had intended to ask him
who Olga was.

A great pity. They might have been friends. The back of her hand went
to her lips but did not touch them. She could not rub away those burning
kisses--that is, not with the back of her hand. Vividly she saw him
fiddling bareheaded in front of the Metropolitan Opera House. It seemed,
though, that it had happened years ago. A great pity. The charm of that
frolic would abide with her as long as she lived. A brave man, too.
Hadn't he left her with a gay wave of the hand, not knowing, for want of
strength, if he could make the detour of the block? That took courage.
His journey halfway across the world had taken courage. Yet he could so
basely disillusion her. It was not the kiss; it was the smile. She had
seen that smile before, born of evil. If only he had spoken!

The heavenly magic of that fiddle! It made her sad. Genius, the ability
to play with souls, soothe, tantalize, lift up; and then to smile at her
like that!

She shut down the curtain upon these cogitations and summoned Cutty,
visualized his handsome head, shot with gray, the humour of his smile.
She did care for him; no doubt of that. She couldn't have sent that
telegram else. Cutty--name of a pipe, as the Frenchmen said! All at once
she rocked with laughter. She was going to marry a man whose given name
she could not recall! Henry, George, John, William? For the life of her
she could not remember.

And with this laughter still bubbling in a softer note she got into bed,
twisted about from side to side, from this pillow to that, the tired
body seeking perfect relaxation.

A broken melody entered her head. Sleepily she sought one channel of
thought after another to escape; still the melody persisted. As her
consciousness dodged hither and thither the bars and measures joined....
She sat up, chilled, bewildered. That Tschaikowsky waltz! She could
hear it as clearly as if Johnny Two-Hawks and the Amati were in the very
room. She grew afraid. Of what? She did not know.

And while she sat there in bed threshing out this fear to find the
grain, Cutty was tramping the streets of Washington, her telegram
crumpled in his hand. From time to time he would open it and reread it
under a street lamp.

To marry her and then to cheat her. It wasn't humanly possible to marry
her and then to let her go. He thought of those warm, soft arms round
his neck, the absolute trust of that embrace. Molly's girl. No, he could
not do it. He w