rily listening to, and because of
her fear of a row, she sat there looking defiant and resentful, and
spoke never a word.

And Tristram could not understand it, and he eventually became annoyed.
What had he said or done to her again? It was more than he meant to
stand, for no reason--to put up with such airs!

For Zara sat frowning, her mouth mutinous and her eyes black as night.

If she had told Tristram what her neighbor was saying there would at
once have been a row. She knew this, and so remained in constrained
silence, unconscious that her husband was thinking her rude to him, and
that he was angry with her. She was so strung up with fury at the
foreigner, that she answered Tristram's few remarks at random, and then
abruptly rose while he was paying the bill, as if to go out. And as she
did so the Count slipped a folded paper into the sleeve of her coat.

Tristram thought he saw something peculiar but was still in doubt, and,
with his English self-control and horror of a scene, he followed his
wife to the door, as she was walking rapidly ahead, and there helped her
into the waiting automobile.

But as she put up her arm, in stepping in, the folded paper fell to the
brightly lighted pavement and he picked it up.

He must have some explanation. He was choking with rage. There was some
mystery, he was being tricked.

"Why did you not tell me you knew that fellow who sat next to you?" he
said in a low, constrained voice.

"Because it would have been a lie," she said haughtily. "I have never
seen him but once before in my life."

"Then what business have you to allow him to write notes to you?"
Tristram demanded, too overcome with jealousy to control the anger in
his tone.

She shrank back in her corner. Here it was beginning again! After all,
in spite of his apparent agreement to live on the most frigid terms with
her he was now acting like Ladislaus: men were all the same!

"I am not aware the creature wrote me any note," she said. "What do you
mean?"

"How can you pretend like this," Tristram exclaimed furiously, "when it
fell out of your sleeve? Here it is."

"Take me back to the hotel," she said with a tone of ice. "I refuse to
go to the theater to be insulted. How dare you doubt my word? If there
is a note you had better read it and see what it says."

[Illustration: "With his English self-control and horror of a scene, he
followed his wife to the door."]

So Lord Tancred picked up the speaking-