hobbies: I _know!_"

She looked down in consternation at the exquisite trinkets he had condemned
so bluntly. Then in a fit of temper she flung them from her with all her
might, threw herself upon the chaise-longue, and wept passionately into its
cushions. Then the young man proved himself tolerably instructed in the
ways of womankind. He said nothing more, made no offer to comfort her by
those futile and empty pats on the shoulder which are instinctive with man
on such occasions, but simply sat him down and waited.

In time the tempest passed, Sofia sat up and dabbled her eyes with a web of
lace and linen. Then she looked round with a tentative smile that was
wholly captivating. She was one of those rare women who can afford to cry.

"It's so humiliating!" she protested with racial ingenuousness--one of her
most compelling charms. "But it's ridiculous, too. I was so sure no one
would ever know."

"No one but an expert ever would, madame."

"You see"--apparently she had forgotten that Lanyard was anything but a
lifelong friend--"I needed money so badly, I had them reproduced and sold
the originals."

"Madame la princesse--if she will permit--commands my profound sympathy."

"But," she remembered, drying her eyes, "you called me an adventuress,
too!"

"But," he contended, gravely, "you had already called me the Lone Wolf."

"But what do you expect, monsieur, when I find you in my rooms--?"

"But what does madame la princesse expect when I find she had been to
mine--and brought something valuable away with her, too!"

"I had a reason--"

"So had I."

"What was it?"

"Perhaps it was to see madame la princesse alone--secretly--without
exciting the jealousy, which I understand is supernormal, of monsieur le
prince."

"But why should you wish to see me alone?" she demanded, with widening
eyes.

"Perhaps to beg madame's permission to offer her what may possibly prove
some slight consolation."

She weighed his words in dark distrust. What was this consolation? What his
game? His attitude remained consistently too deferential and punctilious
for one to suspect that by consolation he meant love-making.

"But how did you get in?"

"By the front door, madame. I find it ajar--one assumes, through oversight
on the part of one of the servants--it opens to a touch, I walk in--et
voila!"

His levity was infectious. In spite of herself, she smiled in sympathy.

"And what, pray, is this wonderful consolation yo