ile the band was playing loudly some new American march,
and Carlotta and Pasquale were laughing together, Judith drew near me.

"You did not answer my question about those two, Marcus."

My fingers trembled as I lit a fresh cigarette.

"He is not a man to whom any woman's destiny should be entrusted."

"And is she a woman on whom a man should stake his life's happiness?"

"God knows," said I, setting my teeth.

It was not an enjoyable dinner-party. I longed for the evening to be
over, to have Carlotta safe back with me at home. I felt a curious dread
of the Empire.

We arrived there towards the end of the first ballet. Carlotta, as soon
as she had taken her seat, leaned both elbows on the front of the box
and surrendered her senses to the stage. Pasquale talked to Judith.
Wishing for a few moments alone I left the box and sauntered moodily
along the promenade behind the First Circle. The occupants were either
leaning over the partitions and watching the spectacle or sitting with
drink before them at the little marble tables at the back. The gaudy,
gilded, tobacco-smoke and humanity-filled theatre seemed to be unreal,
the stage but a phantom cloud effect. I wondered why I, a creature from
the concrete world, was there. I had an insane impulse to fly from it
all, to go out into the streets, and wander, wander for ever, away from
the world. I was walking along the promenade, lost in this lunacy, when
I stumbled against a fellow-promenader and the shock brought me to my
senses. It was an elderly, obese Oriental wearing a red fez. He had a
long nose and small, crafty eyes, and was deeply pitted with smallpox.
I made profuse apologies and he accepted them with suavity. It then
occurring to me that I was he having in a discourteous and abjectly
absurd manner, I made my way back to the box. I drew a chair to Judith's
side.

"You are giving me a captivating evening," she said, with a smile.

"Whom are you captivating?" I asked, idly jesting. "Pasquale?"

"You are cruel," whispered Judith, with a flicker of her eyelids.

I flushed, ashamed, not having weighed the significance of my words.
All I could say was: "I beg your pardon," whereat Judith laughed
mirthlessly. I relapsed into silence. Turn followed turn on the stage.
While the curtain was lowered Carlotta sank back with a little sigh of
enjoyment, and nodded brightly at me.

"Do you remember," she said, turning to me, at a fresh fall of the
curtain, "when you b