her beautiful shoulders and arms.
An expression of cynical amusement crossed his face.

"Excuse me, but I awoke just as you were about to unbutton your blouse,"
he said. "Propriety should have made me close my eyes, but----"

"Oh!" Olga cried, shocked into speech.

"Oh, I know, madam," he said, with a bow, "you think I am suspicious,
and you only came here----"

"To have my portrait painted," Olga said quickly.

"Precisely," he acquiesced, with the same cynical expression. "Only
yesterday I met a lady at the dentist's, and I observed that she
permitted him to extract a perfectly good and very pretty tooth."

"But I----" Olga began, accepting the defensive position into which he
placed her, when he interrupted her:

"Yes, you, I know, speak the truth. I am even at liberty to believe you,
but I cannot."

For an instant Olga recovered her self-possession, and her indignation
sprang into a flame that she should be addressed in this manner by a man
whom she had never seen before--an intruder.

"I don't know why I permit a stranger to talk to me in this fashion,"
she exclaimed. "It amazes me."

The man stepped toward her. Terrified, she turned and fled toward the
door of the studio.

"Karl! Karl!" she called.

The stranger smiled as the doors were flung open and Karl burst into
the room. The young artist paused, astonished at the presence of the
stranger. He was more amazed when the man cried out in the voice of
genial comradeship:

"Hello, Karl; how do you do?"

"Why, how do you do?" Karl faltered, looking blankly from Olga to the
mysterious visitor. "I don't----"

"You don't remember me," the other said. "Don't you recall me at Monte
Carlo?"

"Oh, yes, at Monte Carlo," Karl said with dawning recollection.

"It was an eventful day," the stranger said.

"Yes, yes, of course, I remember; it was last fall, when I had lost all
my money playing roulette. Some one stood behind me, and it was you. I
was afraid when I turned and saw you, because I fancied I had seen you a
moment before, beside the croupier, grinning at me as my gold pieces
were swept away. But when I had lost everything you offered me a handful
of gold."

"Which you refused, but I saw the longing to accept in your eyes."

"I did not know you."

"But I offered it again and you accepted."

"Yes, and in ten minutes I had recouped my losses and won $20,000
besides," Karl cried with growing enthusiasm. "I remember indeed. Your
money seemed