess sent the boy to
fetch his guitar, and when he returned she desired him to sing for her
guest's entertainment.

Joseph Suess, with the too precocious manner of the Jewish child, inquired
with another elaborate bow if Wilhelmine would care to hear his voice.
She begged him to let her hear the seraphim sing. The boy caught the note
of irony in her phrase; flushing deeply, he laid aside his guitar and
would have run away had not Wilhelmine, with her easy self-indulgent
kindness of heart to those who did not get in her way, called him back
and propitiated him with smiling reassurances. The boy seated himself
near her and sang. His voice was deliciously fresh and clear, and
Wilhelmine, delightedly, made him sing again and again till the child's
repertory was exhausted. She praised him and fondled him, and taking
from her breast a small jewelled pin, engraved with her initials, she
fastened it in his coat.

'A remembrance, dear musician,' she said laughing. She was destined to
see that jewel again after long years, when humiliation and defeat came
to her, striking her down at the zenith of her brilliant career.

CHAPTER IX

'SHE COMES TO STAY THIS TIME'

EBERHARD LUDWIG stood before his dull Duchess, his eyes fixed on her
heavy, handsome face with a look of such stern anger, that the unhappy
woman felt herself to be a criminal before some harsh, implacable judge.
The phrases she had prepared in her mind during the two days since she
had expelled her rival from the castle faded away, and seemed to falter
from proud statements to a mere apology, an anxious pleading.

The Duke remained standing, one hand leant upon the back of a chair, the
other hung a