count had given her, she went forth into the
world again, storming the great theatres in a new fever of travel and
adventure.

She was then just twenty-three, but already felt herself an old woman.
How she had changed!... More affairs? As she went over that period of
her life in her talk with Rafael, Leonora closed her eyes with a shudder
of modesty and remorse. Drunk with fame and power she had rushed about
the world lavishing her beauty on anyone who interested her for the
moment. The property of everybody and of nobody! She could not remember
the names, even, of all the men who had loved her during that era of
madness, so many had been caught in the wake of her stormy flight across
the world! She had returned to Russia once, and been expelled by the
Czar for compromising the prestige of the Imperial Family, through an
affair with a grand duke who had wanted to marry her. In Rome she had
posed in the nude for a young and unknown sculptor out of pure
compassion for his silent admiration; and she herself made his "Venus"
public, hoping that the world-wide scandal would bring fame to the work
and to its author. In Genoa she found Salvatti again, now "retired," and
living on usury from his savings. She received him with an amiable
smile, lunched with him, treated him as an old comrade; and at dessert,
when he had become hopelessly drunk, she seized a whip and avenged the
blows she had received in her time of slavery to him, beating him with a
ferocity that stained the apartment with gore and brought the police to
the hotel. Another scandal! And this time her name bandied about in a
criminal court! But she, a fugitive from justice, and proud of her
exploit, sang in the United States, wildly acclaimed by the American
public, which admired the combative Amazon even more than the artist.

There she made the acquaintance of Hans Keller, the famous orchestra
conductor, and a pupil and friend of Wagner. The German _maestro_ became
her second love. With stiff, reddish hair, thick-rimmed eyeglasses, an
enormous mustache that drooped over either side of his mouth and framed
his chin, he was certainly not so handsome as Selivestroff. But he had
one irresistible charm, the charm of Art. With the tragic Russian in her
mind and on her conscience, she felt the need of burning herself in the
immortal flame of the ideal; and she adored the famous musician for the
artistic associations that hovered about him. For the first time, the
much