o the
right, and at the end of that corridor some steps and a landing and a
door, and on the other side of that door a large drawing-room. And
so, without ringing or waiting for the faithful Alexis, I came in."

"And what brings you to Bruges, dear lady?" asked Alresca.

"Solicitude for your health, dear sir," she replied, smiling. "At
Bayreuth I met that quaint person, Mrs. Sullivan Smith, who told me
that you were still here with Mr. Foster; and to-day, as I was
travelling from Cologne to Ostend, the idea suddenly occurred to me to
spend one night at Bruges, and make inquiries into your condition--and
that of Mr. Foster. You know the papers have been publishing the most
contradictory accounts."

"Have they indeed?" laughed Alresca.

But I could see that he was nervous and not at ease. For myself, I
was, it must be confessed, enchanted to see Rosa again, and so
unexpectedly, and it was amazingly nice of her to include myself in
her inquiries, and yet I divined that it would have been better if she
had never come. I had a sense of some sort of calamity.

Alresca was flushed. He spoke in short, hurried sentences. Alternately
his tones were passionate and studiously cold. Rosa's lovely
presence, her musical chatter, her gay laughter, filled the room. She
seemed to exhale a delightful and intoxicating atmosphere, which
spread itself through the chamber and enveloped the soul of Alresca.
It was as if he fought against an influence, and then gradually
yielded to the sweetness of it. I observed him closely--for was he not
my patient?--and I guessed that a struggle was passing within him. I
thought of what he had just been saying to me, and I feared lest the
strong will should be scarcely so strong as it had deemed itself.

"You have dined?" asked Alresca.

"I have eaten," she said. "One does not dine after a day's
travelling."

"Won't you have some coffee?"

She consented to the coffee, which Alexis John Smedley duly brought
in, and presently she was walking lightly to and fro, holding the tiny
white cup in her white hand, and peering at the furniture and
bric-a-brac by the light of several candles. Between whiles she
related to Alresca all the news of their operatic acquaintances--how
this one was married, another stranded in Buenos Ayres, another ill
with jealousy, another ill with a cold, another pursued for debt, and
so on through the diverting category.

"And Smart?" Alresca queried at length.

I had been