to see, Herr Hauptmann, how----"

He commanded her silence with an abrupt gesture.

"If you will be pleased to bear with me a little longer. _Bitte._ I
shall not be very long. I merely wanted you to understand how my whole
life has been devoted to the great uses of the State, with the most
unselfish motives. I have been not a human sentient being, but a highly
specialized physical organism to which any wish, any emotion, unless of
service to the state, was forbidden. Charity, kindness, altruism, all
the gentler emotions--I foreswore them. I relinquished friendship. I
became a pariah, an outcast, save to those few beings from whom I took
my orders, and to them I was merely the piece of machinery which always
accomplished its tasks. I have had no happiness, no friendships, no
affection, but I am the most famous secret agent in Germany. A somber
picture, is it not?"

He paused and shrugged expressively. And then his voice lowered a note.
"Perhaps you will believe me when I say that my whole existence is a
living lie. Ah, yes, you think that. It is a lie, Countess, because no
human being can defy the living God that is within him. He cannot
forever quell the aspirations of the spirit. The spark is always alight.
Sometimes it glows and fades, but sometimes a worthy motive sets it on
fire. It is that spark which has survived in me, Countess Strahni, in
spite of my efforts--my desires even--to deny its existence. Your
illness----"

"Herr Hauptmann, I beg of you----"

"No. You cannot deny me. I nursed you, there--brought you back to life.
Ah, you did not know. I brought a doctor at the hazard of the discovery
of my hiding place. Charity came, love----"

"Herr Hauptmann, I forbid you," whispered Marishka chokingly, wondering
now why she had listened to him for so long. "I must go--go to my room."

Goritz straightened and stood aside.

"You need not fear me, Countess," he said. "You see?" he added quickly.
"I do not touch you."

Marishka moved a few paces away and then turned to look at him. He stood
erect, smiling at her, his cap in his hand.

"I--I must go to my room, Herr Hauptmann," she murmured haltingly. "I--I
am yet--far from strong."

"I am sorry. I pray that you will feel stronger in the morning. Adieu!"

"Adieu----" she murmured, and hurried through the stone portal, aware of
the gaze of those dark, slightly oblique eyes which had puzzled, then
fascinated--then frightened her.

CHAPTER XXIV

PRI