initial commit of ebook 19943HEADmain

7 files changed, 15218 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6833f05
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.gitattributes
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+* text=auto
+*.txt text
+*.md text
diff --git a/19943-8.txt b/19943-8.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3bbbd7a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/19943-8.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,7601 @@
+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Hippodrome, by Rachel Hayward
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Hippodrome
+
+
+Author: Rachel Hayward
+
+
+
+Release Date: November 28, 2006  [eBook #19943]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HIPPODROME***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Al Haines
+
+
+
+HIPPODROME
+
+by
+
+RACHEL HAYWARD
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+George H. Doran Company
+New York
+Copyright, 1913,
+By George H. Doran Company
+
+
+
+
+
+TO
+
+EDYTH AND ARTHUR APPLIN
+
+WITH LOVE AND HOMAGE.
+
+
+
+  "Car vois-tu chaque jour je t'aime davantage,
+  Aujourd'hui plus qu'hier, et bien moins que demain."
+      (_Rosemonde Rostand_)
+
+
+
+
+THE HIPPODROME
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+  "Aujourd'hui le primtetemps, Ninon, demain l'hiver.
+  Quoi! tu nas pas l'étoile, est tu vas sur la mer!"
+            DE MUSSET.
+
+
+Count Emile Poleski was obliged to be at the Barcelona Station at five
+o'clock in the afternoon one hot Friday in May.  His business, having
+to do with that which was known to himself and his associates as "the
+Cause," necessitated careful attention, and required the performance of
+certain manoeuvres in such a way that they should be unobserved by the
+various detectives to whom he was an object of interest.
+
+He looked round, scowling, till he found the man he wanted, and who was
+to all outward appearances the driver of one of the row of _fiacres_
+that waited outside the station.  Cigarettes were exchanged, and a tiny
+slip of paper passed imperceptibly from hand to hand, then he turned
+ostensibly to watch the incoming train from Port-Bou.  As he was on the
+platform it would be better to look as if he had come to meet someone,
+and as he had nothing particular to do just then it would make a
+distraction to watch the various types of humanity arriving at this
+continental Buenos Ayres, the city of romance, anarchy, commerce and
+varied vices.
+
+Emile Poleski called it _l'entresol de l'enfer_, and certainly he was
+not there by his own choice.  It was the centre of intrigue, and to
+intrigue his life, intellect, and the little money he had left from his
+Polish estates, were devoted.  To him life meant "The Cause," and that
+exigeant mistress left little room for other and more natural
+affections.
+
+In his career women did not count, at least they did not count as
+women.  If they had money to spend, or brains and energies that could
+be utilised, that was a different matter.  He had a trick of studying
+people as one studies natural history through a microscope.
+
+It was all very interesting, but when one had done with the specimens
+one threw them away and looked about for fresh material.
+
+The train came in, slackened speed and stopped, and its contents
+resolved themselves into little groups of people all hunting with more
+or less excitement for their luggage, and porters to convey the same to
+cabs.
+
+The figure of a girl who had just alighted and was standing alone,
+caught and held his roving eyes.  The pose of her abnormally slim body
+had all the grace of a figure on a Grecian vase in its clean curves and
+easy balance.
+
+Her head was beautifully set upon a long throat, and her feet were
+conspicuously slender and delicate in their high French boots of
+champagne-coloured kid.  Her face, which as far as he could see was of
+a startling pallor, was obscured by a white lace veil tied loosely
+round her Panama hat, and left to fall down her back in floating ends;
+and she wore a rather crumpled, cream-coloured dress.
+
+She stood, looking round, as if uncertain how to act, evidently in
+expectation of someone to meet her.  No one appeared and she moved off
+in search of a porter.  Emile followed at a reasonable distance.  Books
+he found desperately dull, but humanity in any shape or form was
+attractive to him, and the girl's appearance appealed to a deeply
+embedded love of the exotic and mysterious.
+
+He watched with cynical amusement as she tried to explain her wishes in
+French to a porter, who spoke only the dialect of Catalonia.  Her voice
+finally decided Emile on his line of conduct.  Low-pitched it was, with
+subtle inflections, and with a hoarseness in the lower notes such as
+one hears in the voices of Jewish women.
+
+A woman, whose vocal notes were of that enchanting _timbre_, was likely
+to prove interesting.
+
+He advanced a few steps nearer, saying in French, "I speak the
+language.  Can I be of any use?"
+
+The girl turned, giving him a comprehensive glance, and bowed slightly
+in acknowledgment.
+
+"Many thanks, _Monsieur_!  I know scarcely any Spanish.  Perhaps you
+would tell me where one could get lodgings.  It seems rather hopeless
+for this man and myself to continue arguing in different languages, so
+if you would not mind--"
+
+When they were both in the _fiacre_ she did not speak, but leaned back,
+her hands in her lap, her feet crossed, looking straight in front of
+her with hazel-green eyes, expressionless as those of the Sphinx.
+Count Poleski congratulated himself in silence over his discovery.
+Here was a woman so unique that she asked no questions, did not
+volunteer after the manner of most women a flood of voluble
+information, apparently took everything for granted, and was in no way
+embarrassed by himself or his company.
+
+In some respects she appeared a young girl, but her composure was
+certainly not youthful.
+
+"So you're out from England," he said at last.
+
+"From Paris," she answered him serenely.  "I'm Arithelli of the
+Hippodrome."  There was a girlish pride in her accents, and she looked
+at him sideways to observe the effect of her announcement.
+
+"_Ma foi_!  So it's that, is it?  Then I've heard something about you.
+I know the Manager pretty well.  He said you were _un peu bizarre_."
+
+"_Peut être plus qu'un peu_," Arithelli retorted quickly.  "I see you
+think he's right."
+
+Arrived at the lodgings she sat still, waiting in the cab with the same
+apparent indifference while Emile wrangled with the landlady.  At
+length he came back to her: "You had better try these for a week," he
+said.  "They're forty _pesetas_.  She will want the rent in advance as
+you have no recommendation."  For the first time Arithelli seemed
+disturbed.
+
+"I'm afraid I can't pay it.  I'm to have five pounds a week at the
+Hippodrome, but of course I can't ask for that in advance.  I had a
+second-class ticket out here, and now I've only got four-and-sixpence
+left."
+
+She held out a small blue satin bag, displaying a few coins.  "Perhaps
+I'd better go and explain to the Manager."  Emile shrugged his
+shoulders.  Obviously the girl was very young.
+
+"On the whole I think you'd better not," he said.  "You know nothing
+about either myself or the Manager, and it seems you've got to trust
+one of us so it may as well be me."
+
+When he had arranged matters he departed, saying casually, "I'll come
+in again to-night about nine o'clock to see how you are getting on.
+Don't do anything insane, such as wandering about the streets, because
+you feel dull.  It won't hurt you to put up with the dulness for a bit.
+You'll have plenty of excitement if you're going to live in Barcelona."
+
+"_Tiens_!" said Arithelli to herself.  "What manners and what dirty
+nails!  _C'est un homme épouvantable_, but very useful.  But for him I
+should have been prancing round this place all night, looking for
+rooms."
+
+She dragged her trunk towards her, and proceeded to unpack the
+collection of gaudy dresses that she had bought with so much pride at
+the _Bon Marché_ in Paris, and which were all in the worst possible
+taste.
+
+Perhaps she had been impelled to a choice of lively colours as being
+symbolical in their brightness of the new life on which she was about
+to embark.  There was a green cloth rendered still more hideous by
+being inlet with medallions of pink silk, a cornflower blue with much
+silver braid already becoming tarnished in the few times it had been
+worn, and a mauve and orange adorned with flamboyant Eastern embroidery.
+
+When she had tumbled them all out they showed a vivid patch of
+ill-assorted tints.  Arithelli shivered as she sat back on her heels on
+the floor, and looked round the sordid room.  The excitement of her
+arrival had worn off, and the element of depression reigned supreme in
+her mind.  Certainly the apartment, which was supposed to be a
+bed-sitting-room, but which was merely a bedroom, was not enlivening to
+contemplate.  No carpet, dirty boards, a large four-poster bed canopied
+with faded draperies against the wall facing the window.  There was a
+feeble attempt at a washstand in a small alcove on the left, furnished
+with the usual doll's house crockery affected on the Continent,--no
+wardrobe and no dressing table.
+
+It all looked hopeless, she told herself disgustedly.  Surely there
+were better rooms to be found in Barcelona for forty _pesetas_ a week!
+Either lodgings must be very dear or else Emile Poleski had meant to
+take a large commission for his trouble in finding them!
+
+She was stiff and tired after the long journey and want of proper food,
+and every trifle took upon itself huge dimensions.  She was daintily
+fastidious as to cleanliness, and everything seemed to her filthy
+beyond belief.  The universal squalor customary in Spanish life had
+come as an unpleasant shock.
+
+When she started from Paris she had conjured visions of a triumphal
+entry into her new career.  Now she felt rather frightened and
+desperately lonely, and the horrible room appeared like a bad omen for
+the future.  But, she reflected, after all, things might have been
+worse.  She had found one friend already.  Certainly he had
+disagreeable manners, especially after the artificial and invariable
+politeness of the Frenchmen she had met while travelling, but at least
+he promised to be useful.  She picked herself up off the floor and
+began to consider the disposal of her garments.  Three or four wooden
+pegs, the only accommodation to be seen, were obviously not sufficient
+to hold all her clothes.
+
+Presently there was an interlude, provided by the advent of the
+landlady.  Her dishevelment accorded well with the general look of the
+house; her slippers clicked on the carpetless boards at every shuffling
+step, and she carried a half-cold, slopped-over cup of coffee.  To
+Arithelli's relief the woman was mistress of a limited amount of French
+patois, and in answer to a demand for a wardrobe of some kind, said she
+would send up her son.  He was a carpenter and would doubtless arrange
+something.  She gave a curious glance at the girl's witch-like beauty,
+a mixture of suspicion and barely-admitted pity in her thoughts.
+
+As to Emile's share in the drama she had naturally formed conclusions.
+After a respectable interval her son arrived, and having delivered
+himself of a remark in Spanish and being answered in French, proceeded
+to hammer a row of enormous nails into the wall at regular intervals.
+Arithelli sat upon her trunk, which she considered cleaner than the
+chairs, and watched the process, her green eyes assuming a curious
+veiled expression, a hank of copper-tinted hair falling upon her
+shoulders.
+
+There was something uncanny in her capacity for keeping still, and she
+had none of the usual and natural fidgetiness of a young girl.  In
+whatever position of sitting or standing she found herself she was
+capable of remaining for an indefinite period.
+
+When the carpenter's manipulations had ceased she hung up her dresses
+carefully, put the rest of her things back into the trunk, as being the
+safest place, and sitting down again began to cry in a low, painful
+way, utterly unlike the light April shower emotion of the ordinary
+woman.
+
+Here she was in Barcelona, and the fulfilled desire seemed likely to
+become already Dead Sea fruit.  Supposing she got ill, or failed to
+satisfy the audience.  She would see her name to-morrow when she went
+out in large letters on the posters of the Hippodrome:
+
+"_Arithelli, the beautiful English equestrienne_," and underneath some
+appalling picture of herself in columbine skirts, or jockey's silk
+jacket and cap and top boots.
+
+She had been crazy with delight over her success in getting the
+engagement from the manager in Paris, and it had not occurred to her
+that her appearance had had a great deal to do with her having been
+accepted.  She had signed a contract for a year; and looking forward a
+year seemed a very long time.  There had been opposition at home.
+
+Her father had said, "I don't approve, but at the same time I don't
+know in the least what else you can do.  It's Hobson's choice.  You can
+ride, and you've got looks of the sort to take in a public career."
+
+Her mother had been frankly brutal.  Now that there was no money, she
+said, she could not have three great girls at home doing nothing.  She
+had given them all a good education and they must try and make some use
+of it.  Neither of the younger sisters, Isobel and Valèrie, were old
+enough to do anything for themselves, so Arithelli at the age of
+twenty-four had taken her courage, which was the indomitable courage of
+her race, in both hands, and launched herself on the world.  The
+bare-backed riding of her early days in Galway had proved a valuable
+asset, and there was not a horse she could not manage.
+
+Her slim figure seemed born to the saddle, and her nerve was as yet
+unshaken.
+
+The man who had engaged her had been more than a little astonished at
+the composure with which she showed off the horses' paces, and went
+through various tricks.  As she was young and inexperienced, he would
+get her cheaply; she could be taught all the stereotyped acts with very
+little trouble, and her morbid style of beauty would be a draw in Spain.
+
+There was nothing of the English miss about her appearance and few
+people would have believed her to be only twenty-four.  She had no
+freshness, no _beautè de diable_.  Her beauty was that of line and
+modelling.  Her quietness was partly the result of a convent education.
+An old Irish nun had told her once that good looks were a snare and a
+delusion of the Devil, and that hers would never bring her happiness.
+
+At least they had got her an engagement, and a circus had always
+represented to her the very height of romance.
+
+She wondered how she could manage for money till she got her five
+pounds next Friday.  It was lucky that all her habits, and so on, were
+provided by the management.  She wished to-morrow would arrive, for she
+felt eager to begin work, and see the horses.  She had quite forgotten
+all about Emile's promised visit, and was just pulling down the rest of
+her hair preparatory to getting ready for bed, when he walked in
+without any preliminary knock.
+
+"How are you getting on?  All right?"  Then after a momentary
+inspection of the many garments that festooned the dirty walls, he
+added: "I don't think you've got very good taste in clothes!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+  "All women are good; good for something, or good for nothing."
+            CERVANTES.
+
+
+The next morning Emile made his entrance with the same complete
+disregard of ceremony.  Arithelli was still in bed and only half awake.
+She raised herself slightly and looked at him with sleepy eyes.
+
+"Oh!" she said.  "I didn't hear you knock."
+
+There was the same entire lack of embarrassment in her manner that she
+had shown on the previous night.  Almost before she had finished her
+sentence she shut her eyes again, and leant back yawning.  It seemed a
+matter of the greatest indifference to her whether he was there or not.
+Emile's interest rose by several degrees as he sat down on the edge of
+the bed.
+
+"I didn't knock," he said, speaking English fluently enough, but with
+the hard, clipped accents of the Slav.  "I can't bother about all that
+humbug.  If you're straight with me I'll be straight with you, and we
+may as well be friends.  I dare say you think you're very good-looking
+and all that, but it doesn't make any difference to me.  You're here,
+and I'm here, so we may as well be here together."
+
+"I'm so sorry," Arithelli replied, "but I'm always so stupid and sleepy
+in the mornings.  Do you mind saying it all over again?"
+
+And very much to his own surprise Emile Poleski repeated his remarks.
+It struck him that there was something of the boy, the _gamin_, about
+her in spite of her exotic appearance.  That was so much the better and
+would suit admirably with his schemes for her.  It was better that she
+should not be too much of a woman; for in the realms of anarchy there
+is no sex, though comradeship is elevated to the dignity of a fine art.
+
+For chivalry and love making there is neither the time nor the desire,
+and those who are wedded to _La Liberté_ find her an all-sufficient
+idol for purposes of worship.  Human life is held of small account, to
+join the Cause being equivalent to the signing of one's own death
+warrant.  One would probably have to die to-morrow if not to-day, and
+whether it were sooner or later mattered little.  Emile's fierce
+devotion to the cause of his oppressed country had been the means of
+leaving him stranded in Barcelona at the age of forty, without hopes,
+illusions or ideals.  His estates in Russia had been confiscated, his
+parents were dead, the woman he had loved was married.
+
+Now he lived in a dirty back street, in a single room, on two pounds a
+week, morbid, suspicious, cynical, keeping his own counsel, owning no
+friends, and occupying body and brain with plots, secret meetings,
+ciphers and the usual accompaniments of intrigue.  The Brotherhood
+consisted of fifteen men, though occasionally the number varied.  Two
+or three would disappear, another one come.  There was no feminine
+element.  An Anarchist seldom marries.  To him a woman is either a
+machine or the lightest of light episodes.
+
+Emile had not the least desire to make love to the girl whom he had for
+his own purposes befriended.  He was a quick and subtle judge of
+character, and had seen at a glance that in her he would find a study
+of pronounced interest.  Also she might prove of some utility.  It was
+one of the tenets of the fraternity to which he belonged never to waste
+any material that might come to hand.  In the finely-cut face before
+him, with its Oriental modelling and impassivity, he read brains,
+refinement and endurance.  Her hair was plaited in two long braids, and
+drawn down over her ears, showing the contour of a sleek, smooth little
+head.
+
+She had relapsed into silence after disposing of the slovenly meal he
+had induced the landlady to provide.  The only thing that seemed to
+worry her was the superfluous dirt that adorned the cups.
+
+At length she spoke:
+
+"And what sort of a place is this Barcelona?"
+
+"_L'entresol de l'enfer_," answered Emile curtly.  "What are your
+people doing to allow you to come here alone?"
+
+"They don't know I am here.  I ran away, you see.  If I get on well,
+I'll write and let them know, and if not--"
+
+"_Alors_?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know.  But I will get on.  Don't you think I ought to make
+a success at the Hippodrome?"
+
+Emile ignored the _naïve_ conceit of the last remark.  "But what are
+you doing at the Hippodrome at all?" he demanded.
+
+"I am riding," she answered with an elfish smile in which her eyes took
+no part.
+
+"Obviously!  What are you going to do about _déjeuner_?  The landlady
+won't bring you up all your meals."
+
+"I don't know," was the unconcerned answer.
+
+"You'll have to go to one of the _cafés_, and you had better let me
+show you which are the most desirable ones.  _Enfin_! have you any
+intention of getting up this morning?"
+
+Arithelli yawned again.  "I suppose I must go round and present myself
+to the Manager.  I'm to rehearse a fortnight before I make my
+appearance in public."
+
+"Then I had better come with you," Emile replied with decision.  "As I
+told you yesterday, I know the Manager fairly well."
+
+An hour later they walked together through the streets on their way to
+the Hippodrome.  Emile was a bad advertisement for the secrecy of his
+profession, for he looked a typical desperado.  His velvet coat had the
+air of having been slept in for weeks, and had certainly never been on
+terms of acquaintanceship with a brush; and, besides the usual
+Anarchist badge, a red tie, a blood red carnation flamed defiance in
+his buttonhole.
+
+Under a battered sombrero he scowled upon the world; a dark skin,
+fierce moustache, and arching black eyebrows over hard, grey eyes.
+
+There are few people who look their parts in life, but Emile might
+without addition or alteration, have been transferred to the stage as
+the typical villain of a melodrama.
+
+Arithelli had arrayed herself in the cornflower blue frock, which she
+carried with a negligent ease, and she still wore the Panama hat with
+the flowing veil.  As a matter of fact it was the only piece of
+headgear she possessed; for she had been reckless over dresses and
+boots in Paris and had found herself drawn up with a jerk in the midst
+of her purchases by her small stock of money coming to an abrupt end.
+
+Of her carriage and general deportment, which were noticeably good even
+among Spanish women, Emile approved.  The crude blue of her dress, the
+tags and ends of tinselled braid set his teeth on edge.  In his "Count
+Poleski" days he had known the quiet and exquisite taste of the
+_mondaines_ of Vienna and St. Petersburg, and like most men he
+preferred dark clothes in the street.  Later on he proposed to himself
+the pleasure of supervising her wardrobe, except her boots, which met
+with his fullest approbation.
+
+He noticed that she did not talk much but observed in silence.  He felt
+that nothing escaped those heavy-lidded, curious eyes.  "Is everything
+dirty in Spain?" she said at last.
+
+"How fussy you are about dirt!" retorted Emile disagreeably.
+
+"Yes.  My mother is a Jewess, you know.  I expect we notice these
+things more than the dirty Gentiles."
+
+Her calm assertion of the superior cleanliness of the tribe of Israel,
+amused Emile, who had been accustomed to hear the usual contempt of the
+English-speaking races for anyone possessing a strain of Jewish blood.
+So it was the Jewess in her that accounted for her haunting voice.
+
+The Manager was a hatchet-faced and haggard man who looked as if he
+went to bed about once a week, on an average, and existed principally
+on cigarettes and _absinthe_.  The simultaneous arrival of Emile and
+Arithelli roused him from his normal condition of bored cynicism to
+comparative animation.
+
+Like the landlady he naturally made his own conclusions.
+
+"When did you arrive?" he demanded of Arithelli.  Emile, not being
+afflicted with a sense of the necessity for elaborate explanation,
+removed himself a few paces and began to roll a cigarette.
+
+Arithelli stood her ground, listened to the comments on her appearance
+which the Manager felt himself entitled to use, returned his cynical
+survey with a level glance, and answered his questions with an
+unruffled composure.
+
+It was arranged that she should rehearse every day for two hours in the
+morning, and another two hours between the afternoon and evening
+performances.  For the first act she could wear a habit of any colour
+she cared to choose, and a smart hat; for the second act, which
+included jumping over gates, and the presence of the inevitable clown,
+she would have to wear short skirts.
+
+"_They_ won't suit me," she said.  "You see how long and thin I am, and
+look at my long feet.  I shall look a burlesque."
+
+The Manager glared at her.
+
+"I quite believe you will," he snapped.  "I suppose you think you're
+going to do the leaping act in a court train and feathers!  Is there
+anything more you would like to suggest?"
+
+The intended sarcasm was not a success.  Arithelli considered gravely.
+
+"I don't think so, thank you," she said at last.  "But if I _do_ think
+of anything else I'll tell you.  And I _should_ like to see the horses."
+
+She was filled with a genuine delight by the four cream-coloured
+pure-bred Andalusians, El Rey, Don Quixote, Cavaliero and Don Juan.
+They turned intelligent eyes upon her as she entered their stalls,
+neighing gently as if they recognised a friend.  Both the men
+experienced the same feeling of surprise at her evident knowledge and
+understanding of animals.  In five minutes she had shown that she knew
+as much about their harness and food as a competent groom.
+
+The astute Manager, upon whom no sign of intelligence was wasted, saw a
+good opportunity for getting a little extra work out of his youthful
+leading lady.  He informed her that she must be down at the stables
+every morning at eight o'clock to inspect the horses and see them fed
+and watered.  As a matter of fact the inspection should have been one
+of his own duties, but the girl was not likely to cavil at any little
+additional work that had not been exactly specified in her contract.
+Besides, if she did, he could soon make it uncomfortable for her.
+Arithelli made no objection.  Though she hated getting up early she
+would never have grudged a sacrifice of comfort made on behalf of any
+animal.  When all the business was completed, Emile took her to the
+Café Colomb for lunch.
+
+Before they left he knew the details of her history.
+
+The big house in Ireland, with its stud of horses and unlimited
+hospitality, and the rapidly vanishing fortune.  Her mother, a Viennese
+by birth, a cosmopolitan by travel and education, a fine horsewoman,
+and extravagance incarnate.  Her father, good-natured, careless, manly,
+as sportsmanlike and unbusinesslike as most Irishmen.  When his horses
+died he bought more, keeping always open house for a colony of men as
+shiftless and as easy-going as himself.
+
+As the children grew up the money became less and less.  They were sent
+to Convent schools in France and Belgium, then to cheap schools in
+England.
+
+At length the final crash came, and the big, picturesque, rambling
+house in Galway was sold, and they came to London with an infinitesimal
+income partly derived from the grudging charity of relatives.
+
+Arithelli cleaned the doorsteps and the kitchen stove, blackleaded the
+grates and prepared the meals, which more often than not consisted only
+of potatoes and tea.
+
+Their mother, who hated all domestic work, and could never be induced
+to see that their loss of money was due to her own extravagance,
+retired to bed, where she spent her days in reading Plato in the
+original, and writing charming French lyrics.
+
+When Arithelli ran away she had gone straight to an old friend of her
+mother's, the widow of an ambassador in Paris.  She had made up her
+mind to earn her own living.  She would carve out for herself a career.
+Having decided that riding was her most saleable accomplishment, she
+had gone round to the riding school where the managers of the
+Hippodromes of Vienna, Buda-Pesth and Barcelona waited to select
+_equestriennes_.
+
+Luck, youthful confidence, and her tragic, unyouthful beauty, had all
+ranged themselves together to procure her the much desired engagement.
+
+"I made up my mind to get taken on," she concluded.  "_Et me voilà_!  I
+did all sorts of desperate jumps that day.  I felt desperate.  If I
+hadn't got it, there was only the Morgue.  I couldn't have gone home."
+
+Emile listened in silence, and drank _absinthe_ and considered.
+
+That night at a meeting of the Brotherhood he took the leader,
+Sobrenski, aside and said:
+
+"It was decided the other day that we wanted someone to take messages
+and run errands.  Someone who could go unnoticed into places where it
+would be suspicious for us to be seen.  You suggested a boy.  Fate has
+been so kind as to show me a woman who seems to be in every way
+suitable--or at least with a little training she will become so."
+
+"A woman!" echoed the other.  "Are you mad?"
+
+"I conclude her to be a woman because of her clothes.  Otherwise she
+seems to be a mixture of a boy and wood-elf.  The combination appears
+to me to be a fascinating one.  She is of good family, half Irish,
+speaks three languages, asks no questions, and seems to have an
+extraordinary capacity for holding her tongue.  It is on that account
+that I questioned her sex.  Her appearance is excessively feminine.  Of
+course I do not propose to enrol her among us at once.  As I have said
+before, there are many ways in which a woman would be useful."
+
+Sobrenski pulled doubtfully at his reddish, pointed beard.  "Does she
+know anything about the Cause?"
+
+"I fancy not, but she appears to have the right ideas, and after I have
+judiciously fanned the flame!--girls of that age are always wildly
+enthusiastic over something--so she may as well devote her enthusiasm
+to us."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+  "Out of the uttermost end of things
+    On the side of life that is seamier,
+  There lies a land, so its poet sings,
+    Whose people call it Bohemia.
+
+  "It is not old, it is not new,
+    It is not false, it is not true,
+  And they will not answer for what they do,
+    Far away in Bohemia."
+            "Love in Bohemia," DOLF WYLLARDE.
+
+
+"I think," Arithelli said with deliberation, "that all your friends are
+very fatiguing.  They have such bad tempers, and do nothing but argue."
+
+"They live for the serious things of life," retorted Emile.  "Not to
+play the fool."
+
+"Thanks!  Is this one of the serious things of life, do you suppose?"
+She stuck the large needle with which she had been awkwardly cobbling a
+tear in her skirt, into the seat of a chair.
+
+"What are you doing that for?" demanded Emile.
+
+"Oh, pardon, I forgot."  She extracted the needle.  "I don't think I'm
+unwomanly but I'm not a good sewer.  Emile! don't you think we might
+have some music?  I really am beginning to sing '_Le Rêve_' quite well."
+
+Her education in Anarchy had commenced with the teaching of
+revolutionary songs.  Emile, who was himself music-mad, had discovered
+her to be possessed of a rough contralto voice of a curious mature
+quality.  It would have been an absurd voice for ballads in a
+drawing-room, but it suited fiery declamations in praise of _La
+Liberté_!
+
+They were sitting in Emile's room now, for they made use of each
+other's lodgings alternately, and there was a battered and rather
+out-of-tune piano.  Sometimes, after the evening performance, there
+would be a gathering of the conspirators, all more or less morose,
+unshaven and untidy; and while Emile played for her, Arithelli would
+stand in the middle of the room, her green eyes blazing out of her pale
+face, her arms folded, singing with a fervour which surprised even her
+teacher, the lovely impassioned "_Rêve du prisonnier_" of Rubinstein.
+She was always pleased with her own performances, and not in the least
+troubled with shyness.  Also she was invariably eager to practise.  She
+shook down her skirt, went across to the piano and began to pick out
+the notes.
+
+  "_S'il faut, ah, prends ma vie.
+  Mais rends-moi la liberté!_"
+
+
+Emile was sewing on buttons.  Though he did not look in the least
+domesticated, he was far more dexterous at such work than the
+long-fingered Arithelli.  In fact it was only at his suggestion that
+she ever mended anything at all.
+
+"Do you ever by chance realise what you are singing about?" he demanded.
+
+"Of course I do.  I'm a red hot Socialist.  I've read Tolstoi's books
+and lots of others.  I got in an awful scrape over political things
+just the little time I was in Paris.  It was when the Dreyfus case was
+on.  Madame Bertrand was terrified at the way I aired my opinions.  You
+see politics are so different abroad to what they are in England."
+
+Emile agreed.  The girl was developing even more than he had hoped.
+
+"Ah!  This is the first time I've ever heard about your political
+opinions."
+
+"You've never asked me before.  One doesn't know everything about a
+person at once."
+
+Again Emile agreed.  Then he said abruptly, "Well, if you have all
+these ideas you'd better join the Cause."
+
+"I'd love to!  Shall I have to go to meetings with Sobrenski and all
+the rest of them?"
+
+"Probably.  But you'll not be expected to talk.  You may be told to do
+some writing or carry messages."
+
+"Is that all?"  She seemed rather disappointed.  Emile felt for a
+moment almost inclined to develop scruples.  She evidently regarded
+Anarchy at large as a species of particularly exciting diversion.
+
+"Who are the other women mixed up with it?" she asked.
+
+"There are no other women.  You should feel honoured that we are having
+you."
+
+Emile stood up, having completed his renovating operations.  "You want
+to sing, eh?"  Arithelli assented eagerly.  "You will work?" Emile
+demanded.
+
+"Yes!"  Her eyes had become suddenly like green jewels, and she looked
+almost animated.  She was more interested in Emile's music than in any
+other part of him.  His wild Russian ballads sung with his strange
+clipped accent and fiery emphasis, fascinated her.  She was content to
+listen for an indefinite period of time, her long body in a restful
+attitude, her feet crossed, her hands in her lap, as absolutely
+immovable as one who is hypnotised.
+
+Emile, for his part, was equally interested in her exploits in
+vocalism, which he found as extraordinary and unexpected as everything
+else about her.  Her singing voice was so curiously unlike her speaking
+voice that it might have belonged to another person.  It had tremendous
+possibilities and a large range, but it was hoarse and harsh, and yet
+full of an uncanny attraction.  In such a voice a sorceress of old
+might have crooned her incantations.  Where did this girl get her soul,
+her passion, he wondered; she who was only just beginning life.
+
+He flung over an untidy pile of music, and dragged out the
+magnificently devilish "_Enchantement_" of Massenet.  "Try this," he
+said abruptly.  "It's _your_ kind of song."
+
+For half-an-hour he exhorted, bullied and instructed, losing both his
+composure and his temper.  Arithelli lost neither.  "I don't understand
+music," she observed calmly.  "But show me what to do and I'll do it.
+Mine's a queer voice, isn't it?  A regular croak."
+
+"You've got a voice; yes, that's true, but you don't know how to
+produce it, and you've no technique.  You want plenty of scales."
+
+"Wouldn't that take all the rough off, and make it just like anyone's
+voice?"
+
+Emile stared angrily at the exponent of such heresy, and was about to
+annihilate her with sarcasm, when he suddenly changed his mind.  After
+all, she was right.  It was what she called "the rough" that helped to
+make her voice unlike the voices of most women.
+
+"Is that your idea?  A good excuse for being lazy!  If you don't sing
+scales then you must work hard at songs."
+
+"Yes, I know."  She put her hands behind her back and leant against the
+piano.  "There was a man in Paris, a friend of the manager.  He heard
+me sing once.  He knew I wanted to take up a profession, and he offered
+to train me for nothing, and bring me out on the stage.  I was to sing
+those queer, dramatic, half-monotone songs in which one almost _speaks_
+the words.  He meant to write them specially for me, and I was to wear
+an oriental costume.  He said that every other voice would sound _fâde_
+after mine."
+
+Emile glanced at her sharply, but her tone and manner was both
+absolutely void of conceit.  "Well, why didn't you accept his offer?"
+
+"I don't know.  I suppose because it was fated I should come here.  He
+wanted me to make my _début_ at the _cafés chantants_, but I didn't
+like the idea somehow.  He said my voice was only fit for the stage,
+and would sound horrible in a room."
+
+Emile twisted his moustache upwards, and his eyebrows climbed in the
+same direction.  "So!  Do you think then that your life at the
+Hippodrome is going to be more what you English call respectable, than
+the _cafés chantants_?"
+
+"There are the horses here.  If I don't like anything else I can always
+like them."
+
+Emile decided that the man in Paris had been apt in his judgment of
+this fantastic voice.  Clever of him also to have noticed that she was
+Oriental.  The setting of her green eyes was of the East.  And horses
+were the only things she cared about--so far.  Like most people whose
+lives are a complicated tangle of plots, Emile was not particularly
+interested in animals.  His life, thoughts and environment were morbid,
+and the dumb creation too normal and healthy to appeal greatly to him.
+He discovered that his pupil was able to play in much the same
+inconsistent fashion that she sang.  With a beautiful touch, full of
+temperament and expression, she possessed a profound ignorance of the
+rudiments of music.  She could not read the notes, she said, but she
+could copy anything he played if she heard it two or three times.
+Emile found her astonishingly intelligent as well as amiable, and
+though the music lessons were not conducted on scientific principles,
+they produced good results.
+
+He would give her plenty of music with which to occupy herself till the
+time came when she would be fully occupied in serving the Cause.  As he
+had said, there were no other female conspirators in their circle.
+Sobrenski, the red-haired leader, detested women, and thought them all
+fools, who generally added the sin of treachery to their foolishness.
+Emile himself had taken no interest in any woman since he had lived in
+Barcelona.  He too had found them treacherous.  Since he had lost his
+little childish goddess, Marie Roumanoff, he had had no desire to play
+the role of lover.  If he wanted companionship he preferred men, for as
+companions women bored him.
+
+But Arithelli was not a woman--yet.  She appeared able to keep own
+counsel, to do as she was told, and to judge by the way she rode, her
+courage would be capable of standing a severe test.  Also it had
+occurred to him that she possessed the art of being a good comrade.  It
+would amuse him to watch her develop.  At present she was full of
+illusions about the charm of life in general.  Everything for her
+showed rose-tinged.  Well, it was not his business to dispel illusions.
+At present it was all "_Le Rêve_," but after the dream would come
+awakening.  He took care to leave her very little alone during the
+first few days, and arranged her time according to his own ideas, and
+escorted her backwards and forwards from her rehearsals at the
+Hippodrome.
+
+When she was free he took her for long walks up the hills where they
+could look down upon the gorgeous city, which, as far as natural
+loveliness went, might have been compared to Paradise rather than to
+the Hell to which he invariably likened it.
+
+The beautiful harbour, the dry air, the sunlight and splashes of vivid
+colour--everything was intoxicating to her.  She said very little, but
+Emile felt that she missed nothing, and lacked nothing in appreciation.
+For himself the place must be always hateful, for he was in exile.
+What was the golden sunlight to him when he longed for the snows and
+frozen wastes of Russia, that sombre country so like the hearts of
+those by whom it is peopled.
+
+One day he took her for an excursion to Montserrat, three hours'
+journey from Barcelona.  They left the train at Monistrol, and started
+to walk through the vineyards and pine woods towards the famous
+mountain that towers up to heaven in grey rugged terraces of rock.  All
+round, for miles, were undulating waves of green, here and there the
+brown towers of some ancient castle, or the buildings of a farmstead;
+and below on the plain the glitter of the winding river.  They climbed
+to the wooded slopes of Olese, where they sat down to rest.  Arithelli
+threw herself on the short, dry grass, with her arms under her head,
+and drew a long breath of pleasure and relief.
+
+"I love all this; it makes me feel so free."
+
+Emile sat with his back against a huge plane tree, and rolled
+cigarettes, watching her under his heavy eyebrows.  She looked in her
+proper place here, he thought.  There was something wild and
+animal-like about the grace of her attitude.
+
+"So you're out of a convent?" he said, hurling out the remark with his
+usual abruptness.  "_Tiens_!  It's absurd!"
+
+"But it's true.  Convent schools are cheap, you see, that's why we were
+sent there.  No, I'm not a Catholic.  Most of the girls made their
+abjurations, but I never did.  They told lies there, and they spied.  I
+hated that.  The nuns spied on the children of Mary, and the children
+of Mary spied on the ones who were not the children of Mary, and--" she
+stopped.
+
+Emile told her to continue.  "I should like to hear more about
+your--your religious experiences," he said.  "Besides, it will do you
+more good to talk than to go to sleep."
+
+Arithelli complied at once, with unruffled good nature.  "Oh, of course
+I'll tell you if you like," she said amiably.  "I stopped because I
+thought you would probably be bored, _ennuyé_, you know."
+
+She described the nuns mumbling their prayers, and punctuating them
+with irate commands to the children; the many and various rules, the
+_Mére Supérieure_, the food, the clothes, the eccentricities of
+_Monsieur le Directeur_.  She had the rare and unwomanlike art of witty
+description, though it assorted badly with her tragic face and
+unsmiling eyes.  As she talked her voice rippled and broke into
+suppressed laughter.
+
+"It was all rather dull, _n'est-ce-pas_?" said Emile, who felt more
+amusement than he had any intention of showing.  "You'll find the Cause
+more exciting."
+
+Before any practical steps were taken to make her a member of the band
+it was necessary to stimulate her enthusiasm, her imagination.  He knew
+that for all her outward calmness she had no lack of fire.  The coldest
+countries sometimes produced the most raging volcanoes.
+
+"It's the only thing you care about--isn't it--the Cause?" she said.
+"Tell me more about it.  As I'm going in for it I ought to understand.
+Of course I like anything that's 'agin the Government.'  All the Irish
+have always been rebels and patriots.  We've helped your country too."
+
+Emile did not require a second invitation to induce him to expound his
+views.  "I suppose you think we throw bombs about by way of a little
+distraction?" he asked sarcastically.  "What have we suffered before we
+took to throwing bombs?  Before I came here I saw men and women, old
+and young together, shot down in the streets of St. Petersburg.
+Because they rioted?  No!  Because they wished to offer a protest
+against the brutalities of the Government officials.  Are our petitions
+ever read, our entreaties ever answered?  There were other things too,
+but they didn't generally get into the newspapers.  Women stripped in
+barrack rooms,--and that in winter,--the Russian winter,--and beaten by
+common soldiers.  Not women of the streets and slums, but women of the
+higher classes.  Mock trials held with closed doors, the crime,--to
+have incurred the displeasure of someone in favour at the Court,--the
+end,--Siberia!  A student is known to be quiet, a great reader and
+interested in the condition of the serfs.  He is watched, arrested, and
+on the false evidence of the police ends his days in the mines.
+Entreaties, reason, appeal!  Have we not tried them?  Now we have only
+one weapon left--retaliation.  Sometimes we are able to avenge our
+martyrs.  The two fiends who guarded Marie Spiridonova were shot by the
+members of her Society.  She was only a girl too--about the same age as
+you.  We Anarchists do not serenade women and make them compliments,
+but we think it an honour to kiss the hand of such as Marie
+Spiridonova.  She was tortured, starved, outraged, and came through
+worse than death to be transported to a convict settlement.  Now she is
+in the Malzoff Prison.  She will never see the world again, but it may
+be years before the life is ground out of her by labour and privations.
+Her case will soon be forgotten, except by a few, and thousands of
+other women have gone the same road.  The details of the tragedy may be
+a little different, the thing itself is the same.  One day I shall go
+back to my own country.  In the meantime I carry on the campaign here.
+
+"It's a losing cause.  But if we lose we pay.  We don't ask for mercy!"
+
+      *      *      *      *      *      *
+
+They sat together that evening at a _café_ on the Rambla, the strolling
+place of the Spanish beauties, who promenaded there in an endless
+stream, with waving fans and rustling draperies, carnations and roses
+burning in dark, elaborately dressed hair.  Tziganes made wild, witch
+music.  At the _cafés_ people laughed and drank.
+
+Suddenly Arithelli leant across the little table, raising her glass.
+"To the Cause!" she whispered under her breath.
+
+For an instant the two pairs of eyes flamed into each other; then those
+of the man, hard and steel-grey, softened into something like
+admiration.  Their glasses clinked softly together.  "To the Cause!" he
+repeated.  "_Mon Camarade_!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+  "These were things she came to know, and to take their measure,
+  When the play was played out so for one man's pleasure."
+            SWINBURNE.
+
+
+A few days later, Arithelli was duly initiated, and given the badge of
+the Cause, a massive buckle with a woman's figure, and on either side
+the words _Honneur et Patrie_.  At the suggestion of the leader Emile
+had been made responsible for her behaviour.  If she betrayed them in
+any way his life was to pay forfeit.  There was a fellow conspirator
+working with her at the Hippodrome, a young Austrian of high rank named
+Vardri.  His father had turned him out of doors, penniless, because of
+his political views; and he was now, half-starved, consumptive and
+reckless, employed in harnessing the horses and attending to the
+stables.  There were two men under thirty, but the majority were
+middle-aged.  They all seemed to Arithelli to have the same wild,
+restless eyes.  They called her "_Camarade_," and "_Amigo_," and
+treated her not unkindly, but with an utter indifference to her sex.
+All their sayings showed the most absolute disregard for human life.
+
+"If a vase is cracked, break it.  If your glove is worn out, throw it
+away."
+
+If they heard that some member of the band had found his way to the
+fortress of Montjuich there was callous laughter and a speculation as
+to whose turn it would be next.
+
+Their meetings were held in divers places.  Sometimes they would engage
+a room at the Hotel Catalonia and hold what were supposed to be classes
+for astronomy.  Sobrenski was the lecturer, the rest posing as
+students.  If anyone came in unexpectedly it all looked beautifully
+innocent--the big telescope by the open window, the books and papers
+and charts, and Arithelli at the desk at the end of the room taking
+shorthand notes of the lecture.
+
+There were seldom more than three or four _rendezvous_ held in the same
+place, and more than once there were alarms and rumours of a visit from
+the police.
+
+As the days wore on Emile found new reason to congratulate himself upon
+his discovery of "Fatalité," as he had nicknamed the girl.  She had
+shown herself possessed of a charming temper, a fine intelligence, and
+a most complete understanding of the law of obedience.
+
+She made no comments on anything she was asked to do, but delivered
+messages and ran errands after the manner of a machine in good working
+order.  Even Sobrenski, who hated all women, was obliged to admit her
+usefulness.
+
+She was on pleasant terms with everybody down to the strappers,--the
+men who harnessed the Hippodrome horses,--who adored her.  Even the
+cynical Manager was impressed by her pluck and skill, though he
+considered it his privilege to regale her with comments on her personal
+peculiarities.
+
+The time arrived for her first performance at the Hippodrome.  She made
+her appearance in the ring in a turquoise blue habit, trimmed
+hussar-fashion with much braid, and a plumed Cavalier hat, the dusky
+shadows under her eyes accentuated, and her face powdered.  The Manager
+would not allow her to use rouge, so under the glaring electric lights
+she appeared more than ever spiritual and unearthly.
+
+Her type, he said, did not require colour; and the people preferred
+anything morbid in the shape of looks.
+
+Emile, who was among the audience on the first night, thought she
+looked like a thorough-bred racer as she made a dignified entrance to a
+clanging stately gavotte crashed out by the band.  He had given her
+dresser a couple of _pesetas_ to have her well turned out, and the
+result was exceedingly satisfactory even to his critical eyes.
+
+Her little head with its piled red hair was carried marvellously high,
+and she swayed daintily on the back of the high-stepping Don Juan.  She
+bowed gravely to the various parts of the house, but she had no
+stereotyped smile either for the boxes or for the lower seats.  Her
+slender figure gave the impression of great strength for a young girl.
+
+"Steel in a velvet sheath, _ma foi_!  Body and soul!" was Emile's
+inward comment.  "So much the better for the Cause."
+
+A Spanish crowd usually gives but a languid reception unless roused by
+something either horrible or sensational, but her bizarre appearance
+had the effect which the Manager had foreseen.
+
+In the second act she apparently changed her personality with her
+clothes, and whirled in astride over two horses with neither saddle nor
+bridle, guiding them and keeping them together by the pressure of her
+feet.  She had full skirts, to her knees, of white satin, and
+pearl-coloured silk stockings.  Her satin bodice was cut heart-shaped
+and there was a high jewelled band round her long throat.  Her hair
+hung down in a thick plait, tied with a bow of blue velvet.
+
+The horses tore round the ring at full gallop; she jumped over gates
+and through hoops, and ended her performance by leaping off one of the
+horses which was caught by a groom, and flinging herself on to the
+other, face to the tail, for a final reckless canter round the arena.
+
+The brilliance and nerve with which she carried through the trick,
+roused the enthusiasm it deserved, and Arithelli passed out panting and
+triumphant to the accompaniment of music and cheers, and showered roses
+and carnations.
+
+The part of her work that she most abhorred was the eight o'clock
+compulsory visit to the stables.  A circus life is not prone to
+encourage the virtue of early rising, and she was by nature indolent in
+a panther-like fashion, and was never in bed till half-past one or two
+in the morning.  If she had known a little more she could have
+protested on the grounds that her position of leading lady did not
+involve the feeding of her animals.  She did it as she had done other
+things without complaint, and presently Emile came to the rescue.  He
+knew as much about the habits and requirements of horses as he knew
+about shop-keeping, being entirely ignorant of both.
+
+"How much are the brutes to have?" he asked of the Manager.  "And what
+on earth do you give them?"
+
+"Oh, I generally give 'em fish," was the sarcastic answer.  "What are
+you doing here, Poleski?  This is the girl's business.  I thought she
+was keen on her horses."
+
+"She is also keen on her bed," Emile answered.  "She does her share of
+work."
+
+The Manager grumbled, but the new arrangement was allowed to stand.
+
+Arithelli did not consort with the other female members of the
+Hippodrome.
+
+The one exception was Estelle the dancer, with whom Emile allowed her a
+slight acquaintance.  He neither approved of women in general nor of
+their friendships.  Estelle was the _bonne amie_ of the sardonic
+Manager, who occasionally beat her, after which ceremony it was her
+custom to drink _absinthe_.  Sometimes, for this reason, she was unable
+to appear on the stage.  She would come into Arithelli's dressing room
+and weep, and smoke innumerable cigarettes, and when things had been
+going well, they made a _partie carrée_ at the Café Colomb.
+
+By way of advertising herself and her performance Arithelli was given a
+high, smartly painted carriage in which she drove in the fashionable
+promenade of Barcelona, the Paséo de Gracia, with three of the
+cream-coloured horses lightly harnessed and jingling with bells.
+
+On these occasions Emile played the part of lady's maid and escort.  He
+selected her dress, fastened it, scolded her for putting her hat on
+crooked, and laced up her preposterously high boots.
+
+Then he adjusted the battered sombrero, lit a cigarette and drove
+beside her, scowling as usual.
+
+The appearance of both was sufficiently arresting.  Arithelli drove as
+she rode, recklessly, and yet with science.  Her thin wrists and long
+girlish arms were capable of controlling the most fiery animal.
+
+She had made Emile her banker, and always handed over to him her weekly
+salary, some of which went to the expenses of the Cause as well as a
+certain portion in fines, for she had no idea of time and was never
+ready for anything.
+
+Nearly every night before she was half-way into her habit the call-boy
+came screaming down the passage, calling with the free-and-easy manners
+prevalent behind the scenes:
+
+"Hurry up, Arithelli, or there'll be a row!"
+
+The question of a disguise for her was discussed at one of the meetings
+of the Brotherhood, and it was decided that she should appear as a boy.
+Her height would be an advantage, and her long hands and feet would
+also help the illusion in a country where every woman possesses small,
+plump and highly arched extremities.  Besides, when they had to ride
+out to places at night, she would be less noticeable.  One girl among a
+crowd of men might attract suspicion, though in the daytime she was
+more useful as a woman.
+
+It naturally fell upon Emile to provide the details of her
+transformation, and he presented himself at her lodgings one afternoon,
+bearing an ungainly parcel which he deposited on the table.
+
+"You'd better try these on," he said.  "There is a complete suit of
+boy's clothes, a wig and everything you'll want.  You will have to put
+your own hair out of the way somehow."
+
+It was the drowsy hour of the _siesta_, when no one moved out if he
+could help it, and all work and play were at a standstill.  Arithelli
+was sitting, as was her custom, absorbed in her own thoughts and
+dreams.  For a moment she stared with uncomprehending eyes.  She felt
+tired, she wanted to be alone, and she had not heard a single word.
+Emile shrugged irritably and repeated his remarks.
+
+"Oh, yes," said Arithelli.  She rose slowly, took up the parcel and
+retired into seclusion behind the curtains, with which she had screened
+off the alcove and so made herself an improvised dressing room.  The
+rest of the apartment she had altered to look as much like a sitting
+room as possible, with the exception of the obtrusive four-poster,
+which could not be hidden and which upon entering appeared the most
+salient feature visible.  There was some tawdry jewellery lying about,
+and several pairs of the pale-hued Parisian boots she invariably
+affected.  Emile made and lighted the inevitable cigarette, while he
+fidgeted about, turning over the few French and English novels he could
+find with an air of disapproval; for her taste in literature did not
+commend itself to him any more than did her taste in finery.
+
+At one period of his life he had steeped himself in books, knowing the
+poetry and romance of nearly every nation.  Now he disliked them.  If
+she wanted books he would choose them for her.  She would read the
+love-songs of the revolutionists to their goddess Liberty, the haunting
+words of those who had suffered for a time, and escaped the Siberian
+Ice-Hell.  The fanaticism of his race and temperament flamed into his
+cold eyes as he sat and brooded, and he hardly noticed that Arithelli
+had slid into the room in her noiseless fashion, and was standing
+before him.
+
+Emile, though little given to being astonished, marvelled at the
+unconcern with which she submitted to his critical inspection.  She
+stood and walked easily, and looked neither uncomfortable nor unnatural
+in her boyish array, in which the perfect poise of her body showed
+triumphantly.
+
+The black wig, under which she had skilfully hidden her red hair, made
+her look more pale than ever.  The wide sombrero, tilted backwards,
+made a picturesque framing to her oval face, and the _manta_ or heavy
+cloak, worn by all Spaniards at night, hung, loosely draped over her
+left shoulder.  Emile promptly twisted it off.
+
+"This won't do," he said.  "The _manta_ is never worn like that.
+Besides it's not enough of a disguise.  Watch how I put it on."  With a
+few rough yet dexterous movements he arranged the dark folds so as to
+hide her shoulders and the upper part of her body.
+
+Then he stood back a few paces.  "But your green eyes!  A disguise for
+_them_ will be impossible.  One sees them always."
+
+  "_Les yeux verts.
+    Vont à l'enfer!_"
+
+"Do you know that, _mon enfant_?"
+
+"I've heard it before.  They've already come as far as _l'entresol_,
+according to you."
+
+Emile grinned.  He enjoyed skirmishing, and felt that he had met his
+match in words.  Before he could think of another retort she added:
+
+"I can see in the dark with my green eyes, so they're useful at all
+events."
+
+"Then you'll find plenty of use for them when you're working for
+us--and the Cause.  When you have to ride upon the hills at night you
+will find them of great service.  You'll have to ride astride too, so
+it is better for you in every way to be dressed like this."
+
+Presently he left her with a few words of praise for her successful
+appearance.  His first feeling of surprise at her coolness still
+lingered.  He had expected a scene in a quiet way, a refusal, at least
+expostulation.  All his first impressions of her were being verified.
+Well, he hoped she would continue in her present ways.  Undoubtedly she
+was an original, certainly she gave no trouble.
+
+When she heard the street door shut Arithelli sat down, hiding her face
+in her hands.  Once she shivered involuntarily.  Directly she found
+herself alone the mask of her assumed nonchalance had fallen suddenly.
+As long as there was an audience she had worn a disguise on her soul as
+well as her body.  She had been feeling moody and depressed all day,
+and this last episode was the climax.  Everything she had was to be her
+own no longer.  It was all to be for the Cause--even her green eyes!
+What power it possessed over these men.  They admitted it to be a
+losing Cause, yet it was all they thought about, the sole thing for
+which they lived--and died.  She had not thought it would be like this
+at first.
+
+She remembered how gaily she had discoursed of Tolstoi and Prince
+Kropotkin, and of their writings which had revealed to her a new world.
+Her first interview with Sobrenski had shown the relentlessness of the
+man she was to serve.  She felt that he would sacrifice all alike, men
+and women, to his idol, and would never stop to care whether the victim
+were willing or unwilling.  The fact of her sex would gain her no
+consideration at his hands.  Lately she had been impressed with the
+sensation of being surrounded by an impassable barrier drawn round her,
+a circle that was gradually becoming narrowed.  She had begun to know
+that she was being incessantly watched.  If Emile were occupied with
+the business of the Society, and could not fetch her from the
+Hippodrome himself, he never failed to send an understudy in the shape
+of one of his allies, generally one of the older men.  When she emerged
+from the performers' entrance a silent figure would come forward to
+meet her.  Often they exchanged no words throughout the walk home, but
+she was never left till her own door was reached.
+
+If she went anywhere to please herself, to a shop, or to see Estelle,
+she was expected to give a full account of her doings.  It was an
+understood thing that she should not go to the _cafés_ or public
+gardens alone, nor speak to anyone not already known and approved by
+Emile.  With all these conditions she had complied.  Already one
+illusion had vanished.  She had thought to find freedom in Barcelona.
+
+She had indeed found "_La Liberté_."
+
+But the Fates had chosen to be in an ironical mood, and while making
+the discovery she had herself become a slave.  In all her day there was
+no hour that she could call her own.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+  "I have gained her!  Her Soul's mine!"
+            BROWNING.
+
+
+"You slouched last night in the ring, Fatalité," Emile said.
+
+Arithelli flung up her head.  "I didn't!"
+
+"You looked like a monkey on a stick," proceeded Emile stolidly.  "You
+were all hunched up.  I wonder Don Juan didn't put you off his back on
+to the tan."
+
+"Don Juan knows better!  You see animals are usually more kind than
+people."
+
+She was too proud to admit that the long hours, hard work, and want of
+proper food and sleep had lately given her furious backaches, which
+were a thing unknown to her before, and a cause of bitter resentment.
+She had a healthy distaste for illness either in theory or practice.
+That night she sat Don Juan erect as a lance, passing Emile in his
+accustomed place in the lower tier of seats with a shrug and scornful
+eyebrows.
+
+She had felt more than usually inclined to play the coward during the
+last few weeks.  The heat, worry and over-fatigue had begun, as they
+must have done eventually, to affect her nerves.  When she had felt
+more than usually depressed and listless Emile had taken her to one of
+the _cafés_ and given her _absinthe_ which had made her feel recklessly
+well for the moment, and ten times more miserable the next day.  He had
+also advised her to smoke, saying that it was good for people who had
+whims and fancies, but smoking did not appeal to her, and she never
+envied the Spanish woman her eternal cigarette.
+
+She felt as if she would like to sleep, sleep for an indefinite period.
+She was wearied to death of The Cause, and the Brotherhood, with their
+intrigues and plots and interminable cipher messages.
+
+She had been three months in Barcelona, and now fully justified Emile's
+name for her.  Tragic as a veritable mask of Fate, she looked ten years
+older than the girl he had met on the station platform.
+
+The longer she worked for the Cause the more she realised that Anarchy
+was no plaything for spare moments, but a juggling with Life and Death.
+
+At first they had given her but little to do--a few documents to copy,
+some cipher messages to carry.  Then the demands upon her leisure had
+become more frequent.  She found she was expected to make no demur at
+being sent for miles, and once or twice there had been dreadful
+midnight excursions to a hut up in the mountains.
+
+The realisation of the folly of trying to escape from the burden that
+had been laid upon her affected her nerve and seat during her
+performances in the ring.
+
+For the first time she felt her courage failing her when she entered
+Sobrenski's house in answer to his summons.  When he had given her the
+despatch she made an objection on the grounds that the time taken in
+conveying it would absorb her few hours of rest.
+
+"It's too far," she protested.  "I can't go there to-day."
+
+"Then you can go to-morrow," answered Sobrenski in the accents of
+finality.  He had never cared about the girl's inclusion in their
+plots, and took his revenge in exacting from her considerably more than
+his pound of flesh.
+
+Moreover he suspected her of treachery, and disliked her for the
+quickness of her wit in argument.
+
+Even his unseeing eyes told him she looked both ill and haggard, but if
+she were there, well, she must work like the rest of them.
+
+Arithelli hesitated for a moment, and when she spoke for all her pluck
+her voice was a little rough and uneven.  "I'm tired of being an errand
+boy!"
+
+Sobrenski looked at her, drawing his eyebrows together.  Everyone of
+the band had a nickname for her, and his own very unpleasant one was
+"Deadly Nightshade."  Some of the others were "Sapho" and "Becky
+Sharp," which latter Emile had also adopted as being particularly
+appropriate.
+
+"Oh, very well," he answered.  "Shall it be the messages or a bullet?
+You can take your choice.  Perhaps you would prefer the latter.  It
+makes no difference to me.  This comes of employing women.  When
+Poleski brought you here first I was opposed to having you.  Women
+always give trouble."
+
+"Would you have got a man to do half the work I do?" she flashed out
+with desperate courage.
+
+"Then _do_ your work and don't talk about it," retorted Sobrenski
+sharply.  "If you are absolutely ill and in bed, of course we can't
+expect you to go to various places, but as long as you can ride every
+night at the Hippodrome, you can certainly carry messages."
+
+He turned his back on her and took up some papers from the table, and
+Arithelli went out, beaten and raging.
+
+Emile found her lying on the bed, her hands clenched by her side, her
+proud mouth set in bitter lines.  As he came in she turned away from
+him, to face the wall.
+
+"_Tiens_!" he observed, "you are a lazy little trollop."  Emile was
+proud of his English slang.
+
+Finding there was no answer he changed his tone.  "Hysterics, eh?  They
+won't do here.  Turn over, I want to talk to you."
+
+The girl moved mechanically, and Emile surveyed her.  There were slow
+tears forcing themselves under her heavy eyelids.
+
+"I wish I were dead!"
+
+"Probably you will be soon.  So will the rest of us."
+
+"What brutes you all are!"
+
+"Because we don't care whether we die to-day or to-morrow?  _Souvent
+femme varie_!  Just now you seemed so anxious,--besides, if one belongs
+to the Cause one knows what to expect."  Emile strolled towards the
+uncomfortable piece of furniture by the window, that purported to be an
+armchair, and sat down.
+
+"I loathe the Cause!  I didn't belong to it from choice.  Why did you
+make me join?"
+
+"Because I thought you would be useful.  You _are_ useful and probably
+will be more so."
+
+"Suppose I refuse to do anything more?"
+
+"They will not give you the choice of refusing twice."
+
+"Emile, I believe you are trying to frighten me.  Tell me what they
+would do."
+
+"As I introduced you to the Brotherhood, I should naturally be the one
+chosen to execute judgment on you.  _Enfin_, my dear Arithelli, I
+should be called upon to shoot you.  We don't forgive traitors.  If we
+let everyone draw back from their work simply because they happened to
+be afraid, what would become of the Cause?  Also let me remind you how
+you came to me boasting of your love of freedom.  'I'm a red-hot
+Socialist.'  That's what you said, didn't you?  Perhaps you have
+forgotten it.  Well, I haven't.  Socialism doesn't consist of standing
+up in a room to sing."
+
+Arithelli made no answer.  She lay like a dead thing, and after a pause
+the slow cynical voice went on.
+
+"There was another woman in our affair about two years ago.  Her name
+was Félise Rivaz.  She got engaged to one of the men, and then it
+suddenly occurred to her that comfortable matrimony and Anarchy didn't
+seem likely to be enjoyed at one and the same time.  So she persuaded
+the man to turn traitor and run away to England with her, where they
+proposed to get married.
+
+"Their plans came out,--naturally,--those things generally do.  We all
+spy upon each other.  They both felt so secure that they came together
+to a last meeting--I can show you the house if you like.  It's down in
+the Parelelo, the revolutionary quarter.
+
+"They strangled the woman, and cut off her arm above the elbow--I
+remember she had a thick gold bracelet round it with a date (a _gage
+d'amour_ from her lover I suppose)--and they made him drink the blood.
+He went mad afterwards.  The best thing he could do under the
+circumstances."  Emile shrugged.
+
+"There are plenty more similar _histoires_.  But perhaps I have told
+you enough to convince you of the futility of attempting to draw back
+from what you have undertaken."
+
+Still there was neither movement nor answer.  Emile got up, and came to
+the bed.
+
+"_Allons_!  It's time you were dressing.  You'll be late again, and one
+of these days you'll find yourself dismissed.  You must just go on and
+put up with it all.  Life mostly consists of putting up with things."
+
+But even this consoling philosophy failed to have a rousing effect.
+
+For the first time in her life Arithelli had fainted.
+
+      *      *      *      *      *      *
+
+When she came to her senses that evening Emile sent the landlady with a
+message to the Hippodrome, telling the Manager to substitute another
+turn, and then made Arithelli get into bed.  Her dress and boots came
+off and reposed upon the floor.  The rest of her clothes were left on.
+
+These details did not worry Emile.  Then he found a book and sat
+reading till she had drifted into a heavy sleep, the sleep of
+exhaustion.
+
+In his own way he was sorry for her, and his feelings were by no means
+as brutal as his words.  At the same time he did not believe in a
+display of sympathy.  According to his ideas it was demoralising, and
+cured no one of complaints, imaginary or otherwise.
+
+Also it was likely to make people hysterical.  Therefore when Arithelli
+woke at six o'clock in the morning, and sat up panting, with a hand at
+her left side, he elevated both shoulders and eyebrows.
+
+"_Qu'est ce-qu vous avez donc_?  You're all right now."
+
+He knew perfectly well that there was no pretence of illness.  The
+strained eyes, the blue shadows round the mouth told their own tale.
+
+"Oh, Emile, my heart feels so queer!  I'm sure it must be all wrong."
+
+"_Ma foi_!  _Ces femmes la_!  _Il y a tou jours quelque chose_!  First
+a faint, then a heart!  How often am I to tell you, Arithelli, that
+that part of your--your--how do you say it?--anatomy--is quite without
+use here?  Have you any brandy in the room?"
+
+"There's Eau de Cologne on the washstand."
+
+He mixed water with the spirit and gave her a liberal dose that soon
+helped her to look less ghastly.
+
+She lay back feeling almost comfortable, wishing Emile would see fit to
+depart, but Count Poleski returned again to the subject of her
+misbehaviour.
+
+Like most men he was not at his best in the early morning, and the
+night's vigil had not improved his temper.
+
+He sat scowling after his manner, black eyebrows meeting over grey
+eyes, hard as flint.  "If you are going in for this kind of
+performance, what will be the use of you?" he enquired sarcastically.
+
+Perhaps after all Sobrenski had been right in employing no women.
+
+"Even the best machine will get out of order sometimes," the girl
+replied wearily.
+
+"And when that happens one sets to work to find another machine to take
+its place."
+
+"I didn't know about the horrors; you ought to have told me.  It isn't
+fair."
+
+There was neither passion nor resentment in the low voice.  "What shall
+I do?" she went on, after waiting for Emile to speak.
+
+"Put up with it, or better still go in for the Cause seriously."
+
+"Don't you call this serious?  Blood and brutalities and slave-driving?
+You talked about _l'entresol de l'enfer_, but I'm beginning to think
+I've stepped over the threshold."
+
+"_Ce n'est que le premier pas qui coute_!"
+
+Arithelli bit her lips.  "I don't feel in the mood for arguing now.  I
+wish you would leave me alone."
+
+"On condition that you won't go in for any more hysterics, I'll go and
+settle with the Manager that you don't have to appear to-night.  It's
+lucky there happens to be a new turn with those trapeze people.  The
+audience won't miss you.  Has Sobrenski given you anything to do
+to-day?"
+
+"I don't know.  I can't remember.  Oh, yes, I was to go to the Baroni's
+at two o'clock."
+
+"I'll see to that.  A cipher message?"
+
+"Yes.  It's fastened under my hair."  She dragged herself into a
+sitting position and extracted the little wad of paper with shaking
+hands.  Emile took it.
+
+"Good!  I shall be back at five o'clock.  You can get up later and come
+round to my rooms.  Do you understand?"
+
+"Yes!"
+
+When he had gone she cowered down into the big bed shivering.  Every
+bone in her body ached as if she had been beaten.  She had the
+sensation of one who has been awakened from a bad dream.  Was it all
+real or not?
+
+Last night and its doings seemed centuries ago.  She still heard
+Emile's voice as if from a distance, telling the story of the lovely
+siren woman who had been strangled, and then the room rocked, and the
+walls closed in upon her.
+
+His words worked in her brain: "_Go in for the Cause seriously.
+Remember it's liberty we are fighting for.  A life more or less--what's
+that?  Yours or mine?  What does it matter?  Do you wonder we don't
+make love to women?  It's a goddess and not a woman before whom we burn
+incense.  Blood and tears, money and life!  Is there any sacrifice too
+great for her altar?_"
+
+And she had been both frightened and fascinated.
+
+This was what Anarchism made of men like the cynical Emile.  It had
+never occurred to her before that even Sobrenski, whom she regarded
+solely as a brutal task-master, was himself a living sacrifice.
+
+She drowsed and brooded through the day, and having arrived at Emile's
+room and finding it empty, she "prowled," as she herself would have
+expressed it, among his few belongings, for she possessed a very
+feminine curiosity.  Under a pile of loose music she found the portrait
+of a little blond woman, beautiful of curve and outline, in a lace robe
+that could only have been made in Paris or Vienna.
+
+The picture was signed _Marie Roumanoff_, and on the back was written
+"_Tout passe, tout casse, tout lasse!_"  There were songs too scrawled
+with love-messages in Emile's handwriting.
+
+She pored over them with a vivid interest quite unmingled with any
+thought of jealousy.  Emile always said that no revolutionist ever
+wasted time or thought on women.
+
+After all, if she were shot to-morrow who would care?  She had written
+to her people and sent them photographs and newspapers with the
+accounts of her triumph.
+
+Success was a sure road to approbation.  If she had failed she would
+not have written.
+
+The Hippodrome engagement could not last forever.  A little
+carelessness, a loss of nerve, and her career would be at an end.
+
+Sometimes when she had been singing "_Le Rêve_," she had really meant
+it all.
+
+"_S'il faut, ah, prends ma vie_!"
+
+Only a few days ago Emile had stormed at her in his rasping French,
+because she had, with the vehemence of youth, denounced the Anarchist
+leader as a relentless brute.
+
+"You think yourself over-worked and ill-used--you!" he said as he
+strode up and down the room twisting his fiercely pointed moustache.
+"Look at Sobrenski.  He works us all, but does he ever spare himself?
+Look at Vardri?  Rich, well-born, starving at the Hippodrome on a few
+_pesetas_ a week.  I thought you had better stuff in you.  Are you
+going to turn out English milk-and-water?  You're _not_ English, you
+say?  No, I suppose you're not, or you wouldn't talk about 'dirty
+Gentiles.'  If you think Anarchy is all '_Le Rêve_' you'll soon find
+yourself mistaken.  If some of us dream dreams we have also to face
+actions and realities."
+
+Perhaps the episode of Marie Roumanoff belonged to the days before he
+joined the Brotherhood and became an exile from his country.
+
+She knew that once upon a time he had owned land and estates in Russia,
+and Emile the Anarchist of Barcelona had been known as Count Poleski.
+
+She kept her discoveries to herself, and when Emile returned he found
+her crooning over the piano.  She appeared to have quite recovered her
+boyish good spirits, and demanded a singing lesson, for under his
+tuition her passion for music had developed and increased.
+
+"It's so nice to have a change from the heat and dust and those
+horrible electric lights," she said.  "Let's enjoy ourselves and try
+over all your music.  What a lot you have, and it all seems to have
+been bought in different places.  Rome, Paris, Vienna, Dieppe, London!
+Fancy your having been in London!"
+
+Emile's collection of songs covered a wide field and ranged from the
+gypsy ballad of "The Lost Horse," to "The Bridge," in the performance
+of which he revelled.
+
+Arithelli sat in a corner and rocked with inward laughter over his
+atrocious English, and evident enjoyment of the morbid sentiments.  For
+in spite of her face Arithelli had a fine sense of the ridiculous.
+
+"You don't say the words properly," she said.  "You make such mouthfuls
+out of them!"
+
+"And what of you?" Emile retorted in great wrath.  "You with your
+French all soft, soft like oil!"
+
+"Yes, that's the Irish half of me."
+
+"And your Italian so _raûque_ so hard--!"
+
+"That's the Jewish half of me.  Oh, don't let's quarrel!  I do want to
+learn to sing properly."
+
+"Then don't fold your arms," her instructor said sharply.  "I suppose
+you think it looks dramatic, but how can you learn to sing what you
+call 'properly,' with your chest all crushed up like that?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+  "When I look back on the days long fled,
+  The memory grows still dreamier.
+  Oh! what fantastic lives they led,
+      Far away in Bohemia.
+
+  "There were laws that were only made to break,
+  In a world that never seems half awake
+  Till the lamps were lit--there were souls at stake.
+      Far away in Bohemia."
+            DOLF WYLLARDE.
+
+
+Barcelona in August was like the Hell to which Emile likened it.
+
+The rich escaped from the heat to their villas up in the mountains,
+those whom business, or lack of money, kept in the city, existed in a
+parched and sweltering condition.  Arithelli still kept her place among
+the performers at the Hippodrome, though after the fashion of circus
+artists her name had been changed.
+
+She was now "Madame Mignonne" from Paris, and wore a golden wig, and
+came on the stage riding a lion in the character of a heathen goddess
+in the spectacular display which always ended the performance.
+
+She pined for the _haute école_ and trick riding in which she so
+excelled, and felt unholy pangs when she saw her beloved white horses
+being driven in a chariot by a fat, vulgar English woman, arrayed in
+scanty pink tunic and tights.
+
+She was not afraid of the lion, who was old and toothless enough to be
+absolutely safe, but her new role was not a great success.
+
+The golden hair did not suit her any better than did the classical
+draperies, and she grew daily thinner.  As a matter of fact she was
+practically going through the process of slow starvation.
+
+She had never, even in her healthily hungry days, been able to eat the
+abominable Spanish dishes--meat floating in oil, and other things which
+she classed together under the heading of _cochonneries_.
+
+She generally lived on fruit, a little black bread, coffee, and
+_absinthe_.
+
+Emile would try and bully her into eating more, and occasionally
+essayed his talents as a _chef_, and cooked weird looking things in his
+rooms over a vilely smelling English oil stove, but the Jewess in
+Arithelli found him wanting in the "divers washings" she required of
+the saucepans, and they generally ended these Bohemian repasts with a
+quarrel.
+
+She went about her work in a half-stupefied state, as one who is
+perpetually in a trance.  She was past fear now.  Nothing mattered.
+Midnight rides on a mule up in the mountains, meetings in the low
+quarter of the town, the danger of being arrested while carrying a
+despatch.
+
+"_C'est ainsi que la vie_!"  Emile's motto had become also her own.
+
+She was once more a perfect machine.  Even the only thing that
+Sobrenski could find to say against her was that her appearance was too
+conspicuous for a conspirator and that her hands and feet would betray
+her through any disguise.
+
+Emile, though still outwardly as unsympathetic as ever, was not blind
+to the change in her looks and manner.
+
+Putting the Cause out of the question, he did not wish "Fatalité" to
+get ill.  Her company amused and distracted him.
+
+He liked to hear her views on life, and to colour them with his own
+cynicism, and he enjoyed teaching her to sing and hearing her argue.
+
+For all her quiet she was curiously magnetic and had a way of making
+her absence felt.  She was never noisy or exacting and had none of the
+pride or vices of her sex, and though she was often depressed she was
+never bored, and in consequence bored no one.
+
+They had many traits in common, including fatalism and morbidity, for
+the Slav temperament is in a hundred ways akin to that of the Celt.
+
+In spite of his jeering remarks Emile thoroughly appreciated the girl's
+pluck, and knew that if she failed it would be purely from physical
+reasons.
+
+"Iron in a velvet sheath," he had described her, and iron did not
+bend--it broke.
+
+After some consideration he approached the very unapproachable Manager.
+"It's time you gave your leading _equestrienne_ a holiday," he
+observed.  "She's getting ill.  If you don't let her have a rest soon
+she'll be falling off in public, or having some fiasco.  She was half
+dead the other night after the performance."
+
+The Manager made profane remarks in the dialect of Silesia, of which
+place he was a native.  He was fresh from quarrelling for the hundredth
+time with Estelle, and was in the last frame of mind to desire rest or
+peace for any inhabitant of the globe.
+
+By himself and everyone else at the Hippodrome, Arithelli was
+considered the property of the Anarchist, and Emile had taken very good
+care to disabuse no one of the idea, but had rather been at some pains
+to create such an impression.
+
+For her it was the best protection, and kept her free from the insults
+and attentions of other men.
+
+Bouquets and jewellery he was willing that she should receive; they did
+no harm and the latter could always be sold.
+
+In cold and dispassionate argument he explained to the irate Manager
+the folly of ruining good material by injudicious use.
+
+"You pay her as little as you can considering she is a draw.  She does
+the work of three people, including keeping the books when you are not
+in a condition to wrestle with arithmetic.  If you had your way she
+would be cleaning out the stables."
+
+"Bah!" sneered the other.  "It would do her good--take the devil out of
+her--hard work doesn't hurt that type.  She's all wire and whipcord,
+your She-Wolf, Poleski.  Has she been snarling at you?"
+
+"You'd better give her a week off," proceeded Emile, unmoved.  "The
+audience will be getting tired of her if you're not careful; she has
+been on too long without a break.  Get a fresh _artiste_ and take it
+out of her salary.  I shall give her a week's cruise round the harbour
+and see what that will do."
+
+"Well, try and put a little flesh on her bones," said the Manager
+rudely.  "I never saw such lean flanks!  She's got the expression of a
+death's head.  It's a good thing the Spanish don't care for cheerful
+grins or she wouldn't be here two days."
+
+And so it came to pass that on the following Sunday Arithelli found
+herself sitting on the deck of a yacht anchored far out in the harbour,
+with the shores of Barcelona only a faint outline in the distance.
+
+They had come aboard the previous day.
+
+Emile had made her no explanations beyond saying that he was going to
+take her for a sea trip, and after her custom she had asked no
+questions.
+
+The yacht, which was an uncanny looking craft, painted black and called
+"_The Witch_," she knew by reputation, and had often seen it slipping
+into the harbour after dusk.  It was the property of two Russian
+aristocrats, friends of Emile's, who helped the Cause by conveying
+bombs and infernal machines, and taking off such members of the band as
+had suddenly found Spain an undesirable residence.
+
+Arithelli was not in the least interested in either of the men, the
+dark, handsome, saturnine Vladimir, or the fair-haired, pretty,
+effeminate youth to whom he was comrade and hero.
+
+But she liked their smartness and well-groomed air, and their spotless
+clothes, after Emile and his dirty nails and slovenly habits, and she
+appreciated to the full the surrounding refinement and comfort, and
+enjoyed the daintily served meals, the shining glass and silver and the
+deft, silent waiting of the sailors.
+
+She had been given a luxurious cabin which seemed a paradise after her
+dirty, carpetless bedroom, and in it she could laze and lounge in peace
+without the eternal practising and rehearsals and running errands that
+her soul loathed.
+
+The hot sun glared down upon her, as she sat watching the racing waves.
+
+She was a fantastic, slim, _bizarre_ figure with her coppery hair, over
+which a lace scarf was tied, and high-heeled slippers on her beautiful
+slender feet.
+
+In her ears dangled huge turquoises, showing vividly against the white
+skin that was coated thickly with scented powder.
+
+The manager had told her that she must not get tanned or red or it
+would spoil her type, and she now "made-up" habitually in the daytime.
+
+Her whole array was tawdry and theatrical, and utterly out of keeping
+with her surroundings.
+
+The two owners of the yacht, who wore immaculate white linen clothes
+and canvas shoes, expressed to each other their disapproval of her
+whole get-up, and particularly of her clicking heels.  In common with
+most men, they abominated an _outré_ style of dressing and too much
+jewellery, and above all such finery at sea.
+
+The girl must be mad!  Didn't she know that a schooner was not a circus
+ring?  If she were such a fool Poleski should have taught her better
+before bringing her on board.
+
+They agreed that he had sense enough in other things, and had certainly
+trained her not to be a nuisance.
+
+After _déjeuner_ Emile had hunted up the least doubtful of the French
+novels they possessed and sent her up on deck to get the benefit of the
+sea air of which she was supposed to stand in need.
+
+"_Va t'en_, Arithelli," he said.  "You don't want to be suffocating
+yourself down in a stuffy cabin.  You're here to get lots of ozone and
+make yourself look a little less like a corpse.  Besides, we want to
+talk."
+
+She felt very much depressed and neglected as she sat dangling "_Les
+confessions d'une femme mariée_," which were virtuous to dulness and
+interested her not at all, in a listless hand, long and delicate like
+her feet, and decorated with too many turquoise rings.  Below, in the
+cabin, she could hear the noise of the men as they argued and shouted
+at each other in a polyglot of three different languages.
+
+Arithelli felt more than a little resentful.  Why had they shut her out
+and prevented her from hearing their discussions?
+
+The men at the other meetings had always wanted her in the room.
+
+She had been entrusted with all their secrets and there was no question
+of betrayal.  She knew too much about the consequences now to try that.
+
+When Emile came up from below she asked him why he had insulted her by
+turning her out.
+
+Did he not trust her, or did he think she had not enough intelligence.
+
+For answer he laughed cynically, "I'll make use of you and your
+intelligence fast enough--when I want them.  You were cavilling at
+being overworked the other day."
+
+Of Vladimir and Paul she saw nothing in the daytime, for they both
+ignored her, but in the evenings they all sat together up on deck, and
+Paul sang and played the guitar while Arithelli would listen entranced
+and faint with pleasure.
+
+A love of melody was the birthright of her race, and the boy had a
+genius for music.  He seemed to have but two ideas in life--that, and a
+devotion which almost amounted to idolatry for the older man.
+
+They would walk up and down for hours, Vladimir with his hand on Paul's
+shoulder talking, gesticulating and commanding, while the other, his
+eyes on the ground, listened and assented.
+
+Sometimes Vladimir would speak to him in Russian with an accent that
+was in itself a caress, and Arithelli, who watched them curiously,
+noticed and wondered to see the boy flush and colour like a woman.
+
+She always looked forward with the keenest pleasure to those evenings.
+
+The days bored her, inasmuch as she was capable of being bored, and she
+hated the glare and glitter of the sun and sky.
+
+It was too much like the blue-white lights of the Hippodrome.  With
+night came the glamour of Fairyland, that magic country in which
+Ireland still believes, and which is ever there for those who seek it,
+"East o' the Sun, and West o' the Moon."
+
+The yacht drifting idly at anchor in smooth water, the stars in their
+bed of velvet black, the magic of air and space.
+
+The incense-like scent of Turkish cigarettes and black coffee, the
+little group of men lounging in their deck chairs, the resonant, full
+notes of the guitar, and Paul's voice rising out of the shadows.
+
+If he had sung standing on the platform of a brightly lit concert hall
+half the charm would have vanished in that distraction which the
+personality of a singer creates.
+
+In the illusion of his surroundings the man himself did not exist.
+
+There was only the voice--the singer.  Hungarian folk-songs that fired
+her blood and made her restless with strange longings; "_La vie est
+vaine_," eternally sweet and haunting; then some wickedly witty song of
+the _cafés_, and melodies of Gounod full of infinite charm.  Last of
+all came always "_Le Rêve_," in which Emile and Vladimir joined as if
+it were some National Anthem, and which left her quivering with
+excitement.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+  "There would no man do for your sake, I think,
+    What I would have done for the least word said;
+  I had wrung life dry for your lips to drink--
+    Broken it up for your daily bread."
+            SWINBURNE.
+
+
+When the week of dreams and rest was over she went back to the
+Hippodrome with somewhat of relief in her feelings.
+
+At least the work prevented her from thinking.  Though she was
+physically less languid, the sea air had neither succeeded in putting
+any more flesh on what the Manager called her "lean flanks," nor had it
+made her look much more cheerful.  He had the sense to let her take her
+place as _equestrienne_ once more, and had announced her reappearance
+in flaming posters.
+
+The stablemen and helpers were all delighted to see her again, and in
+token of their satisfaction presented her with a hideous and unwieldy
+bouquet, in which all colours were arranged together so as to give the
+effect of a kaleidoscope.  They liked her for her sweet temper and
+invariable courtesy, and respected her for her knowledge of horses.
+
+Estelle came and embraced her and was voluble over the failings of her
+"_bon ami_," the sardonic manager.
+
+Arithelli received a hearty round of applause as she rode into the ring
+on her favourite "Don Juan," whose wavy tail and mane were decorated
+with turquoise ribbons that matched her habit.
+
+At least she was happy on horseback, and she loved the animals and they
+her.
+
+Even the performing sheep and monkey, and the toothless lion came in
+for a share in her affections.  She had a new and difficult trick to go
+through that night, but this particular sort of danger only made her
+feel exhilarated.
+
+Emile's stories of blood and horrors had sickened her, but the chance
+of breaking her neck over a high jump held no terrors.
+
+She made her exit, gaily waving her silver-handled whip, and Vardri,
+who was standing at the entrance of the ring, came forward quickly to
+lift her off her horse before the groom could reach her.
+
+"You're wanted to-night in the Calle de Pescadores," he whispered, as
+she rested her hand on his shoulder to jump down.  "As soon as
+possible, and go in carefully--there's a scare about spies."
+
+He felt her body stiffen and the little smile that came so rarely died
+in an instant, leaving her once more "Fatalité."
+
+She nodded by way of assent and bent down to gather up her habit.
+
+The ring-master was only a few feet away, and they could never be
+certain as to who was to be trusted.
+
+Vardri stood looking after her as she walked away with her head well up
+and her shoulders thrown back as usual.
+
+The two had become good friends with the comradeship induced by the
+similarity in their misfortunes.
+
+Both were young, reckless and without money beyond what they earned,
+though, whereas Arithelli had been more or less tricked into her
+present position, Vardri had been infatuated with the Cause from the
+time he was old enough to take an interest in anything.  The worship of
+the goddess Liberty had left with him room also for the adoration of a
+human being, and in a boyish chivalrous way he had tried to make things
+easier for Arithelli.
+
+He managed to bring her occasional flowers and music out of his
+starvation wages, and was always jealously careful of the way in which
+her horses were groomed and turned out.  They had a curious resemblance
+to each other, and when Arithelli was dressed in boy's clothes for her
+journeys up in the mountains, they might have been two brothers.  One
+was dark and the other fair, but both had the same haggard,
+well-modelled faces, the same pale skins, and thin, supple figures.
+
+They were exactly of a height, too, and when Arithelli disguised
+herself, she pushed her red hair under a sombrero and black wig.
+
+Even Sobrenski's lynx eyes had been at fault in the semi-darkness of
+the hut, and he had sworn at her in mistake for Vardri.  As the dresser
+took off her habit, she asked the woman whether Monsieur Poleski had
+been behind the scenes during her turn, and was there a note or message?
+
+It appeared that there had been no sign of Emile, and she hesitated for
+a moment, hardly knowing what to do.
+
+The order for her presence in the Calle de Pescadores, which of course
+had been sent by Sobrenski, had told her to come at once.
+
+On the other hand, Emile had always told her to wait for him in her
+room till he came to fetch her.  If she went through the streets alone
+there would be a row, and if she were late at the _rendezvous_ there
+would also be a row.
+
+"_C'est ainsi que la vie!_"
+
+She lifted her thin shoulders after the manner of Emile and decided to
+start at once.  She wiped all the make-up from her face with a damp
+towel, swaying a little as she stood before the glass.
+
+The excitement of her reception and the ensuing episode had made her
+heart beat at distressing speed.
+
+"You're not ill," she adjured her pale reflection.  "It's all
+imagination.  Emile says all these complaints are.  Any way, you're not
+going to give in to it."
+
+She shut both ears and eyes as she sped through the restless city that
+even at this hour was astir with life.
+
+She was only glad that there was no moon.  Roused for once out of her
+naturally slow and indolent walk, she was soon in the poor quarter and
+climbing the stairs to the third floor of a horrible little house, the
+back of which looked out on the dark slums of the quarter of the
+Parelelo, the breeding-place of revolutions; the district between the
+Rambla and the Harbour.
+
+The house was like the one that Emile had described when telling her of
+the murdered woman, Félise Rivaz.
+
+The very air reeked of intrigue and hidden deeds.
+
+She looked round first of all for Emile, but he was not there, and only
+half the usual number of conspirators were assembled.
+
+Vardri, who had left the Hippodrome the minute he had delivered his
+message, was sitting on the end of the table swinging his feet and
+whistling softly.
+
+He had bribed one of the "strappers" to finish his work, and slipped
+out, only arriving a few minutes before her.
+
+He had risked dismissal, but that was no great matter.
+
+The Cause came first, and he feared danger for Arithelli, knowing that
+if there was anything specially risky to be done she would be the one
+chosen.
+
+Sobrenski was always harder on her than on the others.
+
+He watched her with the hungry, faithful eyes of an animal, and got up
+from his seat with instinctive courtesy.  Like all the rest he wore the
+Anarchist badge, a red tie, and the hot, vivid colour showed up the
+lines of ill-health and suffering about his eyes and mouth.
+
+In spite of his disreputable clothes and wild hair, there still
+remained in him the indefinable signs of breeding, in the thin, shapely
+hands that rested on his knee, and in the modulations of his boyish and
+eager voice.
+
+None of the others took the least notice of the girl's entrance.
+
+Nearly all of them were as well-born as the young Austrian, but to them
+she was simply a comrade, a fellow, worker, not a woman.
+
+She gave him a little friendly gesture and went quietly to a seat
+against the wall, where she sat in one of her characteristic attitudes,
+her feet crossed, and showing under her short dark blue skirt.
+
+Emile had made her buy this one plain and unnoticeable garment for use
+on these occasions.
+
+After she had been in the room a minute, Sobrenski turned from the man
+to whom he had been talking in a careful under-tone, and bolted the
+door.
+
+"Listen, all of you," he said.  "We have received information that this
+house will be watched to-night.  Whether the spy is one who was
+formerly one of us, we do not know--yet.  It appears that it is Poleski
+who is the suspect.  They have some evidence against him that is
+dangerous.  If he is seen coming in here to-night, they will arrest
+him.  The next time we will change the place, but for the present all
+that can be done is to warn him against coming here.  Fortunately he
+will be later than usual, because he does not leave the Café Colomb
+till after midnight.  Someone must be sent there to stop him.  It will
+not do for any of us to be seen coming out, so she"--he indicated
+Arithelli--"must go."
+
+Arithelli wasted no time in response.  She was only too eager to get
+out of the abominable place, and was already half way to the door when
+Sobrenski stopped her.
+
+"Not that way!" he said.  "What are you thinking of?  You will walk
+straight into the arms of the spies who are probably watching the house
+by this time.  No, you must go by the window at the back; the rest of
+us will stay here all night."
+
+"This house gives on the quay by a lucky chance," remarked one of the
+older men; "we should be well trapped otherwise.  There are several
+feet between it and the water."
+
+Vardri's eyes had never moved from the girl's face.  He knew that her
+heart was affected, and she had told him once that she would never
+attempt to go on the tight-rope or trapeze because the mere thought of
+a height always terrified her.
+
+In answer to Sobrenski's gesture, she moved towards the window, which
+another of the conspirators was cautiously opening.
+
+Vardri pushed himself forward into the group.  "She can't go down
+there," he said hoarsely, "It's not safe--look at the height!"
+
+"She'll go down well enough if she holds onto the rope."
+
+"The rope may break or fray through on the sill."
+
+"She takes her chance like the rest of us."
+
+"The rest of us--we're _men_!"
+
+"There are neither men nor women in the Cause.  Do you need to be
+taught that now?  Stand back!"
+
+"I'll go down in her place."
+
+"You will do nothing of the kind.  Which of us is the leader here?"
+
+Sobrenski had twisted the girl's arms behind her back, and he was
+holding her by the wrists.  He expected her to scream or struggle, but
+she remained absolutely passive.
+
+One of the men was making a slip-knot in a coil of rope.
+
+Vardri's blood was hot as he looked on.  Blind with helpless rage, he
+was conscious of nothing but the little set face and defiant head.  He
+had come suddenly into his heritage of manhood at the sight of her
+alone, defenceless and roughly handled by brute beasts who called
+themselves men.
+
+He was mad, too, with a man's jealousy.  From the earliest moment he
+had seen Arithelli he had given her homage as a woman.  The _gamin_,
+the "Becky Sharp" that Emile and the others knew, he had never seen,
+and he had always resented her numerous irreverent nicknames.
+
+He could do nothing, nothing!
+
+Get himself shot or strangled, perhaps, and what use would that be to
+her?
+
+"Come!" said Sobrenski, turning her towards the window.
+
+For the first time since she had entered the room, Arithelli spoke:
+"Leave me alone for a minute.  No, I won't move--_parole d'honneur_!"
+
+When she was released, she put out her left hand.  "_Mon ami_, what's
+the use of arguing?  I'm the errand boy, _vois-tu_?  My work is to
+carry messages.  If you make a scene it's only the worse for me.  It's
+good of you to want to go instead.  I shall not forget."
+
+The voice, subtle and sweet as ever, the intimacy implied by the
+familiar "thou" acted like a charm to the boy's wild fury.  Before her
+courage and dignity it seemed out of place to make any further protest.
+
+He crushed the long and lovely hand against his lips with mingled
+passion and reverence.
+
+There was a red streak across the wrist.
+
+"A fine melodrama!" sneered Sobrenski.  "Keep all that for the stage,
+it isn't needed here.  _Allons_!  We can't waste any more time, there
+has been too much wasted already."
+
+Vardri walked to the furthest end of the room, turning his back upon
+the group at the window, and thrust his fingers into his ears to deaden
+the sound of the scream for which he waited in tortured anticipation.
+
+Excitable and neurotic, like all consumptives, his imagination made of
+those waiting moments a veritable hell.
+
+She would never get down in safety--an old and hastily knotted rope, a
+disregard of all ordinary precautions, and her body in the hands of men
+who handled human lives more carelessly than most people would handle
+stones.  He bit his lip till the blood ran down to his chin.
+
+Here he stood doing nothing, he who would have been tortured to save
+her!
+
+The window was shut and one of the men said: "She's down all right
+after all.  I thought by the look of her she would have fainted.  She
+has some pluck, Mademoiselle Fatalité!"
+
+"Yes," answered Sobrenski.  "Here's the coward and traitor."
+
+Vardri wheeled round, looking straight into the cold eyes of his
+leader.  He had heard the last words.  She was safe, that was all that
+mattered, and for himself he was reckless.
+
+"Traitor, am I?  Yes, if the Cause is to include the ill-treatment of
+women!"
+
+"Women?  Again women?  Are our meetings to be used as love trysts.
+There was a certain episode two years ago--Gaston de Barrés and Félise
+Rivaz--you remember it?  Ah, I thought so!  Then let it be a
+warning--in the future you will be suspected and watched.  There is no
+need for me to dilate upon the punishment for treachery, all that you
+knew when you joined us.  You may consider yourself lucky to have
+escaped so easily to-night.  Through the few minutes' delay you have
+caused, Poleski may have been arrested."
+
+Vardri shrugged and sat down.  Like Arithelli, he recognized the
+futility of mere words upon certain occasions.
+
+Moreover, now that the flame of his indignation had died down, he had
+begun to feel wretchedly ill and spiritless with the reaction that
+comes after any great excitement.
+
+He sat shivering and coughing till the dawn, while the other men talked
+in low voices or played cards.  One or two slept fitfully in
+uncomfortable attitudes on the floor.
+
+No one grumbled at the discomfort or weariness of the vigil.
+
+They who looked forward to ultimate prison and perhaps death itself
+were not wont to quarrel with such minor inconveniences as the loss of
+sleep.
+
+Sobrenski had pulled the solitary candle in the room towards him and
+sat writing rapidly and frowning to himself.
+
+His fox-like face framed in its red hair and beard looked more
+relentless and crafty than ever in the revealing light, and the boy
+shivered anew, but not from physical cold.
+
+He did not fear the leader of the Brotherhood for himself, but for
+Arithelli--Arithelli, the drudge, the tool, the "errand boy," as she
+had called herself.
+
+Perhaps in time even she would become a heartless machine.
+
+Human life had seemed so cheap and of so little account to him once,
+but since he had loved her--
+
+She could never live among such people and in such scenes, and still
+remain unscarred.
+
+Again the little desperate face rose before him.
+
+If they did not succeed in killing her soon by their brutalities, she
+would commit suicide to escape from the horrors that surrounded her.
+
+It had never occurred to Vardri to be jealous of Emile.
+
+With the curious insight that love gives he had formed a true idea of
+the relationship between the oddly-assorted pair.  He had never thought
+of himself as her lover.
+
+To him she was always the Ideal, the divinity enthroned.
+
+He was content to kiss her feet, and to lay before them service and
+sacrifice.
+
+Yet, though he might build a wall of love around her, he knew it could
+give her no protection against the realities of her present life.
+
+She had given him dreams, and in them he could forget all other things,
+the things that the world calls real.
+
+Everything had vanished as a mist--the dirty room, the chill of the
+dawn, his own physical wretchedness.
+
+He heard only the honey-sweet voice, saw only the outstretched hand of
+friendship.
+
+"_Mon ami_," she had called him, he who had never aspired higher than
+to be known as her servant.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+  "For all things born one gate
+  Opens, . . . and no man sees
+  Beyond the gods and Fate."
+            SWINBURNE.
+
+WHEN Emile arrived at the Hippodrome, only a few minutes after his
+usual time, he found no one but the dresser, who was clearing away the
+litter of clothes, jewellery, powder-puffs and flowers.
+
+Arithelli had vanished.
+
+She had never before failed to wait for him, and he knew she would not
+have started alone without some very good reason.  He questioned the
+dresser and found she knew nothing beyond that "La Nina," as she called
+the girl affectionately, had left immediately after her last turn.  She
+had asked if the Señor had been in yet, but hearing he had not, she had
+dressed and gone at once.  She had not even stayed to put on a cloak,
+and had left her hair still in a plait, and only a _velo_ over it.  She
+had seemed in great haste (but that was always so with the English!)
+and had looked ill.  The Señor must not be alarmed, she added, folding
+Arithelli's blue habit with wrinkled, careful hands.  True, Barcelona
+was an evil place for one so young as "La Nina," but the blessed
+saints--
+
+Emile gave her a _peseta_, and left her to her invocations.  In the
+long passage that led from the dressing-rooms he ran into Estelle, who
+was just sufficiently drunk to be excitable and quarrelsome.  She still
+had on her dancer's costume of short skirts of poppy-coloured tulle,
+and scarlet shoes and tights.  She was further adorned with long,
+dangling, coral ear-rings, and a black bruise on the left side of her
+face under the eye, the outward and visible sign of her last encounter
+with the Manager.
+
+She saluted Emile with a vindictive glare from her black eyes, and
+tried to push past him.  She hated him in a spiteful feminine way for
+his complete appropriation of Arithelli, of whom, thanks to him, she
+now saw very little.  She had quarrelled with all the other women
+employed in the Circus, but Arithelli had always helped her to dress,
+and given her cigarettes and listened to her woes.
+
+Emile blocked the way, catching the dancer by the wrist as she
+attempted to slip by, leaving his question unanswered.  He repeated it,
+and after a minute's sullen refusal to speak, Estelle stamped her foot
+savagely upon the floor, and collapsed into a state of hysterical
+volubility.  No, she had seen nothing, nothing! she protested in
+French.  Scarcely ever did she see her little friend now, and whose
+fault was that?  Would Monsieur Poleski answer her?  As Monsieur
+Poleski did nothing of the kind, she continued to rage.  All men were
+brutes!  Yes, all!  She had no friends now and if she did console
+herself--what would he have?
+
+Emile decided that she was speaking the truth, and that there was no
+use wasting time in making other enquiries.
+
+One thing seemed certain--that Arithelli had left the building.  From
+the Hippodrome he went next to her lodgings, also with no result.  He
+could only now suppose that Sobrenski had sent her off at a moment's
+notice on some unusual errand.  The possibility of her having gone to
+the house in the Calle de Pescadores did not occur to him.  According
+to the last arrangement they were not expected there till after
+midnight.  It was only eleven now.  He would go to the Café Colomb, and
+spend the hour there.  It was no use to search for her further, and as
+he assured himself there was not the least reason to become alarmed.
+She was not likely to lose her head, and she knew her way about the
+place.
+
+The Colomb was more or less a recognised resort of the many
+revolutionaries with whom the city abounded.  The proprietor was known
+to be in sympathy with their schemes, though he took no active part in
+them himself.  He was considered trustworthy, for notes and messages
+were often left in his charge, and his private room was at the disposal
+of those who wished for a few minutes' secret interview.  When Emile
+entered he was greeted by several of the men who sat in groups of two
+and three at little tables, busy with Monte and other card games.
+
+The smoke of many cigarettes obscured their figures, and clouded the
+mirrors with which the place was lined from floor to ceiling.  Emile
+sat down alone and ordered an _absinthe_.
+
+When called upon to join in the play, he refused with a scowl and a
+rasping oath in his native tongue, and as the evening grew on towards
+midnight he was left to himself and his meditations.
+
+His thoughts were still with Arithelli, the weird witch-girl, whose
+eyes were like those of Swinburne's fair woman,
+
+  "Coloured like a water-flower,
+  And deeper than the green sea's glass."
+
+He, who now never opened a book, had once known that most un-English of
+all poets by heart.
+
+In her many phases Arithelli passed before him, as he stared moodily at
+the shifting opal-coloured liquid in his glass.  He thought of her as
+he had often seen her, fighting through her work at the Hippodrome, the
+little weary head always gallantly carried, and then when she had
+dismounted and was in her dressing-room, the rings round her eyes, her
+shaking hands and utter weariness.  He remembered her consideration for
+her horses, her loathing of the ill-treatment of all dumb things so
+common here.  Once he had found her in the market-place, remonstrating
+in her broken Spanish with the country women for the inhuman manner in
+which they carried away their purchases of live fowl, tied neck to
+neck, and slung across a mule, to die of slow strangulation under the
+blazing sun.  All the animals at the Hippodrome had been better treated
+since she had been there.  It was characteristic of the man that he
+laughed at her to her face for her campaign against the national
+cruelty, and in secret thought of her with admiration.
+
+In many ways sexless, in others purely a woman, to every mood she
+brought the charm of individuality.
+
+_Tiens_!  He was falling in love, he jeered to himself, cynically.  In
+love with that tall, silent creature, who was never in a hurry and
+never in a temper, and who walked as if she had been bred in Andalusia.
+
+Absurd!  He was only interested.  She had brains, and she never bored
+him.
+
+Besides, she was only twenty-four, and one could hardly allow a girl of
+that age to be thrown warm and living to the wolves and vampires of
+Barcelona.  Perhaps he had been wrong in letting her do some
+things--drink _absinthe_, for example.  One lost one's sense of mental
+and moral perspective in a place like this.  At least he had guarded
+her well.  If he had not met her that day at the station, she might
+have fallen into worse hands than his own.  Things could not go on
+indefinitely as they had been going.  What was to be the end of it all?
+
+Eventually she would fall in love, and a woman was no more use to the
+Cause once that happened.  No vows would be strong enough to keep her
+from a man's arms once she cared.  She would not love lightly or
+easily, and where would she find love, here in Barcelona?
+
+Half unconsciously, he found himself comparing Arithelli with the woman
+who had betrayed him.  Emile never lied, even to himself, and he knew
+now that Marie Roumanoff had almost become a shadow.
+
+A plaything she had been, a child, a doll, a being made for caresses
+and admiration.  To a woman of her type camaraderie would have been
+impossible.  He had not wanted it, and it had not been in her nature to
+give it.
+
+A man, who had been sitting opposite, got up, gesticulated, put on his
+hat at a reckless angle, and, with a noisy farewell to his companions,
+swaggered out.
+
+In the mirror that faced him Emile saw the quick furtive glance
+bestowed upon him, though he sat apparently unconscious of it.
+
+Something at the back of his brain suggested to him that he knew the
+man's face, that he had seen him before.  A spy probably.  It was
+nothing unusual for any of them to be "shadowed," and for their
+out-goings and in-comings to be noted.
+
+The highly gilded French clock on the mantel-piece at the far end of
+the room announced the hour as being a quarter to twelve.  Emile
+stooped down to pick up his sombrero which had tumbled off a chair on
+to the floor, when he remained with outstretched hand, arrested by the
+sound of a woman's voice which came through the partly opened door of
+the proprietor's private room and office.  A woman's voice?  It was
+Arithelli's unmistakably.
+
+He recovered himself and the sombrero together, and twisted round in
+his seat so as to get a view of the door, which was on his left hand,
+half way down the long room.  It had a glass top, across which a dark
+green curtain was drawn.  Emile knew that it was possible to enter this
+room without passing through the _café_.  There was another door which
+led into a passage through the kitchen and back part of the house, and
+from thence into a side-street, or rather a small alley.
+
+He had often been that way, and it was generally used by the
+frequenters of the place when they had reason to guard their movements.
+
+He listened again.
+
+The voice was even more hoarse than usual and more uncertain.  Though
+he could not hear the words, the broken sentences gave an impression of
+breathlessness.  When she stopped speaking he heard the voice of the
+proprietor raised in an emphatic stage-whisper.  Yes, Monsieur Poleski
+was within.  Mademoiselle was fortunately in time to find him.  If
+Mademoiselle would give herself the trouble to wait but for one
+moment--.
+
+The little man fancied himself an adept at intrigue, and his methods
+were often a cause of anxiety to those he befriended.  His nods and
+gestures and meaning glances as he emerged would have been enough to
+arouse suspicion in the most guileless.
+
+He stood blinking his short-sighted eyes through the haze in his effort
+to attract Emile's attention without being detected.  The latter got up
+and sauntered towards him.
+
+"_Bon soir, Monsieur Lefévre_," he said carelessly.  "We have a little
+account to settle, you and I, is it not so?"
+
+Fat Monsieur Lefevre rose gallantly to the occasion.  He bowed Emile
+into the room, locked the door by which they had entered, and with
+another bow and a muttered apology scuttled through the passage into
+the back regions.  Two minutes later he made his reappearance in the
+_café_ by the front way, and went to his place behind the counter with
+the satisfied face of a successful diplomatist.
+
+His little sanctum was typical in its arrangement of the Parisian
+_bourgeois_.
+
+Numerous picture post-cards of a famous chanteuse of the Folies
+Bergeres proclaimed Monsieur's taste in beauty.  For the rest,
+everything was neat and rather bare of furniture.  There were chairs
+symmetrically arranged like sentinels along the walls, tinted lace
+curtains, a gilded mirror, and a few doubtful coloured pictures, all of
+women.  An unshaded electric light flared in a corner.  Arithelli stood
+resting one hand on the round polished table in the centre of the
+apartment.  Her dark blue dress was torn in two places, and smeared
+with patches of dust.  The _velo_, or piece of drapery worn on ordinary
+occasions instead of the mantilla, hung down her back in company with
+the long plait of hair, which had come untwisted at the ends.  Her face
+was strained and haggard, and the tense attitude spoke of tortured
+nerves.
+
+She was still struggling for breath, and appeared almost unable to
+speak, but Emile was not minded to allow her much time for recovery.
+
+Patience was not numbered among such virtues as he possessed.
+
+"_Tiens_!" he began.  "What is it now, Fatalité?  You look as if you
+had been having adventures.  Have you been getting into mischief?  And
+where have you been?"
+
+"In the Calle de Pescadores out at Barcelonetta.  Sobrenski sent me
+with a message to you.  The place is being watched.  If they see you go
+in you may be arrested.  The others got to hear about the spies, and
+went early.  They are going to stay there all night because it isn't
+safe to leave."  Her tone was that of one who repeats a well-learned
+lesson.
+
+Emile shrugged.  "Spies?  So that's it!  There was a man just now in
+the _café_ who looked like it.  Probably he is waiting to go outside
+now to 'shadow' me.  He may wait till--!  And how did you get out?"
+
+"They let me down from a window at the back of the house.  I got on to
+the quay and came here by the long way and through the Rambla."  There
+was a pause, and then she said in the same mechanical voice, "Sobrenski
+said I was to tell you not to come.  It isn't safe."
+
+Emile did not answer.  He could see that she was trembling violently
+and on the verge of an hysterical crisis.  He rather hoped she would
+break down.  It would seem more natural.  Women were privileged to cry
+and scream, not that it was possible to imagine her screaming.  He
+dragged forward a chair from the immaculate row against the wall.
+
+As he did so he noticed that she kept her left hand behind her back as
+if to conceal something.
+
+"Sit down," he ordered.  "What's the matter with your hand?  Are you
+hurt?"
+
+The girl retreated before him.
+
+"No!" she answered defiantly.
+
+But Emile's quick eyes had seen a crumpled handkerchief flecked with
+red stains.
+
+"Don't tell lies, Fatalité!" he said sharply.  "Give me your hand at
+once."
+
+Arithelli obeyed, holding it out palm upwards.
+
+Emile looked, and ripped out a fiery exclamation.  The smooth flesh was
+scarred and torn across in several places, and was still bleeding.  The
+mark of Sobrenski's grip on her wrist had turned from crimson to a dull
+discoloured hue.
+
+"It doesn't hurt so very much," she said.  "Only I can't bear the sight
+of blood.  All Jewish people are like that.  I can't help it.  It makes
+me feel queer all over."
+
+She turned her head aside with a shudder.  Emile muttered another
+expletive, adding:
+
+"Then if you feel like that, don't look."
+
+He told her again to sit down, tore her handkerchief into strips,
+soaked them in water from a carafe, and bandaged up the wounds in a
+rough but effectual fashion.
+
+She said nothing during the process, but kept her head still turned
+away so that he could not see her face.
+
+"Voilà!" said Emile.  "That will be all right to-morrow.  What did they
+do to you?"
+
+"I cut my fingers on the window sill when they let me down.  There was
+a piece of iron or a nail or something.  I don't remember.  It didn't
+hurt at the time."
+
+"H'm!" commented Emile.  "But this?" he touched her wrist lightly.  "It
+looks like--"
+
+"That?  Oh, Sobrenski did that.  He--"
+
+"Well?" said Emile.  He waited but there came no answer, so he
+continued the interrogation.  "You didn't make a scene, Fatalité?"
+
+He heard her flinch and draw in her breath as she covered her face with
+her free hand.  Her low painful sobbing reminded him of the
+inarticulate moaning of an animal.
+
+Even in her grief, her abandonment, she was unlike all other women.
+Emile stood beside her in watchful silence, and neither attempted to
+interfere nor to console her.  He was wise enough to know that to a
+highly strung nature like hers too much self-repression might be
+dangerous, and he was humane enough to be glad that she had the relief
+of tears.
+
+At length he said quietly, "I didn't know you could cry, Fatalité.  I
+didn't know you were human enough for that."
+
+She still fought desperately for composure, thrusting a fold of the
+torn _velo_ between her teeth.  The naked light shone on her bent head,
+and on her glittering rope of hair.
+
+A strange impulse suddenly moved Emile to finger a loose strand with a
+touch that had in it something of a caress.
+
+Gamin she had been, _equestrienne_, heroine, and now she was only a
+sorrowful Dolores.
+
+At last words came.
+
+She stood up and faced him, shaking back her hair.
+
+"Emile!  Emile!  I must give it up.  I can't go on!"
+
+"And you can't turn back, _mon enfant_."
+
+"I'll run away."
+
+"Do you think they wouldn't find you?  You know enough about our
+organisation now.  No one who has once joined us is ever allowed to
+escape.  You would be found sooner or later, and then--you remember
+what I told you once?  That I am responsible for you to the
+Brotherhood?"
+
+He spoke calmly, patiently, as if he were explaining things to a child.
+
+If his associates could have seen the cynical Emile Poleski of ordinary
+life they would have found reason to marvel!
+
+The gesture of uncontrollable horror told him that she understood only
+too well.  What should the upholders of the Cause care for ties, for
+friendships, for pity?
+
+If she were recaptured Emile would be her executioner.  He might
+refuse, but that would not save her and he would be shot as well.  Why
+should he suffer because she had lost her courage and turned traitress?
+
+She tried to collect her senses, and to think properly.  Everything
+felt blurred and far off.  One thing alone seemed certain--that there
+was no way out of the _impasse_.
+
+Emile had walked to the glass-door and unlocked it.  Then he came back
+to her.
+
+"It's time we were going," he said.  "It will not do to be here too
+long.  As our friend the spy is patrolling the street outside in
+readiness for my appearance, we will go out the other way.  The Calle
+Santa Teresa is nearly always deserted.  It's just as well you should
+be seen with me.  They don't know yet that you are working for us, so
+it will look less as if I were _en route_ for a meeting.  But before we
+start, have you decided to be wise and to save me from an unpleasant
+duty?"
+
+"Yes.  I'll stay.  At least while you are here."
+
+"While I am here?" the man echoed.  "Et alors--?"
+
+"Then?"  She threw out her arms in a hopeless gesture.  "Who knows?
+Who can read the future?  And after all, as you have said, 'What does
+one life more or less matter?'"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+  "Ninon, Ninon, que fais-tu de la vie!"
+            DE MUSSET.
+
+
+Arithelli awoke next day in her comfortless room, and lay wondering
+over the waking nightmare of the past hours.  Everything seemed so
+different in the morning.  There was no thrill of excitement now,
+nothing to make her blood run quickly.  She only felt flat, dull,
+stupid, and disinclined to move.  How strange and unlike himself Emile
+had been.  She had lost her nerve, raved, and threatened to run away,
+and he had neither sneered nor abused her.  Her hand, still wrapped in
+stained linen, had now begun to burn and smart considerably, and was
+proof sufficient of the reality of her experience.  Her spine and the
+soles of her feet tingled as she lived again through the horror of the
+descent from the window.  She could never endure a repetition of that
+ordeal.  Next time she would refuse and they could add one more murder
+to the list of their crimes.
+
+She dragged herself up and dressed slowly.  She remembered that there
+was to be a gala performance at the Hippodrome that night in honour of
+the presence of one of the Infantas, her husband and suite, who were
+passing through the town, and had announced their intention of being
+present.  For all the performers it meant more work and an extra
+rehearsal.
+
+When Emile came in they shared their coffee and rolls together.  She
+was thankful that he made no reference to her passionate outburst of
+the night before.  He was outwardly as curt and dictatorial as ever,
+and neither of them discussed the affairs of the Brotherhood.
+
+"I must go down to practise," Arithelli said after a while.  "Shall you
+be there to-night?  You know there is to be a grand performance in
+honour of the loyalties?"
+
+"No," answered Emile, "I shall be busy.  Besides, the Royalties will be
+safer if I'm _not_ there!  We don't trouble ourselves about these
+particular ones though.  They're not important enough."
+
+"I'm sorry you're not coming," Arithelli answered.
+
+Emile ungratefully disregarded the implied compliment, and threw out a
+blunt, "Why?"
+
+"I don't quite know.  I think there is going to be something unlucky."
+
+"You're going to tumble off, you mean?  Better not!  You don't want to
+get turned out, do you?"
+
+Arithelli turned to a mirror on the wall.
+
+"Do I look very ghastly?" she asked.
+
+"Not much more than usual.  None of us look very fresh out here, do we?
+Do you think your hat is on straight, you untidy little trollop?  Well,
+it isn't!  Hurry up,--it's late.  No, I'm not going down there with
+you.  I'll stay here, and do some writing."
+
+The rehearsal that morning seemed interminable.  For the first time
+since she had ridden in public Arithelli bungled over her tricks.  She
+jumped short, miscalculated distances, and once barely saved herself
+from a severe fall.
+
+The ring-master, with whom she was a great favourite, shook his head
+reproachfully at her, as he paused to rest and wipe his heated
+countenance.  He was a greasy and affable personage, whose temper was
+as easy as his morals.  He was more soft-hearted than most of his
+compatriots, and he honestly liked Arithelli and admired her riding.
+
+"What have you there, Mademoiselle?" he enquired pathetically.  "Never
+have I seen you like this before.  You fear the grand people, is it not
+so?  You have no heart, no courage!  But again!  Again!"
+
+In the midst of his exhortation the Manager descended suddenly upon the
+scene.  As a matter of fact he had been watching for the last ten
+minutes from one of the entrances, and he had seen her failure to
+accomplish her jumps successfully.
+
+"This won't do for to-night," he said angrily.  "We want your best
+work, not your worst.  Do you suppose I'm going to stand your laziness?"
+
+Arithelli was sitting at ease upon Don Juan's back as he paced slowly
+round the ring.  She did not look up or answer, which enraged the
+Manager still further.  Her silence was one of the things about her
+that always annoyed him most?  She was the only woman he had never been
+able to bully into a state of collapse.
+
+He turned on the ring-master, who was grinning to himself.
+
+"_Allez-vous en_!  I'll see to this."
+
+Señor Valdez looked uncomfortable.  For an instant he felt almost
+inclined to expostulate on Arithelli's behalf, but the Manager's rages
+were well known to his employes, and the little man had no intention of
+losing his present position.  He flung down his long whip, and retired
+muttering vengeance.
+
+The Manager strode into the centre of the ring, picked up the lash and
+drew it through his fingers.
+
+He swore at Arithelli, he swore at Don Juan, and he started the
+rehearsal all over again.
+
+Arithelli clenched her teeth and rode doggedly forward.  The arena swam
+before her, and her limbs felt weak and heavy as those of one who is
+drugged, and her lacerated hand added to her difficulties.  That she
+should presume to be ill, had not entered into the Manager's
+calculations.  If he had realised the fact he would have said that
+people who were ill were of no use in a circus, and the sooner she left
+it the better.
+
+The treadmill continued until Arithelli would have welcomed an accident
+as a break in the grinding monotony.  The exercise instead of making
+her hot, had made her shiver as if with great cold.  She felt as if she
+had been practising for days instead of hours.  It was of no use!  She
+could not go on any longer.  She slipped from her standing position on
+the broad pad saddle to Don Juan's back, and without waiting for the
+word of command, reined him to a standstill in front of the Manager.
+
+"You must let me go," she said.  "I can't do any better now."
+
+The Manager stepped back a pace, and dropped his whip with sheer
+astonishment.  For an instant he stared with open mouth, then he found
+speech.
+
+"You sit there, do you, and tell me you refuse to work!  You with your
+insolence!  When you fall and that long neck of yours goes _crack_" (he
+snapped a finger and thumb together in expressive pantomime), "then I
+shall laugh--_nom d'un chien_!--how I shall laugh."
+
+Arithelli waited in silence, a faint smile curling her lips.  One hand,
+laden with rings, moved caressingly up and down Don Juan's silky mane.
+She had hitherto answered abuse with maddening indifference.  Now she
+flung back her head and mocked him.
+
+"So you hope I'll fall," she said.  "Perhaps I hope so too.  Do you
+think I care, that I'm afraid of breaking my neck?"
+
+Her voice was not raised a tone from its ordinary level, but passion
+and contempt vibrated in every accent.  An unwilling admiration stirred
+the man's dull brutality.  He could dismiss her to-morrow, but he would
+never find another woman who would be her match for physique and
+endurance.  Besides, others would know their value and demand a larger
+salary.
+
+He pointed to the performers' exit.  "_Allez_!"
+
+As she rode past, Arithelli made him a little bow.  It was the salute
+of a courteous duellist to his adversary.  To his profound surprise the
+Manager found himself acknowledging it, with like dignity.
+
+At eight o'clock that evening she sat before the glass in her
+dressing-room and awaited the shouted summons of the impish call-boy,
+who respected no one on earth, and to whom she was never "Mamzelle" or
+"Señora," but only Arithelli.  The dresser had gone out for an instant,
+leaving the door ajar, and a noisy burst of applause swept along the
+passage.
+
+The audience was in a particularly good temper, and ready to be amused
+at anything.  In view of the royal guests the Manager had provided
+several exciting novelties.  There was a wonderful troupe of performing
+horses who did everything that a horse is popularly supposed to be
+incapable of doing; there was a gypsy girl from Seville with a
+marvellous bear, whose intelligence appeared to be of a superior
+quality to that of the average human being; there were new jokes, new
+tricks, fresh costumes.
+
+As Arithelli rode in she heard her name called, and her state of frozen
+misery suddenly gave way to a hot thrill of excitement.
+
+Her head went up like a stag, and her nostrils dilated.  She inhaled
+again the familiar warm scent of freshly strewn tan and hay and
+animals.  It had intoxicated her as a child of twelve, when she had
+been taken to see a travelling circus in Ireland, and it intoxicated
+her now.
+
+The seats were a packed mass of people, and in the upper places and
+from the royal box, bright colours flamed, and jewels and restless fans
+glittered and moved.  In honour of the occasion every woman had draped
+herself in the graceful mantilla, either black or white, and even the
+poorest wore a scarlet or orange silk-fringed _crêpe_ shawl.
+
+The usual precautions as to detectives and a guard of soldiers had been
+taken, but the buxom and amiable Infanta was popular among the lower
+orders, so that no revolutionist outbreak was feared.
+
+Her charities were famous, her diamonds and Paris toilettes equally so.
+She smiled graciously at Arithelli as horse and rider bowed before her,
+and pulling out a few blossoms from the bouquet that rested on the
+ledge, threw them into the arena.  As the girl looked up and the level
+unsmiling gaze met hers, the older woman started back.
+
+"_Santa Vierge_!" she muttered, hastily crossing herself.  "She looks
+in Purgatory already, with those strange eyes!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+  "The nights that were days, and the days that were nights,
+    Griefs and glories and vain delights,
+  With Fame before us in fancy flights,
+    We mocked each other and cried 'All's well'!"
+            LOVE IN BOHEMIA.
+
+
+Of her first act Arithelli had no fear.  She knew that she was safe in
+trusting to the skill and training of her horse to accomplish
+successfully all the stereotyped movements of the _haute école_.  She
+had only to sit still and look graceful, and guide him through his
+paces as he waltzed, turned or knelt.  She carried a whip for show, but
+she had never used it.  A word, a caress had always been enough, and
+she would have been beaten herself rather than touch the beautiful
+creature that carried her.
+
+In the next act it would be all different.  Everything depended on her
+own balance and accuracy.  It would be all trick work then, not riding.
+As she slid out of her habit and into the ugly ballet-skirts she
+loathed, her courage vanished and she trembled as she faced the
+audience for the second time, transformed in white satin and pale blue,
+the thinness of her neck and arms painfully apparent.
+
+The flying rush through the air as she jumped the hurdles and gates
+made her feel horribly dazed and giddy, and unable to collect her
+senses in time for the next leap.  As she descended lightly in her
+heelless silk slippers upon Don Juan's back after the fourth hurdle had
+been passed, she swayed and only by a violent effort recovered herself.
+Her heart seemed to be beating right up in her throat and choking her.
+She put up one hand and pulled at her turquoise collar till the clasp
+gave way and thrust the blue stones into the low-cut bodice.  The band
+sounded louder than ever, the light danced and waved.  Round and round
+and round again, while the ring-master's whip cracked monotonously.
+
+The rhythm of the waltz beat in her brain as the music in some
+delirious dream.  She wondered dully why there was so little applause
+now.  Was she doing so badly?  Once she had jumped too low and knocked
+against a hurdle instead of clearing it properly.  The grooms had
+helped her by lowering everything as much as possible, but all they
+could do had not been able to disguise her unwonted awkwardness.
+
+She would have a few minutes' rest when the clown came on, and perhaps
+that would help her to go through the rest of the act without an
+absolute breakdown.
+
+The interlude was all too short, the signal came and she sprang up and
+poised herself mechanically.  Again the waltz music struck up and Don
+Juan's hoofs fell with a soft thud upon the tan.  The hurdles and gates
+had all been cleared successfully, and now she must dismount and let
+her steed go round alone while she ran across from the opposite side of
+the ring and vaulted from the ground to the saddle.
+
+It was the trick she had found impossible to get through at the
+rehearsal, the trick she most dreaded.  Everything depended on her
+coolness and steadiness.  She must start exactly at the right time, and
+measure the distance with unerring precision.  For the first time in
+her life she feared the audience.  She knew too well the fickle nature
+of a Spanish crowd.  To a performer who failed to please them they
+would be merciless.  People who screamed aloud for more blood when the
+sport had been tame at a bull-fight, people who habitually tortured
+their animals, were not likely to show consideration to one who was
+paid to entertain them.  They would applaud furiously one minute and
+hiss furiously the next.
+
+As she stood alone, waiting, she glanced instinctively towards the
+place where Emile always sat, and wished he had been there.  He would
+be angry with her if she failed, but she felt somehow that he would be
+sorry for her as well.  Perhaps he might even make excuses for her, for
+he was the only person who knew about the episode of the previous
+night, and her injured hand.  Sometimes she had loved the swaying crowd
+of human beings for whose amusement she risked her life and limbs.  Now
+she hated the eager watching faces.  They only wanted to see her fall,
+she told herself.
+
+She ran blindly across the open space.  The next instant she was on her
+feet on the ground again and Don Juan had stopped short.  Her upward
+leap had carried her on to his back, but she had not been able to keep
+her balance.
+
+There was dead silence and then the hissing in the audience broke out,
+vehement and unrestrained.
+
+That she had pleased them hitherto went for nothing in her favour now.
+She had been clumsy, ungraceful, had failed--that was enough.
+
+Arithelli herself scarcely heard the sounds of execration, as she stood
+swaying with one hand over her eyes to shut out the horrible glare.
+She was conscious only of that and the strident noise of the band, and
+the sensation of choking she had felt once before.  The instinct of all
+animals to hide themselves in the dark when ill, was strong upon her.
+
+The fat little ring-master who alone had the sense to see there was
+something wrong, advanced and spoke to her in an agitated whisper.  She
+gave him her hand and he led her out, leaving her hurriedly to go back
+and apologise to the irate spectators, and to claim their indulgence on
+the score of her sudden faintness.
+
+      *      *      *      *      *      *
+
+Would she ever get to her room, Arithelli wondered, as she struggled
+down the passage.  It had never seemed so long before.  Her hand went
+up to her throat again.  She longed for something cool to drink to
+relieve the aching and dryness.  It must be caused by the heat and dust
+of the ring, she thought.
+
+A man's voice sounded behind her, and then hurrying footsteps.  She
+pulled her long blue cloak round her and went on without answering or
+turning her head.  It could only be the Manager coming to upbraid her.
+
+An arm was flung round her protectingly and she turned with the face of
+a hunted animal, and looked up into the wild dark eyes of Vardri.
+
+"What has happened?  You're ill!  It's no wonder.  _Mon Dieu_, those
+brutes last night . . ."
+
+He pulled her head back against his shoulder, dropping his voice to a
+murmur of exquisite gentleness.  "_Mon enfant--ma petite enfant_!"
+
+"You saw me fall?" she whispered.
+
+"The men told me when they brought Don Juan out.  I didn't see what
+happened.  Were you hurt or only faint?"
+
+"Oh, my hand?  That's nothing.  Emile says it will heal in a day or
+two.  But I felt so stupid. . . .  Vardri, you don't think I'm going to
+be ill, do you?  I've never been ill in my life . . . never!"
+
+The boy made some incoherent answer.  Her piteous entreaty tore at his
+heart.  Every fibre in his starved body ached with the desire to give
+her the rest and peace she needed above all things.
+
+What could he do without money?  His own miserable wages barely served
+for necessities.  He was only a useless vagabond, an outcast.  He
+ground his teeth together at the thought of his own impotence.
+
+"Courage, little one.  They will cheer you again to-morrow.  They are
+cruel, these Spaniards, and fickle.  You must not care."
+
+It did not seem strange to either of them that he should be holding her
+in his arms.  After last night everything had changed.  Love, Youth,
+and Nature were hard at work weaving the bonds that drew them together.
+
+The fact that she suffered his caresses had given him the right of
+manhood to protect her, to be her champion, to fight her battles.  If
+he could do nothing else for her, at least he could fight.  For him the
+crown of happiness could be found in loyal service.  Of love-making in
+its ordinary sense, Vardri neither thought nor dreamed.  To have found
+his Ideal, the one woman, surely that was enough.  The innate
+fastidiousness that goes with good breeding had kept his life clean,
+his hands unsoiled.
+
+He had hated the other women in the Circus, and felt sorry for them at
+the same time; and on their side they liked him and regarded him
+somewhat as a fool.  Their voices, their coarse expressions, their
+light jokes all jarred on him.
+
+He pitied them, for their lives were as hard as his own, and when he
+could he helped them, for among the wanderers in Bohemia there is an
+ever-abiding comradeship.  The element of fanaticism in his nature,
+which had once been absorbed by the Cause, now spent itself upon a
+human being.
+
+The firm yet gentle clasp in which he held her, was the outward symbol
+of the love and courage that made him tense as steel.  To every man
+there comes his hour, and his was now.  Both for her sake and his own
+he dare not keep her with him.  That they had been left undisturbed so
+long was a miracle.  Besides, as she was ill, the sooner she was in bed
+the better.
+
+He half led, half carried her to the door of her dressing room, and she
+thanked him with a smile, a gesture.  Her throat hurt so much that all
+speech was an effort.
+
+"You must go now," she whispered.  "You will get into trouble again
+through me."
+
+The boy threw a quick furtive glance along the whitewashed passage.
+With characteristic recklessness he had forgotten that the chances of
+his summary dismissal were looming exceedingly near.
+
+He had left half his work undone the previous night, he had appeared
+late that morning, and now he was in a part of the building to which
+all the grooms and stable helpers were forbidden entrance.
+
+"You'll let me bring you home," he pleaded.
+
+Arithelli shook her head.  "You can't."
+
+"Is Emile coming for you?  You shall not go alone, that I swear!"
+
+"Emile will send someone.  They never let me go alone.  If you will,
+you may do this.  If I am not down at the stables at half-past eight
+to-morrow, will you find Emile and ask him to come to me.  He will be
+there doing my work."
+
+"And you will sleep and be well to-morrow?  To-morrow you will ride
+again, and there will be the applause."
+
+Even as he spoke he knew his words were foolishness.  The feverish
+skin, dry lips and eyes that were like burning holes in the thin oval
+face were signs and tokens enough for the most unseeing of men.  And
+Vardri had suffered sufficiently himself to be able to recognise
+genuine illness.
+
+She slipped from his arms.
+
+The little dreary laugh made him shiver.
+
+"_Mille remerciments, mon camarade_.  I'm a failure, and failures are
+best left alone.  _C'est ainsi que la vie_!"
+
+      *      *      *      *      *      *
+
+Hers was the sole fiasco in an otherwise successful performance.
+
+The final spectacle was a lurid representation of the destruction of
+Sodom and Gomorrah.
+
+This species of scriptural tableaux was frequently given, and was
+greatly to the taste of the spectators.
+
+Such scenes were regularly presented in the theatres and heartily
+enjoyed by the superstitious and devout populace, who found in them
+nothing incongruous or repulsive to their piety.
+
+In this particular display the Manager had excelled himself, and
+achieved above all things a most vivid realism.
+
+The gentleman who impersonated the patriarch Lot had a distinctly
+modern air, and resembled a third-rate Anarchist in depressing
+circumstances.
+
+He was dark and swarthy, and possessed a ferocious expression, and on
+the whole suggested a caricature of Emile in his worst frame of mind.
+
+He appeared in company with his reluctant spouse, whom he dragged along
+by the hand, she meanwhile obviously unwilling to leave the urban
+delights of the Cities of the Plain for a pastoral and dull existence
+in the desert, and as she was several sizes larger than her husband,
+she seemed likely to get the best of the encounter.
+
+She was the same fat Englishwoman who had driven Arithelli's horses in
+the chariot.  She was by no means young, she had applied her rouge with
+a lavish hand, and her golden wig was an outrage.  Her airs and graces
+were those of a well-fed operatic soprano.
+
+She advanced in jerks, she clutched at her plump anatomy and she rolled
+her eyes appealingly at the gallery, which responded with delighted
+yells.
+
+In her train came a small flock of dejected-looking, but real sheep,
+which were seemingly inspired by sufficient intelligence to wish to
+avoid the coming catastrophe.
+
+The city (or cities) was represented by coarsely-painted scenery, and,
+owing to some defect in the perspective, appeared to be only a few feet
+from the travellers, though doubtless intended to fill the distant
+horizon.
+
+The fleeing pair jerked slowly across the stage in time to subdued but
+brassy music from the Hippodrome band, the sheep followed, and thunder
+and lightning were heard and seen.
+
+Flashes and bangs resounded, the doomed city rocked upon its
+foundations, and the audience joined in the uproar.
+
+Sacks full of flour descended from Heaven and burst, converting the
+fleshly Mrs. Lot into the traditional pillar of salt, and the house and
+the curtain were brought down together.
+
+Restored to good-humour, the audience had forgotten the disgrace and
+failure of their favourite _equestrienne_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+  "I am tired of tears and laughter
+    And men that laugh and weep,
+  Of what may come hereafter
+    For men that sow and reap.
+  I am weary of days and hours,
+    Blown buds of barren flowers,
+  Desires and dreams and powers,
+    And everything but sleep."
+            SWINBURNE.
+
+
+If anyone had told Arithelli that she was in for a sharp attack of
+diphtheria, she would have felt surprised and not very much
+enlightened.  Her ignorance of everything connected with illness was
+supreme, and since childhood she had had no recollection of medicine
+and doctors.  Her parents indulged in theories on the subject of
+complaints, the principal one being a large disbelief in their
+existence.  To them anything unhealthy or ailing was an aversion, a
+thing to be avoided rather than pitied.
+
+For accidents, sprains and breakages their pharmacopoeia suggested and
+did not go beyond two ideas,--salt and water and Nature.
+
+The Oriental strain in her character helped her to endure where an
+ordinary woman would have fussed, cried, or grumbled.  At home if she
+had had a fall or did not look her best she had been expected to
+consider herself in disgrace, and to keep out of the way till such time
+as she had completely recovered her looks and spirits.
+
+When she returned to her lodgings, it did not occur to her to rouse the
+landlady and demand remedies or attentions.  The walk home had been a
+nightmare, and now she had all she wanted--solitude and the blessed
+darkness.  She threw off her dress and boots, and walked the room hour
+after hour.  She still heard the brazen band, and saw the flaming
+lights and her ears echoed to the dreadful sounds of hissing.
+Sometimes she had drunk feverishly of the very doubtful water against
+which Emile had so often cautioned her.  When it was nearly dawn she
+gave in, and lay huddled up on the bed, half-delirious with the pain
+and feeling of suffocation.
+
+Two streets away, and in a room more squalid than her own, Vardri was
+also enduring his own private Purgatory.  Hers was physical, his
+mental.  That was all the difference.
+
+Long before half-past eight he was down at the stables and there
+received the dismissal he had fully expected, being ordered off the
+premises by the head groom, who had received directions the night
+before to give Vardri a week's wages, and turn him out of the place
+without delay.  It was no use protesting.  The Manager was not yet
+visible, and even if he had been Vardri knew there was no appeal.
+
+There had been complaints about his negligence more than once, and of
+course he had been missed on the previous evening.  None of the
+"strappers" would have reported him, but one of the clowns, a Spaniard
+with whom he had fought for ill-treating a horse, had seen him leaving
+the vicinity of the dressing-rooms, and had carried the information to
+headquarters.
+
+The informer had chosen his time well, and had found the Manager raging
+over Arithelli's mishap, and ready to dismiss anyone with or without
+reason.
+
+Vardri turned his back on the place whistling defiance, and with his
+courage fallen below zero.  He would have liked to say good-bye to the
+horses, and to some of the men who were his friends.  He had never
+disliked the actual work, and it was at the Hippodrome that he had
+first met Arithelli.  Her misfortune and his had come together.  At any
+other time it would not have been quite so bad.  A few months ago he
+would not have cared whether he lost his place or not.
+
+There had been nothing much in life then, and one could always find a
+short way out of it _via_ the water or an overdose of something.
+
+But now the world was changed, and he craved for Life and the fulness
+of Life, for he had tasted happiness and stood for a moment in the
+outer courts of the House of Love.  He had no friends who could have
+helped him, and no qualifications for earning his living at any other
+trade or profession.  He had begun life with a luxurious home, a
+refined and useless education, and the mind of a dreamer, an idealist.
+None of these things were valuable assets in his present career.
+
+Like Arithelli he spoke several languages more or less fluently, and
+like her again possessed both understanding and a love of horses, but
+what avail were these things when he had neither money, references nor
+influence, and as a further disadvantage he was known to be an
+associate of the revolutionaries, and his tendency to consumption would
+keep him out of many kinds of employment.
+
+He turned over the few coins in his hand.  Just enough to keep him for
+a week and then--the deluge!
+
+He waited, prowling up and down the street, impatiently until Emile
+appeared in the distance.
+
+A few minutes later, the two men were at the door of Arithelli's
+lodgings.  The landlady met them on the stairs, hag-like in the
+disarray of the early morning, and evidently terrified out of such
+humanity as she possessed by the fear of infection.  She had gone up
+with the early morning coffee and found Arithelli raving aloud and
+tearing at her throat.  Her first thought had been to turn the girl out
+of doors, or, as she was obviously incapable of moving, to send for a
+priest and a nursing sister, and have her taken to the public hospital.
+A wholesome fear of Emile prevented her from giving utterance to these
+charitable impulses.
+
+She invoked every saint in the calendar, whose name she could remember,
+and crossed herself with automaton-like energy.
+
+She could not, she protested, be expected to nurse such a dangerous
+case of fever as this undoubtedly was.  There was her son, the adored
+of her old age.  _Santa Maria_!  If he also were stricken!
+
+Emile pushed her on one side.  "I'll talk to you presently," he said in
+her own dialect.  "If you are going into hysterics with fright you'll
+catch anything that is catching.  If you behave sensibly you won't."
+
+The window was fully open and the green shutters thrown back, and the
+fierce sunlight streamed into Arithelli's room, which showed more than
+its normal disorder.  The tray with the _café complet_ was on the floor
+where the landlady had left it on her hasty stampede downstairs,
+half-a-dozen turquoise rings lay strewn over a little table, where they
+had been thrown when they were dragged off, boys' clothes trailed over
+the back of one chair, and a blue skirt over another.  The only orderly
+thing visible was the immaculate row of fine kid boots, long, narrow,
+pearl-grey, tan and champagne-coloured.
+
+Arithelli lay on the big bed under the faded canopy.  She had wrapped
+herself in a thin blue _peignoir_, and her face was half hidden in
+tangled hair.  The tumbled bed-clothes were pulled to one side and
+dragging on the dusty boards.  She was quite unconscious of anyone's
+presence, and moaned softly in a strangled fashion.
+
+The two men stood without speaking, and watched the writhing, restless
+figure.  Vardri turned away first with a smothered exclamation.  Would
+he always be obliged to see her tortured in some way or another?  The
+Fates were sending him more than any man could bear to look upon.
+
+"What are you going to do?" he said roughly in French, "I can't stand
+seeing this!"
+
+Emile showed no signs of surprise at the other's manifest anxiety,
+possibly because his own was as deep, though his method of expressing
+it was different.  He felt helpless, and, being a man, resented the
+feeling, so by consequence his always rugged manner became even more
+unpleasant than usual.
+
+"Well," he rejoined, "what can you expect in this filthy place?  This
+street isn't so bad, but of course she has so often been down in those
+slums in the Parelelo.  The Calle de Pescadores alone is enough to give
+anyone a fever.  I think Sobrenski has made a point of sending her down
+every poisonous street in the place.  Ireland's a clean country, you
+see, compared with this, so she hasn't much chance, and as she starves
+herself half the time that won't make things any better."
+
+"She must have some woman to look after her.  I suppose the landlady
+here will be no good?"
+
+"Not unless you pay her.--Who's going to do that?"
+
+"There's Estelle."
+
+"Estelle!"  Emile exploded a fierce Russian oath.  "Do you want _more_
+hysterics?"  Vardri was tramping up and down the room with the
+noiseless agility of an animal, his fingers mechanically at work at a
+cigarette.
+
+"She must have a doctor too.  Isn't there an English doctor here?"
+
+"Probably.  Do you propose to pay him too?"
+
+The dryly sarcastic voice, the practical question brought Vardri down
+from the clouds to the hard facts of life.  Illnesses and doctors were
+expensive things.  He had no money, and Emile very little.
+
+"I'll get a _Soeur de Charité_ from one of the convents.  She'll come
+for nothing.  Nursing is their work.  I was--I mean I'm a Catholic.
+She's a Catholic, too, isn't she?"
+
+"No, she hates them.  She was educated in a convent, where as far as I
+can gather from her own account she acquired more learning than piety.
+Under the present circumstances I can only suggest the horse-doctor."
+
+"What's the use of--?"
+
+"I believe he began by doctoring human beings, but like the rest of us
+out here, he is a little under a cloud.  He prefers animals now.  They
+don't tell tales.  Human beings do.  Besides, he's English, or rather,
+Irish.  Better go and tell him to come up.  You know his rooms.  Tell
+him it's infectious, and he can bring up a few cigarettes for me if he
+feels generous.  Don't trouble about your _Soeur de Charité_.  I'll see
+that the woman here makes herself useful."
+
+Vardri flung himself out of the room and down the rickety stairs at
+breakneck speed, thankful beyond measure for the relief of action.
+
+Emile subsided into a chair and smoked furiously and meditated upon the
+untoward situation.  Being of a practical turn of mind he began to make
+calculations.  Vardri had told him briefly of how Arithelli had failed
+in the trick-riding, fallen off her horse, and been hissed out of the
+ring.  The loss of popularity might mean the end of her career.  In any
+case he could see she was desperately ill, and there was small chance
+of her being about under three weeks, and even then she would not be
+able to work at once.  Meanwhile they had exactly two pounds a week to
+live upon.
+
+Truly women added to the complications of life!  He might borrow money,
+but that was a thing to be resorted to only in the last extremity.
+Most of the members of his Circle were as poor as himself or poorer.
+They were all bound together by the tie of brotherhood, and no one
+would have grudged or refused a loan, but Emile scrupled to borrow from
+those who were in greater privation than himself.
+
+Sobrenski was fairly well off, but he lived like an ascetic and gave
+everything to the Cause; besides, Sobrenski was out of the question.
+To appeal to him on Arithelli's behalf would only be to give him a
+chance for refusal and a jeer at female conspirators.
+
+Her turquoise rings Emile collected from the table, and put them into
+his pocket; her collar of turquoises he rescued from the floor, where
+it had fallen when she took off her bodice.  The jewels could all be
+turned into the money they needed so badly.  Of course she had not
+saved a single _peseta_.  Emile had the handling of her salary, and he
+knew that anything left over from the expenses of food and lodging went
+in clothes and her particular vanity, dainty boots.
+
+She was lavishly generous to the Hippodrome staff, and there was always
+a certain tribute claimed from all its adherents by the Cause.
+
+He did not hunt further for valuables.  If there was either money or
+jewellery in Arithelli's possession it was sure to be found in quite a
+conspicuous place.
+
+The varied life of the city surged to and fro beneath the window, the
+varied noises floated up into the room, and under the faded red brocade
+curtains, Arithelli turned from side to side and moaned with closed
+eyes.  A seller of fruit passed, crying his wares.
+
+Emile went down into the street and bought a couple of oranges, and
+squeezed the juice into the cup that had been destined for the coffee.
+
+He had not the least idea as to what particular malady Arithelli had
+developed, but he knew that fever and delirium always went together,
+and that with fever there is invariably thirst.  He lifted her up and
+pushed the pillow higher to relieve her breathing, but he could hardly
+do more than moisten her parched and bitten lips.  Then he "tidied" the
+bed with masculine pulls and jerks till it was even more untidy than
+before, and went back to his chair.  There was nothing more to be done
+for her in the way of alleviation till the doctor came.
+
+He took up a book, and tried to shut his ears and distract his
+thoughts.  As he stared unseeingly at the printed pages, there suddenly
+flashed into his brain the name of Count Vladimir, the owner of "_The
+Witch_."  Here was the very man to whom he could confidently apply for
+help in the present difficulties, for the Russian had made it his
+business in life to bestow his wealth in assisting the revolutionaries.
+Emile decided that he would write tomorrow, when he had acquired
+certain particulars as to the address he wanted.
+
+Fatalité had done good work for the Cause, he argued, therefore let
+those who supported the organisation keep her till she was able to work
+again.
+
+The next task he would have to undertake would be that of bullying or
+bribing the landlady into a promise to undertake at least some of the
+duties of a sick-room.  The rest of the nursing he proposed to do
+himself.  He grinned as he lit another evil-smelling cigarette, at the
+thought of Vardri's proposal.
+
+He possessed an artistic sense of the fitness of things, and the
+suggested _Soeur de Charité_ appealed to him as being quite out of the
+picture.  Besides Arithelli had no respect for priests or nuns; Emile
+remembered her inimitable descriptions of the spying "Children of
+Mary," and she should not be worried with either if he could help it.
+
+Yes, certainly the incapable old landlady would be preferable to a
+white-capped _religeuse_, for the latter, though not likely by virtue
+of her training to be scared by the physical atmosphere, would
+undoubtedly be appalled by the mental and moral one.  Most likely she
+would take advantage of Arithelli's weakness to persuade her of the
+danger of her present way of living.  The Church of Rome is never slow
+at seizing the chance of making a convert, and the power of the Church
+in Spain is a byword.
+
+Though Emile had a profound scorn for conventions, he had at one time
+had his place among that class of human beings that calls itself
+"Society," and he knew its rules and ways as he despised its
+hypocrisies.  He could look at Arithelli's position quite judicially,
+and as an outsider.  The world, religious and otherwise, would
+certainly not give her the benefit of the doubt.
+
+She was young, she was possessed of a weird and haunting beauty, she
+had no women friends, no relations, and no companions but a set of
+law-breakers, all of whom were men.  No one would believe that she was
+untouched, unawakened, that she had been treated as a boy, and her
+womanhood not so much respected as ignored.  If anyone put the wrong
+ideas into her head, Emile reflected, it was sure to be one of her own
+sex.
+
+Having matured his plans he descended to the kitchen regions,
+manufacturing impressive threats _en route_.
+
+Here an answer to his problem presented itself, or rather herself.  The
+landlady had a niece who came in daily to assist in household matters,
+and take part in a duet of feminine gossip.
+
+She was a solid young woman of unmoved countenance, who was quite
+prepared to nurse the ten plagues of Egypt, providing she received
+sufficient remuneration.  She proposed to get married at the earliest
+opportunity and what Emile offered her would be of great assistance in
+providing her bridal finery.
+
+The two came to an agreement rapidly, and Emile climbed the stairs
+again, triumphant.
+
+He began to feel anxious about the doctor.  Two hours had passed and
+there was no sight of him.  He might be out, or he might be drunk.
+Emile knew the little weakness of Michael Furness, and as Vardri had
+not returned it meant that he was still searching.
+
+At last the horse-doctor arrived, grunting and ruffling up his crest of
+curly black hair.  He had a large heart by way of counterbalance to his
+many failings, and he was interested in Arithelli, for he had come
+across her once or twice in the stables, and had heard various
+picturesque stories of her exploits.  He might have been a success in
+his own profession, but for the two temptations that beset every
+Irishman--whisky and horses.
+
+He had left his practice in the city of Cork, as Emile had said,
+somewhat under a cloud, and had given up whisky for the _absinthe_ of
+the _cafés_, and had not regretted the exchange.  He made his
+examination quickly, handling the girl with a surprising skill and
+deftness, in spite of his big clumsy-looking hands.
+
+When he touched her she opened her eyes.
+
+"_Mais, où suis je_?" she murmured, painfully dragging out the words.
+Then followed Emile's name.
+
+The doctor laid her back gently, and stood holding one of her wrists.
+"She thinks it's you, Poleski!  'Tis diphtheria.  A bad case, too.
+Shall want some looking afther.  Who's seeing to her?"
+
+"I am," responded Emile, coolly.
+
+"The divil ye are!"  The Irishman's long upper lip twitched humorously.
+"Well, treat her gintly then, me bhoy!  You're wise to be smoking.
+Less chance of infection.  I'll keep you company."  He produced a
+couple of thin black cigars, and handed one to Emile.
+
+"See, now," Michael Furness added seriously, "I may as well be telling
+you the truth.  Your little friend there hasn't a very big chance.
+She's been going to bits for some time.  If it hadn't been this it
+would have been something else.  She's got a grand physique, so there's
+hope.  If she's worse by to-morrow she ought to have an operation.
+Only I can't undertake it, ye see.  There's the trouble.  My hand isn't
+as steady as it was, and I haven't the instruments."
+
+Emile nodded.  He knew nothing of the operation of tracheotomy, and
+though he spoke English well he found it difficult to follow Michael's
+soft, thick, County Cork speech.
+
+"She's a grand heap of a girl, isn't she?" continued that gentleman,
+regarding Arithelli with kindly eyes.  He had all the Celt's love of
+romance, and the ingrained reverence of the Irish Catholic for women.
+"This isn't the place for girls, at all, at all!  And they tell me
+she's from the old country.  Will I be sending up one of the good
+Sisthers to see after her, and put things to rights a bit?"
+
+For the second time that day Emile ungratefully rejected the
+ministrations of the Church.  He knew that no one else in Spain ever
+thought of employing anyone but the religious orders as nurses, but he
+preferred to arrange things in his own way and said so.
+
+"Ah, well then!" said Michael amiably, "give her something to drink if
+she wants it.  That's all.  I'll look in again this evening.  She'll
+have taken a turn then one way or the other.  It's a quick thing, this."
+
+Arithelli's ministering angels left in each other's company.  Michael
+drifted back to his favourite _café_, while Emile betook himself to the
+Hippodrome to wage war with that amiable functionary, the Manager.  The
+strife was both noisy and prolonged, and resulted in only a partial
+victory for Emile.  With many picturesque oaths the Manager accused
+himself of folly unspeakable in not dismissing Arithelli at once.
+
+She had a contract?  Yes!  But in it there was no allowance made for
+incompetence and non-appearance.  It only stipulated that she should be
+paid for doing her work.  She had not done it, and moreover she had
+refused to practise.  That he should be expected to continue to pay her
+a salary even of the smallest description while she lay in bed was a
+monstrous impertinence.
+
+Would he not have the trouble and expense of getting another artiste to
+fill her place?  There must be an _equestrienne_ in the programme.  If
+she found herself taken back again to finish her time after this
+illness or whatever it was, then she should be more than grateful, but
+as for paying salaries to _employés_ who did not work, why, did people
+consider him an imbecile?
+
+Emile shrugged and sneered at intervals throughout this tirade.  He had
+wisely begun by asking more than he knew he was at all likely to get,
+and was now obliged to be satisfied with the compromise.
+
+Disappointment followed his search for the whereabouts of Count
+Vladimir.  The owner of "_The Witch_" was expected back in Barcelona in
+a month or so, no one knew exactly when.  Letters might be addressed
+Poste Restante, Corfu, for he was cruising in his phantom craft through
+those sapphire seas that lie round about the Ionian Islands.
+
+There was nothing to do but to write and wait.  One piece of ill-luck
+was following close upon another, and Emile felt that he needed all the
+consolations that his cynical philosophy could afford.
+
+His anxiety on Arithelli's behalf was fast becoming an obsession.  When
+she had first come into his life he had wondered sometimes how she
+would stand the late hours and all the hardships of a circus training,
+but after her one outburst she had never complained again.
+
+He thought the sea-trip had done her good.  Of course she always looked
+pale, but then that was her type.
+
+He had also been impressed with the unwonted seriousness of Michael,
+knowing that in spite of his erratic ways the doctor understood his
+craft.
+
+Emile's instinct prompted him vigorously to go back now and see how she
+was getting on, but he dared not neglect the work of his Society.
+There were letters to be written, arrangements to be made, all the
+usual paraphernalia of intrigue to be kept going.
+
+He returned to his own rooms and began to write savagely, using all his
+will to expel from his brain the vision of the girl as he had seen her
+last, semi-conscious, and yet with his name on her lips.
+
+Michael had promised to see her again at six o'clock.  It would be time
+enough if he also went then.  Besides, the Cause came first always, and
+there were many women in the world.  His pen tore fiercely over the
+paper as something whispered: "Women?  Yes.  But another Arithelli--?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+"I have something more to think of than Love.  All the women in the
+world would not make me waste an hour."
+            SAYING OF NAPOLEON.
+
+
+The stolid niece blundered heavily about the room, doing things that
+were entirely unnecessary, and raising much dust.  She was a
+conscientious person in her own way, and felt that she must get through
+a certain amount of work in return for the anticipated reward.
+
+She banged chairs and table about, folded up scattered clothes,
+investigated them with much interest, and fingered and re-arranged the
+row of boots with muttered ejaculations and covetous eyes.  She had
+previously contrived to get Arithelli into a night dress, had brushed
+her hair back and plaited it, and pulled the green shutters together to
+keep out the midday glare.
+
+As she looked at the livid face patched with scarlet against the coarse
+linen, Maria began to feel a little perturbed.  Something in the
+atmosphere of the room had penetrated even the brick wall of her
+stolidity.  She hoped the two Señors would soon return and relieve her
+of the responsibility of her charge.
+
+The stillness oppressed her, for Arithelli had ceased her moaning and
+muttering for a merciful stupor.
+
+As the hours went on the fever increased, and the horrible fungus in
+her throat spread with an appalling rapidity.
+
+As Michael Furness had prophesied, the crisis would soon be reached,
+and she had everything save youth against her in the fight for life.
+
+Maria crossed herself perfunctorily and mumbled a few prayers.
+Doubtless the Señora was like all the English, a heretic, and
+therefore, according to the comfortable tenets of the Roman faith,
+eternally damned, but a little prayer would do no harm, and would be
+counted to herself as an act of charity.
+
+That ceremony over, more mundane considerations engrossed her mind.
+She could smell the pungent odour of the _olla podrida_, or national
+stew, insinuating itself through the half-open door, and she knew that
+if she were not present at the meal, there would be more than one
+hungry mouth ready to devour her share.
+
+She drew a breath of relief as she marched heavily downstairs to the
+more congenial surroundings of the kitchen.  She had done her duty.
+Señor Poleski had not told her to stay in the room all the time he was
+away, and she could easily be back again before he came in.
+
+Michael was the first to appear, almost aggressively sober, and
+carrying a small wooden box.  His interest in his case was as much
+human as professional, and instead of wasting the afternoon, after his
+usual custom, loafing and drinking, he had gone, after one modest glass
+of the rough _Val de Peñas_, to search in out-of-the-way streets for a
+certain herbalist of repute.
+
+This was an aged Spanish Jew, unclean and cadaverous, with patriarchal
+grey beard and piercing eyes, a man renowned for his marvellous cures
+among the peasantry.
+
+He was regarded more or less as a wizard, though his wizardry consisted
+solely in a knowledge of natural remedies, and the exercise of a power
+which would have been described at the Paris Salpêtriére as hypnotic
+suggestion.  By the aid of this he was able to inspire his patients
+with the faith so necessary to a successful treatment.
+
+Michael was not fettered in any way by the ordinary conventions of a
+practitioner.  He had neither drugs nor instruments of his own
+wherewith to effect a cure on ordinary lines, and what he had seen of
+herbalists in Spain had inspired him with a vast respect for the
+simplicity and success of their methods.  The wooden box contained a
+quantity of leaves which, steeped in scalding water, and applied to the
+patient's throat, possessed the power of reducing the inflammation and
+drawing out the poison through the pores of the skin.  Of their
+efficacy Michael entertained not the slightest doubt.
+
+He walked straight to the bed, and glanced at Arithelli's throat, now
+almost covered with white patches of membrane.  There was no time to
+waste if she was to be saved from the ghastliness of slow suffocation.
+
+He went to the head of the stairs and yelled lustily for Maria, whom he
+commanded to produce boiling water immediately, thus further adding to
+the reputation of the mad English for haste and unreasonableness.
+
+Then he took off his coat, rolled up his sleeves, and began busily to
+clear a space on the table, on which he emptied the contents of the box.
+
+All his movements had suddenly become alert and energetic.  The joy of
+the true physician, the healer, had awakened in him at the prospect of
+a duel with Death, and he was no longer merely the slouching,
+good-natured wastrel who doctored horses at the Hippodrome.
+
+He possessed for the moment the dignity of a leader, of the master of a
+situation.  He smiled to himself as he moved about humming a verse of
+"Let Ireland remember," and swept away a _débris_ of books, a rouge
+pot, some dead flowers, and a large over-trimmed hat.
+
+"Shure 'tis back in the surgery again I am," he told himself, while his
+lean, ugly face beamed with satisfaction.
+
+No one who knew Michael Furness had ever suspected the regret by which
+he was for ever haunted, regret at the loss of his profession.  His
+rollicking manner made it impossible to believe him capable of any
+depth of feeling, and he had a trick of talking least about the things
+for which he cared most.  The failing that banned him from his work was
+an inherited one.  He suffered for the sins of his fathers, for the
+indulgences of many generations of hard riding, hard living, reckless
+hot-blooded Celts.  He was too old to reform now, he would say.
+Perhaps later on he would be "making his soul"; in the meantime he
+drifted.
+
+Emile, Maria and the boiling water all made their entrée together.  The
+eyes of the former travelled first of all to the bed and then to the
+heap of vegetation.
+
+"_Qu 'est-ce que c'est que ca_?" he demanded.  "She is better, eh?"
+
+"No, she's worse," answered Michael.  He seized upon the leaves and
+began to bundle them into the steaming basin.
+
+"We shouldn't have been gone so long.  What's this did ye say, Poleski?
+Well, 'tis the only thing I can do for her.  After I left you I went
+and got these.  They're great believers in herbs in this counthry, and
+by the light of what I have seen, so am I.  The poor people never use
+anything else, and I've seen some fine cures.  It's unprofessional, but
+it's giving her a chance and as I told you I can't operate."  He
+withdrew his fingers hurriedly.
+
+"Faith, that jade with the dark eyes knew what she was doing when she
+made this water hot!  They're ready now, and I'll want a piece of stuff
+to lay them on.  Find me a piece of the colleen's finery, something old
+that she won't be wanting to use any more."
+
+He pronounced the last two words as "ANNIE MOORE," and would have been
+furious if the fact had been pointed out to him, for like all Irishmen
+he would never admit the possession of a brogue.
+
+A pale blue silk scarf was found, and ruthlessly utilised as a bandage.
+Then Emile lifted the inert figure, while the doctor wound it round her
+throat and fastened it securely.
+
+"Lift her higher, man," he adjured Emile.
+
+"There's only one pillow?--Then use this."  He rolled up his coat, and
+put it behind her head.
+
+"We've done all we can now, and must just wait till this begins to
+draw.  It will make her uncomfortable, and we must watch that she
+doesn't pull it off.  Give me a cigarette if ye have one, Poleski.
+'Tis hot work this."
+
+He sat down on the bed and took up Arithelli's thin wrist.  In his
+shirt sleeves, with his hair well on end, and his robust voice very
+little subdued below its usual pitch, Michael did not convey the
+impression that he was capable of taking either Life or Death in a
+serious spirit.  He talked on gaily, in no way depressed by his
+unsympathetic audience, telling tales of his own escapades in the
+matter of fighting and love-making, of wild midnight steeplechases
+ridden across unknown country, and the delights of the fair town by the
+river Lee.
+
+Once he stopped talking for a few minutes to boil some more water on
+the stove that Arithelli sometimes used for making coffee, and to renew
+the application of leaves.  The fact that his patient was in exactly
+the same condition of stupor, and had not stirred, did not discourage
+Michael's optimistic views of her recovery.
+
+"Ye must give it time, me bhoy," he told Emile.  "There's no hurry in
+Spain, ye know, with anything.  Be careful that ye watch her and keep
+her hands off her throat.  She'll not be lying so quiet presently."
+
+Emile growled out an inaudible response.  He was in a smouldering
+condition of wrath and impatience.  Reserved and limited of words as he
+himself always was, and now rendered savage by anxiety, he found it
+impossible to understand the other man's mercurial temperament.  By
+this time he was without hope, and certainly without faith in either
+Michael or his remedies.
+
+The doctor having skilfully extracted his crumpled outer garment from
+under Arithelli's shoulders, regretfully prepared to depart.  He was
+obliged to be somewhere about the premises of the Hippodrome during
+every performance in case of accident to any of the animals, and
+careless as he was where his own benefit was concerned, he had
+sufficient wisdom to be always within call.
+
+When he had vanished Emile walked to the window, and threw open the now
+useless shutters.  He guessed instinctively that Arithelli needed more
+air, and he had himself begun to find the temperature almost
+unbearable, for the building was lofty, and the room they were in near
+the roof.  He rested his folded arms upon the sill and leaned his head
+and shoulders far out.
+
+The house stood at a corner, and while the side of it was in a small
+street, the front overlooked one of the many wide and beautiful
+_paséos_, with which the city abounded.
+
+A little breeze borne of the incoming tide in the harbour came sweeping
+along, and its coolness stirred him into fresh vitality.
+
+It was the hour of pleasure, when the inhabitants threw off their
+sun-begotten sloth and thronged the _cafés_ and public gardens and
+promenades.
+
+On the Rambla, once the bed of a river, the military bands played waltz
+music, and the favourite operas, and hot blood moved faster to the
+unfailing enchantment of the Habernera, and the newest works of
+Massenet and Charpentier.
+
+It was now dark, and the stars blazed down upon the never-resting city,
+with its sinister record of outrages and crimes, and its charm which
+was as the alluring of some wild gypsy queen.
+
+Men fleeing from the justice or vengeance of their own country could
+find here a City of Refuge.  Here the tide of life ran swiftly, and
+churches and cruelty walked hand in hand, and Hate trod close upon the
+heels of Love.
+
+Here no man's life was safe, for from time to time an epidemic of bomb
+throwing would break out.  Infernal machines would be hurled in an
+apparently purposeless fashion wherever there was a large gathering of
+people in street or square.  A few policemen, soldiers, or onlookers
+would be killed or mutilated, and a panic created, but few arrests were
+ever made.  The whole of the Press would unite to lift up its voice in
+an indignant appeal to the Government, and then everything would be
+forgotten till the next explosion.  People in Barcelona lived from day
+to day and accepted lawlessness as a matter of course.
+
+Emile's own particular circle had no hand in these promiscuous
+destructions of life.  Their own attempts were invariably well
+organised and directed towards some definite end.  They did not destroy
+life for mere wanton cruelty, and their victims were marked out and
+hunted down with an accurate aim.
+
+
+It suddenly occurred to Emile that during the last few months he had
+looked upon Barcelona with a changed vision.  He had always seen her
+beauties and hated them, as a man may hate the fair body of a despised
+mistress, while he yet sees it fair.  Now the thought that he might at
+any time, and at a few days' notice, be forced to leave the place,
+struck him with a feeling of blankness and desolation.
+
+The sense of exile was almost gone, the nostalgia for his own land no
+longer keen.  Had he turned traitor to his own country, the country for
+whose woes he was now suffering--?
+
+There he had neither home, parents, friends nor lover.  Here he
+possessed at least interests.
+
+
+A rustling sound behind him made him turn quickly.  In the gloom he
+could only see the outline of a white moving figure.  He groped for the
+matches, struck one and lit a candle.
+
+Arithelli sat upright in bed; she had pushed back the clothes, and her
+long fingers were dragging at the blue scarf.  It was knotted at the
+back under her plait of hair, and she had almost succeeded in loosening
+it.  The fatal inertia was passed, and she was beside herself with heat
+and pain and the fight for breath.
+
+A couple of strides brought Emile to the bedside.  He caught her hands
+between his own and drew them down.
+
+"Listen, Arithelli," he said quietly.  "You mustn't do that.  This is
+to cure your throat.  It may hurt you now, but to-morrow you will be
+better, _voyez-vous_?"
+
+The girl writhed in his grasp, turning her head from side to side.  The
+wild eyes, the tense, quivering body, made Emile think of some forest
+animal in a trap.
+
+The bandage had fallen from her throat and therefore was useless, and
+the aromatic scent of the crushed herbs was pungent in the air.  He
+remembered Michael's injunction, "See that she keeps it on.  It's her
+only chance."
+
+She was still struggling frantically, and he needed both hands.  For a
+moment he meditated tying her wrists together, but he decided to trust
+to his influence over her to make her do as he wished, she had always
+obeyed him hitherto, and he knew that she was perfectly conscious now,
+and capable of understanding what he wanted.
+
+He set his teeth and tightened his grip, and spoke again in the same
+quiet voice.
+
+"Look at me!  That's right.  Put your hands down, and keep them so.
+You must not touch your throat."
+
+He held her eyes with his own as he spoke, and after a momentary
+struggle and shrinking she grew quiet, and he felt her body relax.  Her
+eyes closed and she sank down against the pillow, turning her face
+towards him.
+
+"_Pauvre enfant_!" Emile muttered.
+
+He released her hands and they lay still, and she made no movement to
+hinder him as he re-adjusted the bandage.
+
+He stood looking down upon her.  A vast compassion shone in the grey
+eyes, that she had only seen hard and penetrating.  The gesture of mute
+abandonment, the ready compliance had appealed to his complex nature,
+which he kept hidden under an armour of coldness and cynicism.  For an
+instant his years of outlawry and poverty were blotted out and he had
+gone back to the days in Russia when he had first come into his
+kingdom, and had believed women faithful and their honour a thing on
+which to stake one's own.
+
+As sweet and yielding Marie Roumanoff had seemed when she had lain in
+his arms.  A few years hence if Arithelli did not succeed in breaking
+her neck in the ring, she would probably also make Paradise and Hell
+for some man.
+
+He could see that the dangerous crisis was over.  She would live and
+eventually go back to her work again.  The swift intelligence, the wit
+and charm of her--_À quoi bon_?  She had been saved, and to what end?
+For a dangerous and toilsome profession, and, in secret, another and
+still greater peril.
+
+Husband and children, and the average woman's uneventful, if happy,
+fate could never be hers.  Her very beauty was of the type almost
+repellent to the strictly normal and healthy man.
+
+She would no doubt have her hour of triumph, of passion.  Some
+_connoisseur_ of beauty would purchase her as a rare jewel is bought to
+catalogue among his treasures.
+
+In Paris she might achieve notoriety.  Not now, perhaps, but later when
+she had developed into a woman and knew her own power.  Paris loved all
+things strange, and gave homage to the woman who was among her fellows
+as the orchid among flowers.
+
+"_FATALITÉ_," he had named her in jest.  Truly a name to bring
+misfortune to any woman.  Her fate had been in his own hands a few
+minutes ago.  He could so easily have denied her her chance, her chance
+of life.  Perhaps the time might come when she would reproach him for
+having helped her to live.
+
+He thrust back the thought and stooped over her.
+
+"_Mon enfant_, do you want anything to drink?  You are thirsty, _n'est
+ce pas_?"
+
+"Yes.  And Emile--you won't--go away--yet?"
+
+"_Ma foi_, no!  Drink this and go to sleep."
+
+He was the Emile of every-day life once more, brusque, blunt and
+practical.  As he turned away to put the glass back on the table, he
+was debating whether it would not be wise to call up Maria.  A woman
+would understand better what to do for another woman.  He knew that
+Arithelli would never ask for anything under any circumstances.
+
+He had taught her too well his own depressing theory that life "mostly
+consisted of putting up with things," and in practice thereof the pupil
+had outshone her master.
+
+The rigid tension of her arms and hands as they lay on the coverlet
+told of her effort for composure, and he noticed for the first time
+that beautiful as the latter still were in shape and colour, one of the
+nails was broken, and the finger tips had spread and widened.  When
+there had been meetings up in the hills at night she had always been
+left to see to the unharnessing of the horses and mules, and these
+disfigurements were the result of her struggles with saddle-girths and
+straps.  Her work was usually well done, and if it did not happen to be
+satisfactory, she came in for the united grumbles of the whole party.
+
+Emile bit into his cigarette as his eyes caught the discoloured lines
+of Sobrenski's sign-manual on her wrist.
+
+It was entirely through him, Emile, that she had in the first place
+joined the league of conspirators, and this was one of the results.
+Sobrenski's judgment had been more far-seeing than his own.  One girl
+in a roomful of fanatics, (he was one himself, but that did not make
+any difference,) would naturally stand a very poor chance if she was
+foolish enough to oppose them.
+
+With masculine thoughtlessness Emile had set the candle close beside
+the bed, where it flared full into Arithelli's eyes.
+
+They were wide open now.  The look of desperation had faded, and there
+was in them only the appeal of one human being to another for help and
+sympathy.
+
+"_Eh, bien_, Fatalité?"
+
+She shifted her position wearily and stretched out her hands towards
+him, murmuring, "_Je veux dormir_."
+
+If Emile had possessed either chloroform or any other narcotic he would
+at once have given it to her without much thought of the possible
+consequences.  An inspiration seized him to use the power for soothing
+and alleviating provided by Nature.  He knew that Arithelli would be an
+easy subject for the exercise of animal magnetism, and her morbid
+condition would make it even easier for him to send her to sleep.
+
+He moved away the candle, so as to leave her face in shadow, and
+leaning forward he laid his hand across her forehead and eyes, and
+began a series of regular and monotonous passes, always in a downward
+direction.  Once he rested his thumbs lightly on her eyeballs,
+remaining so for a few seconds, while his will went out to her, bidding
+her sleep and find unconsciousness.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+  "There is a woman at the beginning of all great things."
+            LAMARTINE.
+
+
+The whizzing rush and discordant scream of the electric trams, the sun
+warm upon his face, aroused Emile from a restless, fitful sleep of a
+few hours.  The street cries had begun to swell into a volume of sound,
+and at the earliest dawn the whole place teemed with stir and life.
+There was no hour in all the night in which Barcelona really slept.
+Some of the shops did not close before midnight, and people were
+continually passing through the Rambla, and entering and leaving the
+_posadas_, which were open for the sale of wine and bread soon after
+three o'clock in the morning.
+
+Emile yawned and stretched, and pulled himself up slowly from the chair
+by the open window in which he had fallen asleep.  He was cramped and
+stiff from his uncomfortable position.  Anxiety and strain had deepened
+the lines on his face, and his eyes were dull and sunken.  He looked
+less hard, less alert, and altogether more human and approachable.
+
+A glance at the bed assured him that Arithelli was still asleep and in
+exactly the same attitude as he had left her.  Though her sleep was not
+a natural one, at least it was better than drugs, and he had given her
+a respite, a time of forgetfulness.  In a few minutes he would have to
+arouse her again to more pain and discomfort, and the inevitable
+weariness of convalescence.  He stood inhaling the wonderful soft air
+and gathering up his energies to face the work of another day.
+Arithelli's affairs had to be put straight, and Vardri provided for in
+some way.  He did not in the least know how this was all to be
+accomplished, and at present the problems of the immediate future
+seemed likely to prove a little difficult.
+
+He was not by nature optimistic, and the events of the last few days
+had made him even less so than ordinary.  He felt that he must go back
+to his rooms, and finish out his _siesta_ before he could work out any
+more plans.
+
+Arithelli awoke at once when he touched her and called her name, but
+before she had realised where she was Emile was half way downstairs in
+search of Maria.
+
+As it happened it was Sunday morning, and being at least outwardly
+devout, the damsel was just on the point of starting for an early Mass,
+and was arrayed in her church-going uniform of black gown and _velo_,
+and armed with missal and rosary.
+
+Her round eyes widened and her round mouth grew sulky when she heard
+that she was expected to go upstairs without further delay and attend
+to Arithelli.  Juan would be waiting for her outside the church door,
+Maria reflected, and perhaps if she did not come he would seek others.
+There was Dolores, of the cigarette factory, for example.  The English
+Señora could surely wait a few minutes.  Her expression, and her
+obvious unwillingness, supplied Emile with material for cynical
+reflections upon the working value of religion.  He did not trouble to
+communicate his views to Maria, but merely gave orders and
+instructions.  His tone and manner were convincing.  Like all the rest
+of her sex Maria respected a man who knew what he wanted, and showed
+that he intended to get it.
+
+Emile made his way into the cool, shady Rambla, where a double avenue
+of plane trees met overhead, and where a grateful darkness could always
+be found even at mid-day.  On either side of the promenade were the
+finest shops, the gaiest _cafés_.  A band of students passed him,
+waving a scarlet flag and shouting a revolutionary _chanson_ of the
+most fiery description.  Emile scowled angrily.  He had not the least
+sympathy with these childish exhibitions of defiance, which he
+considered utterly futile and a great waste of time.  They did harm to
+the serious aims and intentions of the Anarchist community, and were
+often the means of getting quite the wrong people arrested.
+
+At the Flower Market (La Rambla de las Flores) he paused to look at the
+heaped roses, gorgeous against the grey stones.  Daily they were
+brought there in thousands, dew-drenched and fresh from the gardens of
+Sária.  He took up a loose handful from the piled mass of sweetness and
+laid it down again.
+
+Red roses were not for Fatalité.  They would not suit her, and she had
+good reason to loathe the colour that was symbolical of blood and
+sacrifice.  He chose instead a sheaf of lilies, long-stalked and
+heavily scented, and despatched them in the care of a picturesque
+_gamin_.  Sobrenski and the others would certainly have considered him
+hopelessly mad if they had known.  It was many years since he had sent
+flowers to a woman.  His present life did not encourage little
+courtesies and graceful actions.  It was in the natural course of
+events that all the comrades should help one another in every possible
+way, but none of them made any virtue out of it.  It was all done in
+the most matter-of-fact way possible.  As he had told Arithelli when
+they had talked up at Montserrat, one only kissed the hands of a Marie
+Spiridonova.  And he was sending bouquets as to some _mondaine_ of the
+vanished world and of his youth.
+
+He shrugged and walked slowly on.  In passing the house where Michael
+Furness lodged, he stopped to leave a message as to Arithelli's
+condition, and the advisability of another visit.
+
+When "_The Witch_" touched at Corfu for letters Count Vladimir found
+among them one that twisted afresh the thread of two destinies--his own
+and that of a woman.  His companion had still the same features and
+colouring of the boy who had sung at night under the stars in the
+harbour of Barcelona.  Pauline Souvaroff still sang through the hours
+between dusk and dawn, but her disguise had been discarded, and now
+soft skirts trailed as she passed, and the cropped fair hair had grown
+and twisted into little rings.  Her secret had been no secret to Emile,
+though Arithelli with her trick of taking everything for granted had
+never guessed that Paul, the singer, was other than the boy he
+professed to be.  Besides the two women had never talked together
+alone, and seldom even seen each other by daylight, for Pauline had
+sought no one's company.
+
+There was for her but one being in the world, and when she could not be
+with the man she worshipped she was content to be with her thoughts and
+dreams.
+
+At first she had, like many another Russian woman, yearned to make an
+oblation of herself in the service of her horror-ridden country, but
+with the coming of love she had put aside all thoughts of vengeance.
+The Cause was identified for her with the person of her lover.  She
+toiled willingly at it still, but from entirely different motives.  His
+interests were hers, and while he worked for the revolutionary party,
+so also must she.
+
+Pauline Souvaroff had loved much and given freely.  All that she
+possessed of beauty and charm, her whole body and soul she had laid at
+the feet of the man at whose lightest word she flushed and paled, and
+on whom she looked with soft, adoring eyes.  She lived in dreams, a
+life of drugged content in which there was neither past nor future.
+
+In all the Brotherhood no one could be considered a free agent, and the
+ordering of no man's life was in his own hands.  The private actions of
+each member were almost as well known as his public ones, for each man
+spied systematically upon his companions.  If the devotion of two
+people to one another seemed likely to outrival their devotion to the
+Cause, then separation came swiftly.  Nothing would be said, no
+accusations made, but each would receive orders that sent them in
+opposite directions.  The supporters of the Red Flag movement were
+always particularly ingenious in arranging affairs to suit themselves.
+An Anarchist could form no lasting ties.  Some time in the future there
+was always separation to be faced.
+
+It was in Vladimir's power to settle matters in his own way by ignoring
+Emile's letter, and remaining where he was in enjoyment of the present
+idyll.  As long as they kept out to sea they were safe.  But he had
+pledged his word to answer any summons and to give his help, and with
+him, as with all men, love came only second to his work.  Emile had
+also explained Vardri's position, and it would be impossible to adjust
+anything without being on the spot.
+
+He read the letter over again, slowly and carefully.  It hinted and
+suggested more than it had said.  Emile had just come from an interview
+with Sobrenski, and there had been a talk of an entire re-organization
+of the band.  Some of the members would be required to carry on the
+propaganda in other countries, Russia, for example.  They all knew what
+that meant--!
+
+As he climbed the ladder by the yacht's side, and swung himself onto
+the deck, the girl ran up to him with outstretched hands, her white
+skirts fluttering behind her in the wind.  She was as incapable of
+disguising her feelings as a child, and she was a joyous pagan in her
+happiness.
+
+Vladimir slipped his hand under the warm round arm.  "Have I been long,
+_petite_?  Come and walk up and down.  I want to talk to you."
+
+"You have found letters, _mon ami_?" Pauline asked carelessly.
+
+"From Poleski.  Yes.  I'm afraid they are rather important ones.  We
+shall have to talk them over later on."
+
+"When you like.  Vladimir, do you remember the girl Monsieur Poleski
+brought on board once for a few days.  I never knew her real name.  She
+always looked so ill and miserable.  Do you remember?"
+
+"It is about this very girl that he has written."
+
+Pauline looked up quickly.  "She is dead?"
+
+"No!  No!  I suppose you think that because she always looked such a
+tragedy.  However, she is very ill, out of danger now, but of course
+not able to ride--she was in the Hippodrome, you know--and apparently
+she has no money, so one must do something for them.  Poleski has
+barely enough for two, especially under these circumstances."
+
+"I am sorry," Pauline said gently.  "I remember how she used to sit all
+day and look at the sea.  Monsieur Poleski left her too much alone, and
+always spoke so roughly, but I think he loved her."
+
+Vladimir gave a short laugh.
+
+"You're wrong there, child.  No, I'm sure that's not the case with
+Poleski."
+
+"But she loves him?"
+
+"Possibly!  She always seemed to me uncanny with those extraordinary
+eyes, and that voice.  Poleski has certainly failed to educate her as
+regards taste in clothes.  You saw how she was dressed when she came on
+board--!"
+
+Half an hour later the anchor was up, and they were cutting through the
+white-crested waves.  The girl pointed to a green headland on the left
+that rose suddenly and overhung the water like a sentinel on guard.
+
+"I have been watching that all the morning in the distance, and I could
+think of nothing but the Winged Victory in the Louvre.  You remember
+how she stands on a rough-hewn pedestal at the head of the marble
+staircase, and she is all alone against a dull red background.  And as
+one looks one goes back all those centuries, and sees her as she was on
+the day the Greeks set her up to celebrate their great sea-victory.  It
+must have all looked just as it does to-day, those centuries ago in the
+Island of Samothrace.  There was a strong wind blowing, and the waves
+met and raced and leapt together, and the sky was the same wonderful
+colour that it is now, and there were wild birds hovering and screaming
+round her."
+
+"What will you say to me, when I take you away from all this,--when we
+have to go back to Barcelona?"
+
+"But I shall go with you?"  The blue eyes were searching his face, and
+there was fear as well as a question in them.
+
+"Do you suppose I shall leave you here alone, child?"  He hated himself
+for the evasive answer.
+
+He turned her thoughts to other things, bidding her talk of those days
+they had spent together in Paris.  She had named it Paradise, and to
+her it had been indeed a place of enchantment, for she saw it for the
+first time, and Vladimir was always with her.
+
+She had seen its treasures of art, and abandoned herself to its glamour
+with the enthusiasm and the freshness of a child.
+
+She had looked out of place in the artificial atmosphere of the
+boulevards, among the gas-lit _cafés_, dazzling shop-windows,
+_flâneurs_ and gaily dressed women.  A man who wrote poetry, and
+starved on what he received for his verses in the Quartier Latin, had
+stood beside her for a few moments in the Rue de Rivoli, and had gone
+home to his garret inspired to produce some lines in which he compared
+her to the delicate narcissus blooms that died so quickly in the flower
+sellers' baskets.
+
+Together she and Vladimir had strolled among the wonders of the Louvre,
+he critical and unmoved, but indulgent and gratified at her pleasure as
+at the pleasure of a child.
+
+Pauline had never been able to express what she felt.  She could only
+worship dumbly before the changeless unfading beauty of these relics of
+the fairy-cities, of Athens, and Rome, and Alexandria.  She had loved
+the Greek marbles best.  The weird shapes in the Corridor of Pan, the
+glorious torso of the Venus Accroupie with the two deep lines in her
+side that make her more human and alive than any other Venus, more
+divine even than the Milo, faultless in her "serpentining beauty rounds
+on rounds," serene and gracious in the shadow of her crimson-hung
+alcove.
+
+And Vladimir was wise, for he allowed her to dream, and did not show
+her more than he could help of modern Paris.
+
+From there they had gone to Brussels, then to Vienna, and last, and
+most beautiful of all, Buda-Pesth, the city among the hills.  They had
+seen it first of all as Buda-Pesth should be seen, at night, hanging
+between earth and sky, and with her million lights sparkling against
+the soft darkness of the surrounding hills.  Pauline's eyes had never
+become satiated with the sight of beautiful things.
+
+Perhaps, as she had told Vladimir, it was her love for him that had
+given her this gift of clear-seeing.  Without love she might have
+allowed herself to be blindfolded as many other women are, by ambition,
+or money, or intellect.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+  "La vie est vaine,
+  Un peu d'amour,
+  Un peu de haine,
+  Et puis bon jour."
+
+
+In the process of Arithelli's convalescence, comedy fought for place with
+tragedy.
+
+For the first time in her life she felt irritable, and inclined to
+grumble, and her racked nerves made the lonely hours appear doubly long
+and lonely.
+
+Day after day, each one seemingly more unending than the last, the sun
+poured into her room, and the dust and litter accumulated in all four
+corners, and she lay and gazed at the hideous meandering pattern of the
+stained wall-paper, and the cracks and blistering paint on the door.  The
+nights were less terrible, for the darkness veiled all sordid details,
+and there was a star-lit patch of sky visible through the open window.
+
+The attendance she received could only be described as casual.  Neither
+Emile nor Maria possessed one idea on the subject of hygiene between
+them.  The methods of the former were, as might be expected, a little
+crude, and Maria combined a similar failing with a vast ignorance.
+Moreover, she was not original.  At the beginning of Arithelli's illness
+pineapple juice had seemed to Maria a happy inspiration, and she
+continued to provide it daily.  What was good to drink on Sunday, she
+argued, must also be good on Monday.
+
+Arithelli's throat had healed quickly, but the depression and weakness
+clung to her persistently.  She fought it and was ashamed of it, true to
+her Spartan traditions, but was forced to realise that it was not in her
+own power to hurry her return to the world and work.
+
+Michael Furness, who was much elated by the success of the Jewish
+herbalist's remedy, continued his treatment on the same lines, giving her
+various tisanes of leaves and flowers, which if they tasted unpleasant
+were at least harmless.  He had grown fond of his patient, and she always
+looked for his visits with pleasure.  He treated her with a genuine,
+almost fatherly kindness, and they were drawn together by the kin feeling
+of race, so strong among all Celts.  In many respects Michael was not
+ideal as a medical attendant.
+
+He smoked vile tobacco,--he dropped some things and knocked over others,
+he shaved apparently only on _festas_, and if he happened to arrive late
+in the day his speech was thick and his manner excitable.
+
+Upon one occasion Arithelli had complained that her mane of untended hair
+made her uncomfortably hot, and Michael brought out a pocket knife,
+clubbed it all together in his hand like a horse's tail, and obligingly
+offered to relieve her by cutting it off.  Emile had arrived only just in
+time to prevent the holocaust, and the two men exchanged fiery words for
+the next ten minutes.
+
+Another day, prompted by a desire to amuse her, Michael introduced into
+her room a fat mongrel puppy with disproportionate legs and an alarmed
+expression.  His wish to provide her with what he was pleased to call a
+"divarsion" was, like many of his other good intentions, not entirely
+successful.  He had deposited the excited animal on the bed, and in the
+course of its frantic gambols it overbalanced and fell sprawling to the
+floor on its back.  The ancient canopied bed was high, and the puppy was
+frightened as well as hurt, and lifted up its voice in anguished yells.
+When Michael had rescued it, and put it outside the door and finished
+laughing, he came back to find Arithelli weeping helplessly with her face
+buried in the pillow.  His alarmed suggestion that he should fetch Emile
+helped her to recover more quickly than any amount of sympathy could have
+done.
+
+Sometimes there were other visitors.  The grooms and strappers from the
+Hippodrome came often to enquire, and Estelle, forbidden by the Manager
+to come at all on account of infection, sat on the stairs and showered
+effusive speeches in a high-pitched voice through the open door.
+
+Arithelli had sent no word of her illness to her parents in London.  She
+knew their views on the subject of complaints.  They would consider the
+whole thing due to imagination, there would be unpleasant letters, and it
+was perfectly certain that they would send no assistance in the shape of
+money.  Emile had wished to write, but she had begged him not to do so,
+and for once he had yielded to what he called her "whims."
+
+From the scraps of information she had received from time to time it
+appeared that the uncomfortable _ménage_ of her kindred had become even
+more disorganised.  Her father had turned for consolation to the whisky
+of his country, her mother spent whole days in bed reading, and weaving
+futile dreams of a recovered fortune, and Isobel and Valerie grew taller
+and hungrier, and fought and wrangled after the manner of Hooligans.
+Lazy and shiftless, they envied Arithelli the life she had chosen, but
+had neither the pluck nor the brains necessary to emulate her example.
+
+Emile's manner had troubled her of late, for he had been strangely
+bad-tempered and variable in his moods.  She had become more or less
+accustomed to his eccentricities of behaviour and speech, but this was
+something different, indefinable.  One day he would be extraordinarily
+kind and considerate, the next almost brutal, either hardly speaking at
+all, or else finding fault with everything she said and did.
+
+She often felt a presentiment that he had something important to tell
+her, but he would come and go without imparting any news, and, as always,
+she did not worry him with questions as many women would have done.
+
+She wondered if he were feeling harassed over "_les affaires
+politiques_," or whether he was afraid that the Manager's small stock of
+patience would be exhausted before she was able to appear in the ring
+again, and that he would cancel her contract.  If that happened she felt
+that the end of all things would have indeed arrived.  She could not
+struggle against the Fates any longer, obviously she could not return
+home, and it was not fair that Emile should continue to keep her.
+
+He came in one evening about eight o'clock to find her up for the first
+time since her illness, and sitting on the edge of the bed draped in the
+long blue cloak she used for covering her circus attire.
+
+Her hair was parted over her ears, and divided into two long sleek braids
+drawn forward and falling over her shoulders, the ends resting on her lap.
+
+She looked up, as he entered, with the haunting sea-green eyes that
+showed larger than ever in contrast to her hollowed cheeks.  Something in
+her pose, in the arrangement of her hair, reminded Emile vividly of her
+first morning in Barcelona, when he had come in early in the morning to
+find her dazed with sleep.  He remembered also how she had asked him to
+repeat his remarks, and how carelessly nonchalant had been her manner.
+
+"You look like a witch sitting crouched up there, Fatalité," he snapped.
+"What's the matter?  You don't seem very cheerful."
+
+"I don't feel very cheerful," the girl responded.  She spoke with grave
+deliberation, and without moving a muscle.  Emile grunted and sat down.
+
+"There has been another explosion of bombs on the Rambla," he said.  "A
+market woman killed and two work people injured--I believe one has since
+died.  Of course a got-up affair of the Government.  They hope by doing
+this sort of thing often enough to make the populace take vengeance on
+us."
+
+"Then the Anarchists didn't do it?"
+
+"My dear Fatalité, we don't blow up harmless people simply _pour passer
+le temps_.  I've told you that before, and being inside the movement
+yourself you ought to know.  It is a favourite trick of the officials to
+excite public feeling against us.  They have been doing it now for the
+last three years, letting off bombs in various parts of the city.  They
+take care always to choose the most frequented places and to kill someone
+who doesn't matter, and then all the Republican journals have four
+columns of indignation with large head-lines, 'LATEST ANARCHIST OUTRAGE.'
+They like to get their exploits well talked about.  Everything seems to
+be against us now.  Sobrenski will have it that there is treachery inside
+our circle as well as outside.  You know whom he suspects?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Vardri."
+
+"That is my fault," Arithelli said quietly.  "Sobrenski has felt like
+that since the night Vardri made a scene about my being lowered down from
+the window.  He just stood up for me because I'm a woman.  I'm only a
+machine to the rest of you."
+
+She spoke without a touch of resentment.  It was purely a statement of
+fact.
+
+"Ah, that's just the point.  The feminine side of you is exactly what we
+don't want.  One Félise Rivaz is enough, most of us think.  Try and keep
+the elfish boy you were when you arrived.  It will be less trouble,
+Fatalité, _ma chère_.  With the other thing there are always
+complications.  No, I'm not accusing you of falling in love with Vardri.
+I only say, be careful.  Even an elf-child can develop suddenly into a
+woman once she arrives at a knowledge of the fact that there is a man
+ready to make love to her.  Perhaps you do not know it yourself, but you
+have changed lately.  You are losing your fearlessness, your
+indifference.  I have watched you sometimes when you have not known, and
+have seen your eyes soften, your face change.  You started when I spoke
+just now."
+
+"How did you learn things about women?  From books?"
+
+"Books?  _Ma foi_, no!  I liked them well enough at one time, when I
+hadn't studied _la vie_.  Now they're _fâde_."
+
+Arithelli was silent for a little while.  She knew only too well that
+Emile had spoken the truth, had put into blunt words what to herself was
+only a vague, half-formed idea.  Her illness had been Vardri's golden
+harvest time, for it had given him the chance of being often alone with
+her.  He had read to her, waited upon her, served her with the utmost
+chivalry and devotion.  He had made of her a Madonna, a goddess, she who
+was fair game for all other men in Barcelona.
+
+Emile's voice broke in upon her meditations.
+
+"You shouldn't worry, Fatalité.  It's not becoming.  Have a cigarette to
+make yourself a little distraction."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"No, thank you, Emile.  I never wanted to smoke, and any way it would not
+give me a distraction to-night."
+
+"Then what are you worrying about?"
+
+"I've only been wondering what will be the end of me."
+
+"What has made you suddenly become so anxious about your end?"  Emile
+looked at her keenly.
+
+The wide eyes raised to his were tragedy incarnate.  The long nervous
+fingers were tightly locked together.
+
+"I'm a coward to-night," the soft hoarse voice went on.  "I've never
+grumbled before, have I, Emile?  I seem to have suddenly realised how
+hopeless everything looks for me in the future.  I've had time enough to
+think it all out since I've been lying in bed.  When I first came here I
+thought I was going to do all sorts of wonderful things, but now I see
+that this life leads to nothing, and I may go on being just a circus
+rider for years.  When I get well and finish out this contract I shall
+have to try and get another engagement in Paris or Vienna.  The English
+Consul and all the other men wait to see me come out, and throw me
+flowers and rings, but when they see me driving with you in the Paséo de
+Gracia, they look the other way, especially if they are with their wives
+and families.  They like 'ARITHELLI OF THE HIPPODROME' in her proper
+place,--the ring.  Gas and glare, paint and glitter!  That is my life.
+And they always hope that I shall fall off.  I can feel it.  It's the
+Roman arena all over again.  For a long time before I had that accident I
+didn't know how to get through the rehearsals.  I nearly fell off two or
+three times, but there was no one there to see.  The more I practised the
+more cold I got, and I used to have horrible shivering fits.  It's so
+queer.  I don't believe I'm made like other people.  Estelle gets hot and
+scarlet when she practises."
+
+"Poor little child!"
+
+"Why are you so nice to me?  You've never said anything like that before."
+
+"Because if when you first came here I had begun to pity you it would
+have made you realise your position sooner than need be.  You were like
+one in a dream.  It was not my place to awaken you.  I left that for
+Life, '_la vie_' that you were so anxious to experience.  You made
+yourself '_Chateaux en Espagne_.'  We all do that at some time or other."
+
+"Nobody really cares what becomes of me except--" she broke off the
+sentence and continued steadily.  "My people don't mind whether I am here
+or not.  They won't like it if I come back a failure."
+
+In his heart Emile cursed the Fates.  Her awakening had been a complete
+one.  At first novelty and excitement had served as merciful
+anaesthetics, but they could not last for ever.
+
+He was not in love with her, he still told himself, but he would miss
+her.  Women like the Roumanoff were the women to whom men made passionate
+love, but Arithelli was unique.  She had become part of his life in
+Barcelona.  Their lives had touched and mingled till it was impossible to
+believe that he had only known her for a few short months.  A future
+without her would be one without interest.  For her he could see no
+future.  She would have to go to the devil some way or another
+eventually, and there would be plenty of people ready and willing to
+provide her with an escort.
+
+He threw away his cigarette, and came across the room to her, and his
+hands fell heavily upon her shoulders.
+
+"Look here, Fatalité," he said roughly; "we thought you were dying a
+little while ago, and I helped to fight for your life, and all the time,
+at the back of my brain I wished you were dead.  Yes, you needn't look so
+horrified."  He gave her a fierce shake.  "I hoped to see you in your
+coffin.  Can't you understand, Fatalité?  No, of course you can't, and
+you think me a brute.  One of these days perhaps you will think
+differently.  Probably you imagine I don't care for you, but if I didn't
+should I mind whether you were alive or dead?  You've always been saying
+that you feel something is going to happen.  It seems you are right.
+There have been several unexpected developments during the last few days.
+It is most likely that I may be chosen to go back to Russia with
+despatches to one of the secret societies there.  Here I cannot be
+arrested, there I can.  Of course it means Siberia--eventually.  That's
+only what we all expect."
+
+"Then I shall be here alone."
+
+"Yes, and there's no future for a woman in this vile place.  You know the
+proverb they have, 'Can any good thing come out of Barcelona?'  Your
+looks are against you too."
+
+"There's always the river."
+
+"Then when the time comes choose that--if you still have the courage.
+You've been _bonne camarade_ to me, Fatalité.  The men you will meet
+later on may not want that."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+  "I kiss you and the world begins to fade."
+            W. B. YEATS.
+
+
+Count Vladimir and Emile met and consulted together, the immediate
+result of the interview being that Vardri was offered the post of
+private secretary to the former.  Emile had gone out leaving them
+together, and Vladimir had hardly finished speaking when he found
+himself faced by an unexpected situation.
+
+"I accept with pleasure," Vardri said, "but on one condition--that it
+means my remaining in Barcelona."
+
+Vladimir hesitated.  "Well, I had not contemplated that.  Naturally one
+requires one's secretary to be--"
+
+"I understand, Monsieur.  I hope you will not consider me ungrateful,
+but there is a reason."
+
+"It's a woman?"
+
+Vardri bowed gravely.  "Exactly, Monsieur.  It's a woman."
+
+"You are risking a great deal for her.  Poleski has told me something
+of your circumstances, and it appears that if you do not get some
+appointment very soon, you will starve."
+
+Vardri straightened himself, throwing back his head with a
+characteristic gesture.  He looked the older man in the eyes, his own
+alight and eloquent under finely drawn brows.
+
+"That's as it may be!  I'll take my chance of work.  In any case I
+cannot leave Barcelona.  Of course, I regret greatly that it is
+impossible for me to fall in with your arrangements."
+
+Vladimir smiled and shrugged.  He knew the type with which he had to
+deal.  Quixotic and generous to the verge of folly, the type that will
+sacrifice itself without reserve for an illusion, an ideal; the type
+that filled monasteries, and Siberian prisons, and made a jest for half
+the world.  Such men were valuable to the Cause, because they gave
+ungrudgingly, and never counted cost.  The Russian was a man of
+affairs, cautious, cynical and given to analysis, and he was also a
+student of human nature.  He was moreover interested in the unknown
+woman.
+
+If he had been told that she was Arithelli the circus-rider, who had
+sat silently upon the deck of his yacht dressed in gaudy raiment, and
+indifferent almost to stupidity, then his smile would have been
+contemptuous instead of tolerant.  He was interested too in the unknown
+woman's champion.  Something in Vardri's attitude of courteous defiance
+appealed to him by the law that will attract strongly one man's mind to
+another, diverse in every way.  He could see that Vardri was plainly
+consumptive, and that the disease was in its advanced stages.  Even
+with the aid of good food and an easier life he could not last more
+than a year or two, so one might as well make things a little more
+smooth for him during the time.
+
+"I see you have the illusions of youth, my friend," he said carelessly.
+"I trust they may remain long unbroken.  Myself I am sorry to have
+lived beyond the age when they content one.  Sit down and talk to me."
+He motioned Vardri towards a chair.  "Well, since you have refused to
+entertain my plan, we must think of something else.  I'm at present
+writing a series of articles on '_Militarism in France_,' and should
+like to have them translated for publication in an English journal.
+You speak the language well, better even than Poleski, for you have a
+better accent.  I have been a good deal in London and I notice the
+difference.  I suppose you also write it easily?"
+
+"Yes, I had an English tutor."
+
+"Good!  Then you will undertake this work, and you shall fix the price
+of payment.  I'm not in the least afraid of your asking more than I
+care to give.  You are the type that gets rid of money, not the type
+that acquires it.  Also I will give you an introduction which will
+enable you to get on the staff of _Le Combat_.  They want another man
+there who is a good linguist, as there is a great deal of
+correspondence with other countries.  As I have an interest in the
+paper, you may consider it settled.  No, don't thank me.  Your thanks
+are due to--a woman.  She is unknown to me, but perhaps that is the
+reason I--I also owe you something, Monsieur Vardri.  Your example has
+made me feel young again."
+
+A week later Vardri went swinging quickly down the Calle San Antonio,
+on his way to Emile's rooms.  He was in exuberant spirits, and whistled
+as he walked keeping step to the dancing gaiety of '_La petite
+Tonquinoise_.'  His headgear, which vied in picturesque disorder with
+Emile's historical sombrero, was pushed to the back of his head,
+exposing his thick, unruly hair, and over one ear, Spanish fashion, he
+had stuck a carnation.
+
+There was more money in his pocket than he had possessed since his days
+of luxury in the Austrian chateau, and for him the sun was shining in a
+metaphorical as well as a literal sense.  During the last few days he
+had been happier than he could have believed possible.  He felt in
+better health, for he had been able to go to bed at a reasonable time,
+and though he missed the horses and the free life of the Hippodrome,
+and found the work of a newspaper office somewhat trying, there were
+shorter hours and other advantages.
+
+He had also the joy of knowing that Arithelli was almost well again.
+She had not been out yet, but Michael Furness had declared her to be
+practically recovered.
+
+One day Vardri hoped to take her along the sea-front towards the old
+quarter of the town, where the fishermen and sailors lived, and where
+she could sit on the stone parapet and look across the harbour, and let
+the sea-air blow strength and vitality into her.
+
+After all he told himself, life was good even if one were a vagabond.
+Life with adventure, a little money, and love.
+
+He burst open the door of Emile's sitting-room, and entered headlong.
+The sun-blinds were all drawn, making everything appear pitch dark
+after the blinding glare of the streets.
+
+"I want some matches, Poleski!  By luck, I've got some cigarettes.  One
+never has both matches and cigarettes at the same time."  He had come
+to a dead stop and stood staring.
+
+"Fatalité!  Fatalité!  The gods are kind for once!  If only I had known
+you were here sooner."
+
+The half-full box of cigarettes descended to the floor, and its
+contents went in all directions, and he was kneeling beside her chair
+and holding both her hands.  It was Arithelli not "Fatalité" who smiled
+back at him.  The little mask-like face changed and grew soft till she
+looked more a girl, less an embodied tragedy.  Vardri's wild spirits
+were infectious, and, as on the night of the Hippodrome fiasco, Youth
+called and Love made answer.
+
+"_Mon ami_, I am so glad you have come."
+
+"Is this the first time you have been out?  Who said you could get up?
+The doctor?"
+
+"No, it was Emile."
+
+Vardri nodded towards the communicating door of the bedroom.  "Poleski
+is here then?"
+
+"No, and he doesn't know I'm here.  He has gone to Sária and will not
+be back till late.  I was horribly irritable this morning, so he thinks
+I'm all right now."  A ripple of amusement broke her voice as their
+eyes met.
+
+"My sweet, you must ask me to believe some other little _histoire_."
+
+"Oh! but it's true.  You should have heard us!  I knew that it was
+funny afterwards, but there was no one to laugh with at the time.  It
+was about that dreadful old coat of Emile's.  He threw it on my bed,
+and--I can't help being a Jewess, can I?  and I so loathe dust and
+dirt, and I said so.  Emile was furious.  'Very well,' he said.  'If
+you are strong enough to grumble, you are strong enough to get up.'  So
+when he had gone I dressed and came here.  I was so glad to get away
+from that room."
+
+"Not as glad as I am to see you here.  And I've heard you laugh,
+Fatalité.  You're a little girl today."
+
+"I have moods, dear.  I shall depress you sometimes."
+
+Vardri smiled scornfully, and slid down to the floor, his head resting
+against her knee.  "_Je suis bien content_!  What cool hands you have,
+and how still you keep.  No other woman in the world was ever so
+restful.  You love to be quiet, don't you?  I know you better to-day
+than I ever did.  You were always in the wrong atmosphere at the
+Hippodrome."
+
+"And I have to go back to it," the girl said under her breath.  "And I
+may be hissed again.  You will not be there now, and we shall miss you.
+I and Don Juan and Cavaliero, and El Rey, and Don Quixote.  Some of the
+grooms are horrible, and the animals get so badly treated."
+
+"It seems to me that everything gets badly treated here," Vardri
+muttered.  "Women and horses, it's all the same.  Don't let us talk
+about it.  It drives me mad to think, I shan't be able to be near you.
+I was some use to you there."
+
+He jumped up and began to move about the room collecting the scattered
+cigarettes.
+
+"Shall I play to you, _mon ange_?  I suppose the piano hasn't been
+tuned yet."  He struck a few notes, and made a rueful grimace.  "It's
+worse than ever."
+
+"I'm afraid it never will be tuned now that I've been ill and caused so
+much expense.  Emile always says he will go without cigarettes to
+afford it, and I say I will go without powder, but neither of us keep
+our heroic resolutions, and the piano gets worse and worse."
+
+Vardri shut down the lid with a bang.
+
+"Well, anyway it doesn't matter," he said, "I don't want to play or do
+anything; I just want to be with you."
+
+"Bring up a chair, and sit and smoke, _mon camarade_."  She held out
+her hand with a gesture of invitation, and Vardri took it and kissed
+it, and went back to his former position at her feet.
+
+"Shall I read to you?" he asked.  "Ah!  I'd forgotten there was
+something I wanted to tell you.  I found a poem the other day, a
+love-song of De Musset.  Do you know that you lived in this very city
+years ago, Fatalité, and he saw you and loved you?  How else could he
+have written this?
+
+  "_Avez-vous vu en Barcelone,
+  Une Andalouse au sein bruni,
+  Pâle comme un beau soir d'Autômne,
+  C'est ma maitresse, ma lionne,
+  La Marchesa d'Amagui._"
+
+Arithelli listened, her eyes dilating, and a little flame of colour
+creeping up under the magnolia skin that made her likeness to the woman
+of the poem.  Her awakening senses thrilled to the eager voice, the
+riotous challenging words:
+
+  "_J'ai fait bien de chansons pour elle_."
+
+He broke off abruptly and continued: "I hate all the rest of it.  The
+woman isn't like you, further on, and the lover laughs at his own
+passion, and the whole thing jars.  That first verse haunted me for
+days after I'd read it."--The sentence was finished by a convulsive fit
+of coughing, which he vainly tried to stifle.
+
+"This is the first time to-day," he gasped, between the paroxysms.
+"I'm quite well really.  It's the cigarette.  They often have that
+effect.  Don't look so worried, or I shall think you hate me for being
+a nuisance."
+
+"If you talk so foolishly I shall go."
+
+She made an attempt to rise, but Vardri caught at her skirts.  "You
+won't go!  You don't want to make me worse, do you?  Think how sorry
+you'll be if I cough and worry you all the evening!"
+
+"Can't I get you anything?  If only I were not so stupid about illness.
+Don't try to talk if it makes you worse."
+
+"I won't--if you'll stay."
+
+To Arithelli caresses did not come easily, but during the last few
+weeks she had learnt many things.  She stroked the dark head that
+rested against her knee, wondering how it was that she had never before
+noticed till to-day how feverishly brilliant Vardri's eyes were, and
+how his skin burnt.  She had often heard him coughing before, but he
+had always gone away and left her when an attack came on, with some
+laughing excuse about the horrible noise he made.  After a while he
+shifted his position, and smiled up at her.
+
+"You're getting tired, Fatalité!"
+
+"No.  Tell me, have you anything important to do to-night?"
+
+"No, dear, and if I had I shouldn't do it.  Do you feel well enough to
+come out and have dinner with me somewhere?  I'll take you to some
+place where it's quiet."
+
+"Why not let us stay here all the evening, and have  supper together?"
+Arithelli  suggested.  "We'll take Emile's things.  He loves cooking
+_cochonneries_, and there is sure to be a _quelque chose_ somewhere in
+the cupboard."
+
+Vardri scrambled to his feet.  "_Bon_!  Sit still, and I'll go and
+_acheter les_--things!  We'll leave Emile's _cochonneries_ alone.  I'm
+rich now, so we will have luxuries."
+
+"Yes, and I'll hunt for plates and dishes, and wash them properly (not
+like the Gentiles do) while you go and _acheter les_--things!"
+Arithelli mocked.  "What a dreadful mixture of languages we all use!  I
+used to speak German quite well when I was at the convent, but now I
+have forgotten nearly all of it.  This place is bad for both one's
+French and English, and Emile says that when I try and speak Spanish it
+sounds like someone sawing wood."
+
+Vardri went out still coughing, and came back flushed and excitable,
+laden with various untidy parcels, from which some of the contents were
+protruding.  Long rolls, the materials for a salad, a _pâté_, flowers,
+and an enormous cluster of grapes.  They pledged each other in the
+yellow wine of the country, and presently Vardri set about the
+manufacture of what he inaccurately described as Turkish coffee.  That
+the result of his efforts was half cold and evil-tasting mattered not
+to either of them.
+
+Arithelli's red hair was crowned with vine leaves that he had stripped
+from the grape-cluster and twisted into a Bacchante wreath.  She leant
+her elbow on the table, resting her chin upon her hand.  Her eyes
+glowed jewel-like, almost the same colour as her garland.  The flame of
+love had melted into warmth her statue-like coldness, and given her the
+one thing she had lacked--expression.  Yet the mystery, the charm that
+surrounded her clung to her even when she appeared most womanly.  To
+the boy lover gazing with devouring eyes she seemed that night more
+than a woman.  He thought of the tales he had heard as a child from the
+peasants on winter nights in his own country.  Tales of the forests and
+legends of the Hartz Mountains, of lonely places haunted by nixies and
+wood maidens, fairy shapes with streaming hair and vaporous robes,
+seeing which a man would become for ever after mad with longing, and
+desire no mortal woman.
+
+Arithelli's long limbs appeared nymphlike in her plain blue
+high-waisted gown of Emile's choosing, that had no superfluous bow or
+trimming, and left free her beauty of outline.  She possessed no
+jewellery now wherewith to deck herself, and there was no trace of
+artificial red on face and lips.
+
+The candles on the table flickered to and fro in the draught from the
+open window and she shivered in the midst of some laughing speech and
+glanced over her shoulder at the door behind her.
+
+Vardri, reading her thoughts, said, "You're afraid of something, dear,
+what is it?"
+
+"Nothing, at least I thought someone was listening, was coming in.  We
+are always talking of spies till one gets absurdly nervous and imagines
+all sorts of foolish things.  I have never said so to anyone else, but
+there is always the feeling of being watched.  It is so difficult to
+know who is for and who against us, and so easy to give evidence
+without meaning to be a traitor.  Just before I got ill, Sobrenski sent
+me to a little newspaper shop down in the Parelelo quarter.  I was to
+ask if they sold '_Le Flambeau_.'  The man looked at me hard and asked
+if there was any connection between that journal and the one published
+at number 27 Calle de Pescadores.  The sun must have made me feel
+stupid, and I answered _Yes_, without thinking.  I had taken it for
+granted that the man was one of us, and then I knew suddenly that he
+wasn't."
+
+Vardri bent forward across the table.  "Did you tell anyone what you
+had said?"
+
+"Not Sobrenski; I told Emile.  He looked me up and down, and said
+something that I couldn't hear, and then, 'I thought you could hold
+your tongue, Fatalité.  It seems, after all, you are a woman and
+can't!' and then he walked out of the room.  Vardri, did you ever feel
+as I do when you first began to work for the Cause?  Perhaps one gets
+used to it in the end and doesn't care."
+
+"Yes," the boy answered between his teeth, "Yes!  One gets used to it.
+Dear, your hands are trembling.  Do you think anyone can hurt you while
+I'm here?  You are nervous because you've been ill, that's all.  This
+is the first time you've been out and you are overtired.  I'll take you
+back soon.  You were all right a few minutes ago.  You thing of moods!"
+
+She tried to smile, "I warned you, _mon ami_."
+
+"I know.  It wasn't any use.  That wreath makes you look like the
+statue of Ariadne in Rome."
+
+"I wish you would talk to me about yourself."
+
+"Myself!" Vardri shrugged expressively, "_Ma foi_!"
+
+"Tell me what made you join the Cause."
+
+"Because of a man I believed in.  You have heard of Guerchouni who died
+early in the year?  There was a great funeral in Paris.  It was in all
+the papers."
+
+Arithelli nodded, "Yes, I heard the men talking about it at one of the
+meetings.  I wasn't interested enough to listen then.  Was he--?"
+
+"He was one of our greatest leaders.  His death meant something to me,
+because it was really through him that I joined the Red Flag.  He had a
+life sentence in Eastern Siberia and he escaped from there and got to
+America.  For some time none of us knew exactly where he was, and then
+we heard rumours that he was dangerously ill at Geneva.  Then came news
+of his death and his funeral in Paris.  His friends had decided to
+bring the body there, so that all the comrades might be present, for
+there are many anarchists in Paris.  They gave him a guard of honour of
+Russian students, men and women surrounding the coffin with linked
+hands, and there were hundreds of red roses and red carnations, though
+it was in the winter--there had been snow on the ground a few days
+before.  There was a crown of thorns from those who had been his
+companions in prison, and the canopy of the hearse was a red flag.  If
+only I could have been there to do him homage!
+
+"There are all sorts of wild stories about his escape from Siberia.  I
+suppose he bewitched the jailers as he bewitched other men.  He was the
+first man I ever heard speak about the Cause.  He came to Vienna and
+held meetings for the propaganda and collected enormous crowds.  I had
+just begun to take life seriously then, to think about things and to
+hate injustice.
+
+"My father drank and wasted money and treated his servants brutally.
+My mother was dead, and when she was alive she was an invalid, and
+could do nothing.  Most of the people I knew seemed to think the serfs
+no better than animals.  I remember how sometimes when we were starting
+off in the early morning for a boar hunt in the forest, they would come
+begging and whining round the horses' heels.
+
+"They seldom got anything except a kick or a curse.  They looked
+scarcely human, yet it was ourselves who were the brutes really.
+
+"Well, Guerchouni spoke and I went and listened to him.  A friend with
+whom I had gone to the meetings gave me an introduction to him.  I was
+mad on the Cause long before the interview was over.  He was a man
+that!  If he had looked at me twice, I would have walked through flames
+to please him.  Oh, I wasn't the only one!  We all felt like that more
+or less with Guerchouni.  I couldn't describe him.  He was not a tall
+man, but he carried himself well, and he was dark and pale with
+wonderful blazing eyes.  One knew him at once, and talked as if one had
+known him for years.
+
+"Of course I accepted all his theories and doctrines except two.  I
+don't believe in '_L'Union fibre_.'  (They all do, you know, or nearly
+all) and I never was an atheist.
+
+"A Catholic and an Anarchist!  It sounds impossible, doesn't it,
+but"--he flushed boyishly--"I believe in _Le bon Dieu_, and the _union
+libre_ is hard on women.  Yes, I adored Guerchouni.  He worked day and
+night, he feared nothing, he did impossibilities himself and he made us
+do impossibilities."
+
+"He was like Sobrenski."
+
+"Yes, he was like Sobrenski in some ways.  He will be a loss to the
+Cause."
+
+For a few moments there was silence, and then Arithelli spoke.  "Tell
+me one more thing.  Now we are alone, we can speak the truth to each
+other, you and I.  Vardri, do you still care for the Cause--in the same
+way you did before?"  She whispered the question fearfully, yet knowing
+well what the answer must be.
+
+"I don't feel the same about it since I have known you."
+
+"I have not tried to make you a traitor, have I?  Sobrenski always
+suspects me of that."
+
+"My sweet, you have done nothing.  I love you, therefore I must feel
+differently about the Cause.  Why?  Because I'm afraid of it for you.
+Because these men have no consideration for you as a woman, because
+they always make you take the greatest risks.  It is always so in this
+work.  Look what happens to the women in Russia.  When there is a
+political 'Execution' there, nine times out of ten it is a woman who
+throws the bomb.  Look at the things they have done lately.  At the
+printing office we see all the anarchist journals, and the comrades get
+news privately.  The men do little in risking their lives compared to
+the women, and some of them are so young.  An article in '_Les temps
+Nouveaux_' of last week said that, '_beside the men these young girls
+are as artistes beside artisans_.'  The last case was Sophia Pervesky.
+She was arrested for being in charge of a secret printing-press.
+Before the police seized her she nearly found time to put her lighted
+cigarette down on a pile of explosives.  They wounded her in two
+places, threw her down, and stamped on her injuries.  Then they took
+her to the hospital and kept her there till she had recovered.  She
+waited two months for death and then they brought her out one morning
+in the dawn and hanged her.
+
+"'You shall see how a Russian woman dies,' she told them as she ran up
+the ladder and flung herself into space.
+
+"You women shame us with your courage.  Now every time I hear of a
+thing like that, I think of you.  You may have to run some great risk
+here for a caprice of Sobrenski's."
+
+"Vardri, Vardri, I wonder what will be the end of it all?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+The walls of the Hippodrome were no longer adorned with gaudy posters
+whereon flared a travestied portrait of "_The beautiful English
+equestrienne_."  No longer for Arithelli were showered roses, the
+tribute of head-lines in the weekly journals, and the welcome of many
+voices.  She had been absent for nearly a month, therefore she might as
+well have been dead as far as the Spanish public was concerned.
+
+The Manager had known this and had been careful to provide his patrons
+with a new toy, who had come, even as Arithelli herself, from Paris.
+This was a female contortionist with a serpent's grace, and a serpent's
+flat head, and wicked slit eyes.  She had proved a success, so he could
+afford to exult, and Estelle dangled in triumph a new pair of diamond
+earrings.  He had lost nothing and the once famous Arithelli, the
+"_She-wolf_" who had been mad enough to defy him, was now simply one of
+the crowd.  Her name did not appear on the programme.  She was not even
+Madame Mignonne now, but merely a unit among the many other women who
+were grouped in the grand spectacle, or a rider in a procession with
+twenty others.  He had reduced her salary to a third of what it had
+been formerly, and every Saturday she was required to assist with the
+correspondence and weekly accounts.  If she did not like this
+arrangement, he explained, she could fight out the terms of her
+contract in the courts.  Doubtless she had a great opinion of her own
+capabilities, but as she could see for herself her place had been
+easily filled.  The world was large, and there were plenty of
+women--_sacré_, too many!
+
+As usual he was disappointed in the effect of his remarks.  Whether her
+silence meant indifference or sheer stupidity he was never quite sure.
+As Arithelli had no vanity the loss of her position meant little to her.
+
+The loss of a private dressing-room meant a great deal.  It was a
+refined torture to her to be herded among the other women, with their
+noise and quarrelling and coarse jokes.  She found changes too.  Her
+friend the toothless lion had succumbed to old age, several of the
+helpers had been changed, and Vardri was no longer near at hand to lift
+her on to her horse and wait to help her dismount.  Whenever he could
+get away from Vladimir and the newspaper office, he was among the
+spectators, and their thoughts and glances met across the wide arena's
+space.  Emile did not come regularly now though he took care there was
+always someone sent to bring her home.
+
+Since the night of the alarms in the Calle de Pescadores, the
+Brotherhood had decided in council that they must change their place of
+meeting, at any rate for a time, and that no part of the city itself
+could be considered safe for the purposes of a meeting place.
+
+They must keep to the hut up in the mountains.  This had been seldom
+used on account of the difficulty in getting there, and the waste of
+time involved by the distance.  In all respects it was safer.  If they
+were surprised it was not likely they would all be caught, for in the
+open there was always a chance of escape.  The distance and lonely
+situation were all in their favour.  In a small house in a narrow
+street they were like trapped animals.
+
+The custom was to start at midnight on the outskirts of the town,
+collecting by degrees, and when they were well on their way the
+cavalcade joined together and formed into Indian file.
+
+Some were on horseback and some on the more sure-footed mules.
+
+Not one among the conspirators could ride with the exception of Vardri
+and Emile, and the knowledge of the art possessed by the latter was
+poor enough.
+
+The steeds of the general company went at whatever pace they chose and
+in what direction they saw fit, and occasionally two or three got
+wedged together in some narrow place and there was an interlude of
+kicking and squealing.
+
+Then "Fatalité" was called to the rescue as being the only one among
+them capable of managing horseflesh.
+
+When not required in her office of peacemaker she was sent on in front
+as guide to the procession, dressed in her boy's disguise and astride
+the most vicious of the mules.  These excursions meant less rest for
+her than ever for the party seldom returned till five o'clock in the
+morning.
+
+Emile had told her that she must get her sleep up in the hut.
+
+"You have two hours to yourself," he said.  "You can't sleep up there?
+Nonsense!  Make up your mind to do it and then you will."
+
+The building in question, which was more like an outhouse than anything
+else, she had christened, "The Black Hole of Calcutta."  The upper
+part, which was approached by a ladder as a loft would be, was used as
+a meeting-room, while the ground floor became a temporary stable for
+the horses and mules, of which she was left in charge.  Since the scene
+in that upper room in the Calle de Pescadores she had put herself
+outside all consideration; and Sobrenski now excluded her from all work
+other than the merest drudgery.  Vardri was also kept under
+surveillance.  It was felt by all that in some quarter treachery lurked
+as yet undiscovered, and every man suspected his comrades.  There were
+indications that someone, hitherto a sworn ally of the Cause, had
+turned spy and sold certain information to the authorities.
+
+Even Sobrenski's iron nerves were stretched to breaking point.
+
+The rest tried to drown anxiety in _absinthe_, and all grew daily more
+morose and uncertain of temper.
+
+The first sensation came in the shape of a rumour that Count Vladimir's
+companion, Pauline Souvaroff, had disappeared.
+
+Only three people knew that she had vanished utterly and completely on
+the same day that she had received a communication from the leader.
+The note had been brought to her by Vladimir himself.  He could guess
+at its contents, but Pauline had revealed nothing.
+
+Two hours afterwards when he went on shore she was shut up in her
+cabin, and he had not interrupted her, thinking she was asleep.  When
+he returned, and found her door unlocked, and her cabin empty, a
+suspicion of the truth occurred to him.
+
+Everything was left in perfect order, but there was no letter, no word
+of explanation.  He questioned the crew, and heard that she had been
+rowed to shore by two of them soon after he left.  She had given the
+men orders not to wait, but to return at once to the yacht.  For a week
+Vladimir hunted through street and slum.  At the end of that time he
+knew that alive or dead he would never see Pauline Souvaroff again.
+The missive he had brought her from Sobrenski had probably meant a
+journey for her to one of the great centres of the movement--Amsterdam,
+Geneva, or perhaps even London.
+
+Alphonse of Spain was now in England, having escaped two attempts upon
+his life in Paris, and in his own capital.  His every moment would be
+watched and noted by the destroyers of monarchy.  Probably she had been
+chosen to obtain information, because women made better spies than men,
+and their movements were not so likely to be noticed by the police.
+Many a high official whose name was on the list of those condemned to
+death by a revolutionary tribunal had been tracked from city to city by
+female agents.
+
+Yet, if she had been sent on such an errand, what reason could she have
+had for going in secret, alone and without a word of farewell?  He had
+supposed it impossible that she could have kept anything from him; of
+course there must eventually be separation.  He had warned her of that.
+And when it came he had expected scenes, tears and a frantic appeal.
+
+That she should vanish in silence was inconceivable.  Perhaps she had
+not cared for him so much after all.  In any case the episode had been
+a charming one, and to him no woman could ever have been more than an
+episode.  He had shown her some of the many beautiful things and places
+of the world, and by her own words he had made her happy.  Now their
+play time was over.  He had his work and she hers.  She had come into
+his life as a piece of driftwood floats to shore on the edge of a wave,
+and gone out of it as noiselessly.
+
+Vladimir did not discuss his private affairs, so that among all the
+conspirators Emile alone knew, and it was Emile alone who guessed the
+truth.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+  "Tout passe, tout casse, tout lasse."
+
+
+For some days Arithelli had not seen Emile, and she had wondered.
+Since the night she had sat with Vardri in his room, he had scarcely
+spoken to her except for a few moments on business matters.
+
+She thought he looked haggard and worried, and there was a change that
+she could not define in his manner towards her.  She wondered if he
+knew about Vardri, if he thought she was deceiving him.
+
+She wanted to tell of this new, wonderful thing that had befallen her,
+but he had given her no chance, and she had begun to think that he did
+not even take sufficient interest in her to care what she thought or
+felt as long as she performed her allotted tasks and did not worry him
+with complaints or questions.
+
+The feeling of a barrier between them troubled her vaguely, and she was
+glad when she found him one night waiting for her outside the stage
+door.
+
+Half an hour later he was smoking a cigarette in her room while she
+brushed her hair.
+
+They had been silent for some time, and both started when the door was
+assaulted by a sudden thump, and the scarecrow-like visage of the
+depressed landlady appeared in the opening.
+
+Having delivered herself of a small cardboard box, and a few grumbling
+comments upon the indecent hours and ways of circus performers, she
+withdrew, and Arithelli proceeded to cut the string and remove the lid.
+
+"I can't see what it is in this light," she said; "Emile, may I have
+the candle a little nearer?  Flowers?  No one sends me flowers now.
+But these are--"
+
+Her voice broke and stopped.  Emile, who had been on the alert from the
+moment of the landlady's entrance, sprang up and pulled the girl to one
+side.  A mysterious parcel at that hour of the night, too late for any
+post.  One might have guessed what it meant.
+
+"What is it?" he asked sharply.  The answer was an incoherent one, and
+he could see that she was paralysed with terror.
+
+The opening of the box had revealed a sinister-looking bouquet of
+artificial black roses tied with blood-red ribbons.
+
+In Barcelona there are many strange and ingenious ways of conveying
+death by explosives.  A clock, a painted casket which might contain
+bon-bons; a coffee-pot, a _casserole_--any apparently harmless and
+common utensil.
+
+A bunch of flowers was one of the most common mediums for a bomb.
+
+The Anarchist colours showed clearly that it must either have been sent
+by an enemy who had been formerly one of the band, and who was now
+revenging himself by an attempt to see his former associates "hoist
+with their own petard," or else it was an affair of the police.  In any
+case, supposing the thing to be harmless, it was a warning of danger.
+
+Emile's wits worked swiftly, and he was used to emergencies.  He looked
+round, and found a jug of water, and the floral tribute floated
+harmlessly therein.  As it did not sink at once he concluded that there
+was no concealed bomb.  Then he turned his attention to Arithelli, and
+gave her a vigorous shaking, which was probably, under the
+circumstances, the best possible restorative.
+
+"You'll die more than once in imagination before your time comes,
+Fatalité.  Probably the next parcel you receive will not need as much
+investigation."
+
+She tried to smile.  "I'm sorry!  They looked so uncanny, and when I
+saw red I thought--Emile, what does it all mean?"
+
+"It means danger, my dear.  It means that you are suspected.  You
+yourself best know whether the suspicion is deserved or not.  Of course
+it may be only one of the police tricks, but I don't think so.  Anyway
+whether it was charged or not it's safe enough now.  Look in the box
+and on the floor to see if there's any note or message.  There isn't?
+_Eh bien_!  I suppose they thought this would speak with sufficient
+eloquence."
+
+He fished the bedraggled bouquet out of the water and hung it like a
+trophy across Arithelli's mirror, which was a fetish of its owner and
+the one valuable thing she now possessed.  It had been the gift of
+Michael Furness, who had bought it from the Jewish herbalist.  It was
+of antique silver gilt in oval shape, and rimmed with rough topaz set
+in silver, and was alleged by its former owner to have been the
+property of Agnès Sorél.  Arithelli had often declared that in it she
+could see visions as in a crystal.
+
+Over it Emile carefully arranged the flowers so that the stained red
+ribbons hung limply across the polished surface.  Then he sat down
+again and lighted another cigarette.
+
+"You ought not to be afraid of this sort of thing, you know," he said.
+"Sudden death is part of our business.  In the oath we take we swear to
+'Slay or be slain,' if by so doing we can advance the Cause one small
+step forward."
+
+She caught at her breast with a sudden gesture of passion.
+Death--could they talk and think of nothing else?  And she was a woman
+now, not a weapon, and she wanted life.
+
+"You don't seem very enthusiastic," the cold voice continued.  "A few
+months ago the dangerous side of the game was rather an attraction to
+you than otherwise.  Now you shrink and shiver at everything.  You do
+your work, yes, because, you can't help doing that, but is there any
+heart in what you do?"
+
+"None!  Every day I live, I loathe it more!"
+
+"Take care!"
+
+"I'm past caring.  When I came out here first I was a child playing at
+a new game."
+
+Emile's back was turned to her, and if his answering speech was brutal,
+it was because his conscience was awake and crying fiercely.  He would
+not be likely to make the mistake of interfering with people's lives a
+second time.  He had seen in her an instrument to be handled at will,
+and had charged himself with the burden of her destiny, and now he
+supposed she was about to reproach him.
+
+"You are hysterical.  That's the worst of women.  They always are--more
+or less.  You had better go to bed, and not talk nonsense.  If you were
+a child only a few months ago you are not too old to be treated as one
+now."
+
+It hurt him more than it hurt her, but she would never know that.  His
+pulses hammered furiously as she dropped at his side with a soft rustle
+of garments.  Her clasped hands rested on his knee; the strong, slender
+hands that had grown rough with work.
+
+"Emile," she whispered, "can't you see that I've altered?  I'm a woman
+now.  You said I should be one soon.  I've wanted to tell you all
+along, but I always hoped you had guessed."
+
+"Perhaps I did, but I preferred that you should tell me yourself.  And
+since when have you become what you call 'a woman'?  No, you needn't
+answer.  When I knew that you and Vardri had been together in my rooms,
+I was certain I had not warned you without reason."
+
+"You knew before I did myself."
+
+"_Mon enfant_, I'm neither blind nor a fool.  As they say in this
+country, 'love and a cough cannot be hidden.'  I was sure about Vardri,
+but about you;--no, one couldn't say.  When you came out here you were
+a sexless creature with a brain.  It did not seem likely that you would
+develop into the ordinary girl with a lover."
+
+It was the only way he could keep a hold upon himself, by keeping up a
+pose of cynicism.  The fragrance of her hair, the curved mouth so close
+to his own, maddened him.  He who could have been her lover had been
+only her guardian, her taskmaster.  And now she was ready to give
+herself to a boy, who thought life was a romance, and who would
+probably sit at her feet reading poetry while they both starved.
+
+"You have been together often?"
+
+Her head drooped.  "Yes.  I should have told you before."
+
+"What plans have you made?  I suppose it will be the usual mad scheme
+of running away.  I ought to betray you, of course, but--"
+
+"We haven't arranged anything yet; there is plenty of time."
+
+"Plenty of time--Mon Dieu!" the man rasped out.  "How like you,
+Fatalité!  What a pair!  Vardri always living _au clair de la lune_,
+and you half asleep, and full of illusions.  _Les illusions sont les
+hirondelles_.  How often have I told you that?"
+
+"They make life possible," Arithelli answered softly.
+
+Again the man stared and marvelled.  Verily, here was another being who
+was neither "Becky Sharp" nor "Fatalité."  The exultation, the triumph
+of one loved and desired, was hers for the moment.  Who, seeing her
+now, could have the heart to warn her of inevitable disillusion, the
+doubts and fears, the clinging and the torments that are the heritage
+of all womenkind.
+
+He, too, had once dreamed foolish dreams.
+
+He gripped her by the shoulder and forced her to look at him.
+
+"Vardri is your lover?  You shall answer me before I leave this room."
+
+She did not flinch, or blush, or look away.
+
+"I love him."
+
+Joy shone in her widely open eyes.  Love hovered about her mouth, and
+the passion that had stirred in him momentarily shrank back ashamed.
+He pushed back her hair with a rough caress.
+
+"It's all right, _ma chère_.  You needn't be afraid.  I shall not be
+here to advise you soon, and all I have to say now is, never imagine
+yourself secure for an instant.  Sobrenski is bound to discover this in
+the course of time, and he has seen this sort of thing before, which
+will not make him any more merciful.  He has watched human nature long
+enough to know that where there is what you would call love, people
+want to create, they no longer want to destroy.  If, as you say, you
+have made no plans, then make them.  And now you'd better go to bed,
+unless you want to look more like a ghost than usual to-morrow."
+
+As he went out into the moonlit street Emile knew that he had taken the
+first step on his _Via Crucis_.  He did not call it that, for of
+religion in the orthodox sense he possessed nothing, but he knew that
+his feet were set upon the path where snow and blood would mingle in
+his footprints.  He was going back to Russia, where death would be a
+thing to be welcomed and desired.  He had listened to the tales of
+escaped prisoners, and he knew that no words could exaggerate this
+frozen Hell in which flourished vices unnamable, where men rotted
+alive, and women strangled themselves with their own hair, or cut their
+throats with a scrap of glass to escape the brutalities of a gaoler or
+Cossack guard.
+
+He wondered whether it would be Akatui, or the mines, for him.  It was
+no use to try and delude himself that he could escape the police.
+
+He had got out of Russia by the skin of his teeth last time, and, even
+if he managed to get his despatches safely delivered, there would be a
+raid on the newspaper office, an arrest in the street.  Of course there
+was always the hope that he might come in for a chance shot in a
+scrimmage, but that was too much luck to expect.
+
+He had nothing to wait for now after what he had heard to-night, and
+the sooner he put himself out of the way, the better.  He would
+volunteer at once for the St. Petersburg mission.  The usual custom was
+to cast lots, unless some enthusiast begged for the privilege of a
+speedy doom.  By virtue of his long service he had a right to claim
+that privilege.
+
+If he could go to-morrow so much the better.  After what Arithelli had
+confessed it would be dangerous for them both if he stayed.  For a
+moment the primaeval man in him leapt up, telling him that he had only
+to pit himself against Vardri, and the victory would be assuredly his
+own.  His rival was only a boy, and Emile knew that if there came the
+struggle between male and male, the odds were all in his own favour.
+Arithelli had grown into the habit of obedience to him, and if he
+wished it he could make it practically impossible for her to see Vardri
+without his knowledge and consent.  She would sorrow for her lover at
+first, but he was a man, and he could make her forget.
+
+A thousand little devils crowded close, whispering how easy it would be
+to get Vardri sent out of the way.  A few words to Sobrenski, and the
+whole thing would be done.
+
+His sense of justice reminded him that he least of all people had a
+right to grudge her a few hours of happiness.  If he obliterated
+himself he was only making her a deserved reparation for some of the
+things she had suffered.  Through him she had joined the Anarchist
+ranks, and through him she had taken vows that despoiled her of the
+hopes and joys of womanhood, and transformed her into an instrument of
+vengeance.  She had apparently never realised that she had been in any
+way injured, for she had never blamed him, and been invariably grateful
+for anything he had done for her physical comfort.
+
+She loved Vardri, or imagined that she did.  Emile told himself
+savagely that he was a fool who deserved no pity, for he had had his
+own chance and missed it.  He had been with her by night and day, and
+her life had been in his own hands all these months, but he had never
+made love to her.  He had only bullied her, taught her, made her work,
+looked after her clothes and food, and, he knew it now too late, loved
+her.
+
+She had never suspected it, and the secret should remain his own.  Love
+and love-making were two very different things.  She did not know that
+now, but later on she would, when she was ten years older, perhaps, and
+then it would not matter to him, for he would be under two or three
+feet of snow in a Siberian convict settlement.
+
+He had gone about persuading himself that she was still a child, and
+this Austrian boy, this wastrel and dreamer, had awakened her.
+
+It was no use wasting time in sentiment and regrets.  _À la Guerre,
+comme à la Guerre_.  The episode was finished.
+
+He would have work enough to divert his mind soon.  There was nothing
+left to him now but the Cause.
+
+He would see Sobrenski to-morrow, and hurry on all arrangements for
+departure.
+
+After all, as he had once told Arithelli, in any venture it is only the
+first step that counts.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+  "Would I lose you now?  Would I take you then?
+    If I lose you now that my heart has need,
+  And come what may after death to men,
+    What thing worth this will the dead years breed?"
+            THE TRIUMPH OF TIME.
+
+
+Three days later the early morning post brought Arithelli a letter.
+
+She sat up in bed eagerly to receive it, and with the heaviness of
+sleep still upon her eyes.  As she read, the lace at her throat
+trembled with her quickened breathing, and her heart called back an
+answer to the tender, reckless phrases.
+
+Vardri was idealist as well as lover, and graceful turns of expression
+came to his pen readily and without effort.  In many pages of
+characteristic, hurried, irregular writing he set forth wild and
+unpractical schemes for their future.
+
+He urged her to take the dangerous step of leaving Barcelona and
+cutting herself free of the bonds of her allegiance to the Cause.
+
+If there was risk in going, he wrote, there was infinitely more risk in
+remaining.
+
+If he abandoned his political views it was more than likely that his
+father would receive him.  Their quarrel and parting four years ago had
+been solely on those grounds, and he was the only son, and there were
+large estates to be inherited.
+
+If it were the price of gaining her he was prepared to renounce all his
+theories, socialist and revolutionist.
+
+He had been able to save a little money lately, enough for their
+journey to Austria.  He was sure of a welcome among the officials and
+work-people of his former home.  The wife of the steward had been his
+mother's maid, and she and her husband would give him shelter till he
+could see his father and make terms.
+
+If things turned out well then his life and Arithelli's would be one
+long fairy-tale, which should begin where all other fairy-tales ended.
+If his father refused to see him then surely they could both find some
+engagement in another circus or Hippodrome.
+
+She had the advantage of the reputation she had gained here, and he
+could work in the stables again, and they would be free and together.
+
+Arithelli kissed the letter, before she put it down, and lay back with
+her hands over her eyes, trying to think.  She had begun her adventures
+by running away from home, and now for the second time her only course
+was flight.  Even Emile had told her not to waste time in going.  For
+her it seemed there was never to be any peace or rest.
+
+If they could only find some haven away from all the world, she
+thought.  A forest or desert, some unknown spot where there was air and
+space and natural savage beauty, a tent to dwell in, a horse to ride,
+complete freedom, the life of her remote ancestors, simple, dignified.
+
+Once she had craved for change.  Now she feared it.  She knew what
+Vardri had ignored, that the moment they both left Barcelona they would
+become fugitives.  If they were discovered they would be treated simply
+as deserters from the ranks of an army.
+
+Instinctively her thoughts turned to Emile.  It was he who must help
+her to decide.  She slid out of bed, and commenced her toilet, while
+she recalled to mind the things that must be got through during the
+day.  There was a manuscript to be delivered to Sobrenski, an article
+of Jean Grave's from _Les Temps Nouveaux_ which she had copied for
+reproduction.
+
+She finished dressing her hair, and pushed the window more widely open,
+for the sound of music in the distance had caught her ear.
+
+Though it was now autumn, and in England there would have been mist and
+gloom and fogs, here the sun shone, and the air was sweet and mild.
+
+The parching, exhausting heat of the summer was gone, and everything
+smelt fresh and clean, without any touch of winter cold.
+
+Down below in the Calle Catriona the music swelled louder and higher
+till her attic room was filled with the dancing notes.
+
+Along the pavement two men walked slowly with guitar and flageolet.
+
+They walked turning in opposite directions, their heads thrown back,
+their feet keeping step, two black-haired, supple vagabonds of gypsy
+breed, who had come down to the city from their mountain home on the
+heights of Montserrat.
+
+The guitar twanged merrily, the reed-like notes of the flute were true
+and clear as the song of a thrush.  The melody turned and climbed and
+twisted, rose to a climax, and re-commenced again the same phrase.
+Arithelli listened, hypnotised and bewitched, as she always was by
+music.
+
+Something wild and primitive in her responded to the shrill, sweet,
+insistent call.  She had felt like that before, listening to the
+Tziganes on the Rambla, and it was as if the heart were being dragged
+out of her body.  She thought of the childish story of the Piper of
+Hamelin.  She could understand now what had made the children follow
+him with dancing footsteps, through street to street, on, on from dawn
+till dusk.
+
+The guitar-player glanced up in passing and mocked her with laughing
+eyes.  An orange-coloured scarf left his brown throat exposed, and
+there were gold rings in his ears.  She kissed her hand and called down
+greetings in Spanish, and stood at the window, watching and listening
+and longing to run out into the street and follow as the children
+followed through the town of Hamelin.
+
+All the joy of life was in those oft-repeated and alluring phrases, the
+fall of water, the hum of bees, the shiver of aspen leaves, the slow
+music of a breaking wave.
+
+She strained to hear the last faint echoes till all sound was hidden by
+a turn of the road, and the brief enchantment was at an end, leaving
+her to the realities of life.
+
+She dressed slowly, singing under her breath as she plaited her hair
+before Agnès Sorél's mirror.  Before she left the room she thrust the
+loose sheets of Vardri's letter between the folds of her blouse,
+leaving the envelope lying among the bed clothes.
+
+Late in the afternoon one of the "comrades" brought her a cipher
+message, warning her of a meeting arranged to take place in the "Black
+Hole" up in the hills.
+
+Half an hour after she left the Hippodrome she was in boy's clothes and
+riding out to the _rendezvous_ to wait till the others appeared.  She
+had hoped for the chance of a talk with Emile, but to her surprise he
+was not among those who mustered outside the town.  She had never known
+him to be absent from a meeting before, but it was not her business to
+ask questions.
+
+While the rest of the company occupied themselves with long and
+bloodthirsty orations, and hatched fresh schemes for the destruction of
+their fellow-creatures, and the regeneration of the whole earth, she
+went quietly about her duties as stable boy.
+
+When she had finished she set the lantern at the furthest end of the
+stable, and pulling off her hat and black curly wig stretched herself
+wearily at full length on a truss of hay in a dark corner among the
+tethered horses.  The ways of men she had begun to fear and hate, but
+of the beasts she had no fear, for they were always grateful to those
+who cared for them, and they also had suffered at the hands of their
+masters.
+
+A lethargy had taken possession of her whole body, and her limbs felt
+heavily weighted.  She closed her eyes and sank inertly into the bed of
+soft and fragrant hay.
+
+Her loose shirt of faded dusky red had fallen open at the throat, and
+showed the dead-white skin.  Her feet, in riding boots of brown
+leather, were crossed beneath the dark drapery of her cloak.  A leather
+strap served as a belt for the slender hips that were more like those
+of a boy than a woman.  The horses fidgeted and stamped, and a mule
+dragged at its halter with laid-back ears and vicious sidelong glances.
+Sometimes a stirrup or a bit clashed against another with a musical
+ring and jingle.
+
+Arithelli heard nothing till she awoke to find herself in Vardri's
+arms, and being lifted into a sitting position with her back against
+the wall.
+
+In answer to her sleepy murmur of surprise, a hand was laid over her
+mouth with a whispered--"_Gare à toi petite! ne fais pas de bruit_."
+
+She sat up fully awake, and swept the veil of hair out of her eyes.
+
+"Oh!  it's you, _mon ami_!  Is it time to go?  I must get up and see to
+the horses."
+
+But he held her kneeling by her side.
+
+"No, no!  Lie still, dear.  There's time enough.  Yes, Sobrenski is
+still talking.  Can't you hear him?  You had my letter safely?"
+
+She laid her hand on her breast.
+
+"It's here."
+
+"Thank you!  How long is it since I've seen you?  It seems like a
+century.  Those brutes up there were driving me mad with their
+cold-blooded arrangements for wholesale murder.  The latest idea is to
+explode a bomb outside one of the big _cafés_ when Alfonso comes here
+next week to inspect the troops.  They might as well leave him alone.
+What harm has he done them?  As long as they can see people flying into
+atoms with the help of a little nitroglycerine they are quite happy.
+Vengeance, vengeance!  That is their eternal cry.  Of course in Russia
+it's a different thing.  One must either be an autocrat and
+slave-driver or a Nihilist out there, but here--they are mad, all of
+them!  They have just settled to draw lots to-morrow night.  I wonder
+who will have the 'honour' of becoming executioner?  I suppose they
+can't do it to-night because Poleski isn't here."
+
+Arithelli shook her head.
+
+"That is not the reason.  They have given Emile other work to do in
+Russia.  He is leaving here very soon.  I thought you knew."
+
+"Who told you that Poleski is going away?  It may not be true."
+
+"Emile himself.  Oh! it's true enough.  I don't know when he will go.
+He doesn't know himself, but soon."
+
+"Will you trust me to take care of you when Poleski is gone?"
+
+"I'll trust you always."
+
+"Promise me you'll come away with me.  If you care you'll come.  I'll
+give up the Cause for your sake.  I've told you so in my letter and now
+I say it again."
+
+"So I've made you a traitor.  Sobrenski was right."
+
+"My sweet, how can I live with violence and death and misery since I
+have known you?  I want to get away from men and back to Nature to be
+healed.  It doesn't follow that because I have grown to hate some of
+the revolutionist methods that I am against all their theories.  I
+believe they are right in sharing things, in fighting for those who are
+trodden down by the rich, but you and I can still believe all that
+without becoming inhuman.  Think of Sobrenski.  He's a werewolf, not a
+man!  Promise me that you'll come soon.  Let me take you away before
+they make you one of their 'angels of vengeance,' as they call these
+women of the revolution."
+
+Excitement and the feverish devil of consumption had turned his blood
+to fire.  He would take no denial, pay no heed to Arithelli's
+entreaties for time to think, and to consult Emile.
+
+For once he forgot to be gentle, and dragged her head back roughly,
+whispering passionate words, his face pressed against her own.  For a
+moment he saw no longer the goddess on her ivory throne, but a woman of
+flesh and blood, warm, living, and fragrant and to be desired after a
+man's fashion.
+
+Arithelli closed her eyes and leant back, yielding herself to his
+caresses.  The pressure of his hand across her throat hurt her, but in
+some strange way it also gave her pleasure.  Love, the schoolmaster,
+again stood by her side teaching her the lesson learnt sooner or later
+by all women, that pain at the hands of one beloved is a thing close
+akin to joy.  She felt incapable of any struggle or resistance, bodily
+or mental.  She had given her heart therefore her body was also his to
+use as he willed, and feeling her thus abandoned to him all the boy's
+chivalry was stirred anew, and the hunger for possession was lost in
+the desire to serve and protect.
+
+Possibly if he had been forty instead of twenty-eight, he would perhaps
+have demanded a man's rights.  Being, however, according to the world's
+standard, a fool and a dreamer, he chose to let the moment pass, to
+refuse what the gods offered, to think of Arithelli rather than of
+himself.
+
+"I'm hurting you, dear."  His voice shook a little, in spite of his
+efforts to control it.
+
+"No.  Nothing hurts now.  And I'm glad you love me."
+
+"I hurt you a minute ago.  I was mad and a beast.  Will you forgive me?
+You are not frightened?"
+
+"No.  I was only thinking of the future of tomorrow."
+
+"Let us forget to-morrow," the boy pleaded.  "Can you not forget for
+once?"
+
+"We have to-day, and each other.  '_Aujourd'hui le Printemps, Ninon_.'
+It's summer for us now, Fatalité!  When one loves there is always
+summer."
+
+He drew her out into the starlight as he heard the noise of the men
+pushing back their seats and moving about overhead.
+
+Several voices were raised in angry altercation.
+
+He raged inwardly as he thought how in a few minutes he would have to
+see her at the orders of them all, sent here and there, at everyone's
+call, and forced to work without either thanks or reward.
+
+"Let me go in, dear," Arithelli said.  "They will expect to find things
+ready."
+
+But Vardri held her back.
+
+"Let them expect!  Give them the trouble of looking for you.  They keep
+you up all night, so they can afford to waste a few minutes extra."
+
+It was both a foolish and useless protest and Arithelli knew that she
+would pay afterwards for these snatched moments, but she did not grudge
+the price, for to her they seemed worth the payment required.
+
+She was glad of the air too.
+
+She turned a little in Vardri's arms, lifting her face to the soft
+night wind.  The coolness and the dark were like the touch of a
+soothing hand.
+
+The branches of the tree under which they stood rustled softly, and the
+undergrowth stirred with the startled movements of some awakened bird
+or small animal.
+
+A bat flew past, almost brushing them with its velvet wings.  From the
+marsh lands below the dangerous white mist hovered like a fairy veil.
+
+"I love the night," Arithelli whispered.  "It makes me want to do all
+sorts of things.  Do you remember the story of Marguerite of France,
+who heard the gypsies singing under her window and leant out and called
+to them to take her away.  I feel like that.  Do you understand?"
+
+Vardri drew her closer.  "I know, my heart.  Tell me more."
+
+"There were some gypsies singing under my window this morning,"
+Arithelli went on.  "I wished I could have gone out and followed them
+'over the hills and far away' like the children in the old rhymes.  The
+Irish and Jewish people have always been wanderers.  Perhaps that is
+why I am fated never to stay long in one place."
+
+He answered her in the same mood.
+
+"We'll start at once, shall we, Fatalité?  We'll saddle two of the
+horses and ride, ride day and night till we come to Montserrat, and
+there we shall find your gypsies and their tribe.  When you come to my
+country there'll be gypsies too, and they shall play and sing for you,
+and you'll know what music is for the first time."
+
+"How foolish we are!"  Her eyes were wet, but she was smiling.  "If
+Emile heard me talking like this he would be so angry."
+
+"He talked like this once," Vardri replied.  "Poleski was young too not
+so very long ago, and he loved someone."
+
+"Yes, I know."  She found it almost impossible to think of Emile as a
+lover in spite of the photograph she had found, and the words in his
+own writing upon his songs.  She knew them by heart.  "_Emile à Marie.
+Sans toi la mort_."  And on another, "_Etoile de mon âme!  Je vous
+adore de tout mon coeur, ton Emile_."
+
+Perhaps it was the memory of this passion of his youth that had made
+him kind to her.
+
+While they talked and lingered, Sobrenski was descending the rickety
+ladder that served as a staircase.
+
+He had noticed Vardri's exit from the room, as he noticed everything
+else.  All the other men had been too excited to care whether one more
+or less was there or not.  In the hot argument that raged in the upper
+room, the absence of one of the members of the Brotherhood was
+apparently forgotten.
+
+Their leader, however, did not lose his head or his powers of
+observation even when matters of life or death were in the balance.
+Whatever he did was always done deliberately and in cold blood.
+
+All the time he had been apparently presiding over the discussion he
+had also been thinking rapidly.
+
+It would be to his ultimate advantage not to interfere with Arithelli
+and Vardri just now, but to let them be together, to see as much of
+each other as possible.  It was as well that Vardri should become
+thoroughly infatuated, as then he would be certain to take some step
+that would bring things to a crisis.  They would be sure to try to
+escape out of the country and hide themselves somewhere.  They would
+not be the first people who had tried that sort of thing before.
+
+In the course of his life he had known others who had flung the Cause
+and their vows to the winds from fear or passion and tried to hide
+themselves under some disguise.
+
+If they happened to be clever and have plenty of money their escape had
+been fairly easy, and they had even been safe for perhaps a year or so.
+Then just as they had begun to feel secure and had grown careless, the
+vengeance of their own particular circle had overtaken them.  There had
+been accounts in the newspapers of a mysterious tragedy to which no
+motive could be assigned, and for which no one could be brought to
+justice, and that was all.
+
+They were all monotonously alike, these affairs!
+
+Sobrenski had said little to anyone else of his suspicions.
+
+No need to declare anyone a traitor till it was proven.  Such things
+had a demoralising effect, and treachery was an infectious disease.
+
+He descended the uneven rungs of the ladder, treading soft-footed as a
+cat.
+
+There was no noise of talking, so of course she was asleep.  _Sacré_,
+these lazy women!  So she could not keep awake even for a lover!
+
+The place was dark except for the glimmering light at the far end, and
+he was obliged to feel his way to avoid the mules, who had an evil
+trick of lashing out with their heels at anything in the vicinity.
+
+At the foot of the steps he trod on a riding whip, which he recognised
+as one belonging to Vardri.
+
+In the dim circle of light cast by the smoky lamp there was only a
+truss of hay disordered as if someone had lain upon it, and the
+_manta_, and other things belonging to Arithelli.
+
+There was one thing more, a sheet of paper covered closely with an
+untidy scrawl.
+
+The lynx eyes flashed, and Sobrenski bent eagerly forward.
+
+Bad as the light was it had not taken him long to recognise the writing.
+
+He held it close to the lamp, and smiled with satisfaction.
+
+Nothing could be better from his point of view.  In the first sentence
+there was all, even more, than he wanted.
+
+He smoothed it out between his pointed fingers, folded it, and bestowed
+it carefully in an inside pocket.
+
+It was just the kind of thing he would have expected from a girl of
+Arithelli's type,--to go about dropping letters.  She had not method
+enough even to put on her clothes decently; they always looked as if
+they were falling off, and her hair as if it was coming down.
+
+_Sapristi_!  A fine agent for the Cause! and one fit to be trusted with
+important documents.
+
+Poleski must have been quite mad when he suggested introducing her to
+the Brotherhood, and he himself deserved even more blame for having as
+much as listened to the suggestion.
+
+A girl of that age, picked up from nowhere, and like the rest of her
+sex a mass of lies and vanity.
+
+He held the lantern above his head, and peered round.  Surely they had
+not been so utterly insane as to have attempted to escape to-night?
+All the horses and mules were there safe enough, and obviously they
+would not attempt to walk.
+
+He strode towards the door, meeting them on the threshold, and in spite
+of himself could not help being impressed by the uncanny likeness
+between the two, in form and outline.
+
+They had even the same trick of movement.
+
+The thought of what he had found made him feel almost good-humoured,
+although he took good care that no one else should benefit by this
+unusual mood.
+
+"You have found yourself a little distraction, _hein_?" he said,
+ignoring Arithelli's presence.  "We are not up here for amusement all
+the same.  There's nothing done.  I supposed you had come down to see
+to the horses."
+
+Vardri strolled across to a rack, and took down an armful of saddles
+and stirrups.
+
+"I have," he answered laconically.  "They'll be ready in five minutes."
+
+Sobrenski turned to the girl, and spoke to her in an undertone.  "What
+are you wasting time for?  See to your work."  Vardri raised his head
+from the adjustment of a girth.
+
+"I'm doing Mademoiselle Arithelli's work.  There is no need for her to
+trouble."  His accents possessed both dignity and command.  For an
+instant their positions were reversed.  The leader smothered an oath;
+but said no more.  He reflected that he could well afford to wait for
+his revenge.  The game was absolutely in his own hands if only they had
+known it.
+
+He could see that they were both perfectly unconscious of the fact that
+they had lost anything.  When they discovered they would most likely
+conclude it had happened during the ride up.
+
+When Arithelli had dragged herself up into her bedroom the sky was
+lighting with the dawn.  They had mistaken the road and gone a mile or
+two out of the way, and one of the men had been thrown off and twisted
+his ankle, and made another halt and delay.  She drew the curtains
+closely and lay down without undressing.
+
+Before she slept she put her hand into her breast, and felt the rustle
+of the thin paper on which Vardri's letter had been written.
+
+It was not until the landlady had nearly battered down her door that
+she stirred four hours later, and then she unfastened her blouse and
+drew out instead of the original two sheets, only one.
+
+She did not feel particularly alarmed; supposing it had been put with
+the envelope that she had left about in the morning.  Her things so
+often got lost, and it was Emile who generally found them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+  "Must a man have hope to fight?
+  Can a man not fight in despair?"
+            "A Polish Insurgent," JAMES THOMPSON.
+
+
+How he lived through his last day in Barcelona Emile never quite knew.
+A strong will, strong tobacco, and plenty of work were all aids in
+helping him to preserve his sanity.
+
+He soon arranged things with Sobrenski, and found no difficulty in
+obtaining the post of messenger in the St. Petersburg affair.
+
+He walked to the Hippodrome while the _matinée_ performance was in
+progress, and left a message for Arithelli at the stage door.
+
+Then he went back to his rooms in the Calle San Antonio, and began to
+make the few necessary preparations for departure.  He was not
+encumbered with worldly goods, and his wardrobe was not extensive, so
+there remained only to look through and destroy all documents, books,
+or letters that could not be carried about or that might involve the
+safety of others.
+
+Certain songs and pieces of music he put together in a pile, the rest
+he tore across and threw into a corner.  He would have no need of these
+amusements now.  Cultivation of the fine arts is not encouraged in the
+political prisons.
+
+At five o'clock Arithelli entered the room, her clothes put on
+carelessly, the grey pallor of intense weariness upon her face.  She
+had been working early and late during the past two days, and the
+thought of the missing letter worried her from time to time.  Sometimes
+she felt almost certain that she had dropped it in changing from her
+circus clothes, and that it had been appropriated out of curiosity by
+one of the women who shared the dressing-room.  As it was written in
+English, they would probably throw it away at once in disgust, annoyed
+at being deprived of the excitement of a romance or scandal.
+
+She knew it would be useless to make enquiries.  If it had been left
+there it had been done late at night, and the dressing-rooms were
+always cleaned early next morning, and it would have been swept away
+with the other rubbish.
+
+She had not said anything about her loss to Vardri.  It would make him
+even more anxious than herself, and she must bear the penalty of her
+own carelessness.
+
+She hoped that after all it would come to light in some box or drawer
+among her clothes.
+
+She came forward noiselessly across the polished, carpetless floor.
+
+"_Bon jour_, Emile!  You wanted me?"
+
+He pointed to a chair.
+
+"Sit down!  Your hat is on crooked--as usual!  Are you so little of a
+woman that you never use a mirror?"
+
+A gleam of fun lit up her eyes.
+
+"You covered mine up the other night with that horrible wreath and
+streamers.  I can only see myself in little bits now."
+
+"Well, sit down and I'll talk to you presently."
+
+Emile returned to the sorting and destruction of his correspondence,
+and Arithelli lay back in her chair with a sigh of content, and closed
+her eyes.  When she opened them again he was standing beside her with a
+glass of red wine in his hand.
+
+"Drink this," he said, giving it to her.
+
+"It isn't _absinthe_, is it?" she asked.  "I can't see in this light,
+and I don't want--"
+
+"It doesn't matter what it is or what you want.  Don't argue, but
+finish it.  How fond you women are of talking!"  He waited till she had
+obeyed him.
+
+"You see that music?  Well, you can take it back with you.  I shall not
+have any more use for music when I leave here.  And listen to me now,
+and don't go to sleep for the next five minutes if you can help it."
+
+He kept full control of himself and his feelings.  If anything his
+voice was a little more rasping than usual, and his dry words of
+counsel and advice were spoken in his ordinary hard, practical manner.
+An outsider would have found it difficult to say which was the more
+indifferent in appearance of these two who had been so strangely
+intimate for half a year, and who were now about to part.
+
+The girl was apathetic from physical fatigue and past emotions.
+
+She thought as she looked round the familiar room how impossible it was
+to believe that she would never be there again after to-day, and that
+Emile would never again come to her.
+
+The wine cleared her brain and made her blood run more quickly.  She
+roused herself to listen to what Emile was saying, and to answer the
+questions he was asking her about her own arrangements.  She thought he
+seemed relieved when she told him of Vardri's scheme, and she
+restrained a strong desire to tell him also about the missing letter.
+
+He gave her an address in the Russian capital to which she could write
+during the next month, warning her at the same time to be careful in
+what she said, to mention no names, and to avoid all references to
+politics, as his correspondence would run the risk of being edited by
+the police.  Inside the envelope on which the address was written he
+had enclosed forty francs.
+
+"You'll probably find a little money useful one of these days," he
+said.  "Keep it till you really want it.  You can't wear more than one
+pair of boots at once, and there are other things more important.  I
+don't want you to thank me.  You can go and sing something instead, and
+do your best as it's for the last time."
+
+Arithelli rose at once and went to the piano, eager to do something
+that might give him pleasure.
+
+She could play for herself now.  Emile had succeeded in teaching her a
+few easy accompaniments, so that he could listen without distraction.
+
+She hesitated for a minute, turning over his big music book, and then
+chose the popular song of the _café-chantants_ and streets, the famous
+"_La Colombe_" with its lilting time, and mingled gaiety and sorrow.
+One heard it everywhere, sung in Spanish, in the local patois, and in
+French, by _artistes_ in the theatres, by factory girls, and sailors,
+and market people.  The _gamins_ and beggars whistled and hummed it in
+the streets and squares.
+
+Emile walked up and down the room as he listened.  He had made her sing
+in the hope of lessening in a small degree the strain he was enduring,
+but what had possessed her to choose this song of all others?  The
+words told of one who was about to set sail, and lingered bidding adieu
+to his Nina, the woman he loved.
+
+  "_Le jour où quittant la terre pour l'océan,
+  Je dis, priez Dieu, priez Dieu pour votre enfant.
+  Avant que nous mettre en route je crus revoir,
+  Nina! qui pleurait sans doute de désespoir._"
+
+
+One could hear the rocking of the boat at anchor, the rippling of the
+out-going tide.
+
+In the second verse the time was changed, the words were hurried and
+insistent.
+
+  "_Nina! si je succombe, el qu'un beau soir,
+  Une blanche colombe vient te voir,
+  Ouvre-lui ta fenêtre car ce sera,
+  Mon âme qui peut-être te reviendra._"
+
+
+Her voice had grown weaker since her illness, and she sang with visible
+exertion and faulty breathing, but it was still the golden voice of the
+Israelitish woman, and there was the same _tîmbre_ that had attracted
+him, and made him speak to her that afternoon in May at the station.
+
+And all that had only happened six months ago!  When she had finished
+he said nothing in approval, but he asked her to sing again, and she
+understood, and was pleased.
+
+"You may thank the Fates for having given you a voice," he told her.
+"It's better than a face.  It lasts longer.  No man having once heard
+you would listen to another woman."
+
+It was the first compliment he had ever made her, but Arithelli did not
+answer.  Her back was turned towards him as she gathered together the
+music.
+
+He could see that her whole body was trembling with repressed sobs.  If
+he could only have been sure they were for him, he would have taken her
+in his arms.  She was sorry he was going, perhaps, in a way, but not in
+the way he wanted.  She had become dependent upon him, and he had
+filled a certain place in her life.  If she made a scene it was
+entirely his own fault.  Farewells were always a mistake, and he had
+been foolish enough to allow her to sing sentimental verses about doves
+and people's wandering souls.  She was over-tired and over-wrought, and
+a woman's tears were more often due to physical than to mental reasons.
+So he argued, trying to convince himself, yet knowing all the time that
+Arithelli was not one of the women whose emotions are on the surface.
+
+Once before he had seen her cry, and now as then he stood apart.  It
+was for Vardri to dry her tears.
+
+He glanced at the clock.  Of course it was wrong, but he knew by the
+shadows that filled the room that it must be time for her to leave if
+she was to appear in public again to-night.
+
+He must hurry the interview to a close, for he could not play his part
+much longer.
+
+"You ought to be glad to get rid of me, Arithelli.  _Vous avez la
+chance_!  What have I given you but work and grumbles, eh?"
+
+The soft, broken voice answered him:
+
+"I shall feel afraid without you."
+
+"You will have Vardri,--your lover."  His tone was brutal as the blow
+of a knife.  The natural animal jealousy of a man had risen in him
+again.  When he was between stone walls, she would have the warmth of a
+lover's arms; every nerve in his own body would know it, and long for
+that which he had himself resigned.
+
+He would have long hours to sit and think the thoughts that drive men
+to insanity or self-destruction.
+
+"Yes, but one can care in different ways, and you have done so many
+things for me."
+
+The man drew in his breath sharply.  The knife was in her hand now, but
+she had stabbed unconsciously.  He knew that she spoke quite simply,
+thinking only of his care for her physical well-being.
+
+Truly he had done things, things that he would have given several years
+of life to undo.
+
+Now he had that for which he craved,--the assurance that she cared,
+that she would miss him.  Still he did not delude himself.  He knew
+that what she felt towards him was not the love between a woman and her
+mate, but the affection of dependence, of habit.  Yet for such as it
+was his soul uttered thanksgiving.  Any other woman gifted with a less
+sweet nature would have felt for him nothing but hatred, but in
+Fatalité's mind neither spite nor malice ever found a place.  The petty
+vices of womankind had never been hers.  He knew now that he had been
+something to her, and that knowledge would make sunshine for him even
+in the shadow of a prison.  It gave him courage also to play out the
+tragi-comedy to the end, to make a brave jest, to lie convincingly.
+
+"We needn't make each other eternal adieux, _mon enfant_.  You must not
+take all I said about Siberian dungeons _au serieux_.  Russia isn't
+quite as dangerous as it's made out to be.  Of course the police keep a
+watch more or less on the 'suspects,' but we know all their tricks, and
+how to avoid them.  Plenty of us go to St. Petersburg and even to Kara
+and come back again.  The Schlusselburg fortress is about the only
+place we haven't succeeded in getting out of yet.  It's fairly easy to
+manage a false passport.  You can write to me at the address I've given
+you."
+
+      *      *      *      *      *      *
+
+It was all over now, and he was alone.  He had taken both her hands for
+an instant, and felt the convulsive clinging of the thin fingers.  He
+had longed to kiss them, but dared not trust himself.  His words were
+only such as might have been used by anyone of the Brotherhood.
+
+"_Au revoir, camarade_!"
+
+"_Au revoir_!"
+
+Her tears were falling still, though she answered him steadily enough.
+
+Then she turned away, pulling down her veil, and he saw her grope
+blindly for the fastening of the door.  It shut gently behind her, and
+he was alone.  He sat down by the table with its litter of books and
+newspapers, and stared dully round the room which her passing had left
+more hopeless and ugly than ever.
+
+Life itself would be more _fâde_ and ugly now.  As well for him that
+after to-day he would have no time to sit and brood.  It would be all
+stern reality soon, enough to cure him of lovesickness.
+
+First the work and risks of a secret printing press in some cellar or
+sordid room behind a shop, and later on the inevitable police-raid, a
+trial that would be no trial with the condemnation signed before-hand,
+and afterwards the _travaux forcés_, the long marches, the agonies of
+farewell at the Siberian boundary-post--not for him, for his were said,
+but for his companions in misery--the miseries of the sick and dying,
+the partial starvation, and the horrors of dirt and vermin.  There were
+sure to be some women too among the "politicals," and he would be
+obliged to watch their sufferings.
+
+There would be no imaginary grievances in that life at all events.
+
+On the floor, as it had dropped from among the music there lay a
+photograph, face downwards.
+
+He picked it up and looked back at the childish, smiling face, the
+tiny, rounded figure of Marie Roumanoff.
+
+"_Tout passe, tout casse, tout lasse_."
+
+His mouth twisted into a cynical smile.  She had been a true prophetess
+when she had written that.
+
+He tore the picture across, and threw it upon the rest of the _débris_.
+
+The Roumanoff would never haunt his dreams again.
+
+Her portrait was easily destroyed.  A flimsy thing of print and paper,
+as slight and fragile as herself.
+
+Of Arithelli he possessed no tangible likeness, but he would have her
+always with him, for her image was seared deep upon both heart and
+brain.
+
+_The Witch_ sailed out of Barcelona harbour with the early morning
+tide.  Besides Emile and Vladimir, and a small picked crew, she carried
+an assortment of strangely-shaped machines, things that looked like the
+inside of a clock, and were full of wheels and cogs, firearms, and
+ammunition, some copies of a revolutionist manual on street fighting
+tactics, and other inflammatory literature.
+
+Their plan was to enter Russia by way of Finland, leaving all the
+things there to be smuggled through by degrees.
+
+When they came to the frontier they would part company.  Emile would
+make his way towards the city that holds its trembling autocrat as
+closely guarded in his palace as any convict in the mines, while
+Vladimir was to go back to Spain overland to report success or failure
+in the landing and disposal of their dangerous cargo.
+
+All day the two men sat together, talking, plotting, preparing for all
+contingencies.
+
+There were no feminine voices to be heard on board the yacht now, no
+singing on deck in the evenings, no hint of the presence of a woman,
+either as wife, mistress, or companion.
+
+They neither discussed nor recalled these vanished days, though one had
+hours of memory and regret, and the other was consumed with a savage
+hunger for that which he had lost.
+
+Both had taken upon themselves vows that put them outside the pale of
+human ties and affections.
+
+The Goddess whom they both served had risen, claiming their allegiance,
+their service, and with the lives and ways of mortal women they had no
+concern.  The Cause had triumphed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+  "Do you not know I am a woman?"
+            AS YOU LIKE IT.
+
+
+Sobrenski was a man who wasted no time in making up his mind.  His
+success as a leader had depended upon his swiftness of action and
+unscrupulousness, and his latest manoeuvres had turned out an admirable
+success, upon which he might safely congratulate himself.
+
+The day following the resolution of the Committee, he had written to
+Arithelli, telling her to come to his flat to receive instructions.
+She would arrive in due time, and then he would explain things.
+
+He wondered whether she would faint or scream or perhaps refuse, but
+probably she would be easier to manage now that Poleski was safely out
+of the way.  He had schemed that business well too, and could now spare
+all his attention for Vardri and the girl.
+
+As to the amount of work they both did, they would be no great loss,
+for he could easily supply their places by other human machines who
+would carry out his desires without question.  The majority of the men
+who composed the circle were completely dominated by him, and incapable
+of opposing his will or argument, and by some he was worshipped as a
+hero.  Callous of suffering in others, he was equally indifferent to it
+for himself, and if he did not spare his tools he also slaved
+incessantly day and night.
+
+The large bare room in which he sat possessed very little furniture and
+no signs of comfort.  There were a quantity of books piled on the floor
+and mantelpiece, and the centre space was filled by an enormous bureau
+heaped with a mass of printed and written papers, for besides his
+extensive correspondence he was part-editor of one of the Anarchist
+journals, which he enlivened by daring and sarcastic contributions.
+The fragment of the letter that Arithelli had dropped, lay open in
+front of him.  He read it through again and smiled to himself.
+
+"I'll give up even the Cause for your sake," Vardri had written.
+"Seeing how these men have made you suffer has changed my views.  There
+must be something wrong about our ideas if they produce this cruelty to
+women.  Sobrenski and the others are killing you slowly.  I wanted
+struggle and excitement at one time, and whether it meant Life or Death
+it was all the same.  There was no one to care.  Now I want Life and
+Love and You!"
+
+Another madman like Gaston de Barrés!  How alike all these effusions
+were, all in the same strain.  They had found a pile of ravings when
+they had searched among the property of the heroine of that affair.
+These were the people who did an incredible amount of harm, who were
+even more dangerous than the ordinary traitor.
+
+He pushed the letter underneath some others, and Arithelli had knocked
+more than once, before he called "_Entrez_!"
+
+He saluted her with a cold scrutiny, telling her to wait till he had
+finished.  He invariably made a point of using no title in addressing
+her, and never even gave her the customary Anarchist greeting of
+_camarade_.  He did not invite her to sit down, and she would have been
+surprised if he had done so.  There was another chair at the far end of
+the room, and she did not trouble to fetch it.  Her heart was still
+further weakened by her illness, and she was breathless after climbing
+two long flights of stairs.  She leant up against the wall, breathing
+quickly, and thankful for a few moments' respite.
+
+She supposed she was required to play "errand-boy" as usual, and to go
+through the well-known routine: A crumpled-up slip of paper, which she
+must hide in her hair or dress, a long walk, or a ride in the electric
+tram if she happened to have any money, and then perhaps at the end of
+it she would find the man for whom she was seeking absent, and then she
+would have to wait till he returned.  It was never safe to leave a
+message.  Everything had to be given directly into the hands of those
+for whom it was intended, and she had spent many weary hours in the
+rooms of Sobrenski's followers.
+
+She studied his face as he rapidly stamped his letters, flinging them
+on to a pile of others that lay ready.  It crossed her mind how Emile
+had once likened a certain group of the conspirators to a pack of court
+cards, saying that they were alternately red and black.
+
+Sobrenski's hair and small peaked beard were of a curiously unpleasant
+colour, and his thin lips, pointed teeth and long sloping jaw gave him
+a wolfish appearance.  His eyes, deep-set and narrow, were too close
+together to satisfy a student of Lavater as to his capacity for
+truthfulness.  The forehead alone was good, and showed reasoning and
+intellect.  He was about fifty, and like all fair men looked less than
+his age.  He was better dressed, and altogether more careful of his
+appearance than most of the other men, though he spent nothing on
+luxuries and never touched the _absinthe_, to which most of them were
+addicted.  The sole luxuries in which he indulged were Work and Power.
+
+"Probably you have heard a great deal of talk about spies lately," he
+began, addressing Arithelli in French.  "For some time I have suspected
+one of our own number of treachery.  However, one cannot condemn
+without proofs.  For these I have been waiting and they have now come
+into my hands.  I'm perfectly satisfied that the man I have all along
+suspected is a traitor, and there is no need to delay action any
+longer.  I suppose Poleski has informed you of how we treat those who
+are unwise enough to betray us?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+She was on her guard now, and stood upright, all her languor gone.  Why
+could he not say what he meant at once?  She wondered why he had taken
+the trouble to seek for proofs of anyone's guilt.  Enough for a man of
+his type to find an obstruction in his path.  He would need no
+authority but his own for removing it.  She hated him all the more for
+his parade of justice.  It had not occurred to her that his speech was
+a prelude to anything that concerned Vardri.  If anyone was implied she
+imagined it was herself.  These men were never happy unless they were
+suspecting evil of someone.  The Anarchist leader found in her
+incomprehension merely another sign of feminine stupidity.  Her outward
+air of indifference was as irritating to him as it had been to the
+Hippodrome Manager.  Sobrenski's blood had never stirred for any woman,
+however charming, and Arithelli's type of looks was repulsive to him.
+He loathed her thinness and pallor, her silence and immobility of
+expression.  He vowed inwardly that she should look less indifferent
+before he had finished with her.
+
+"You do not appear to have the least idea of the identity of the man to
+whom I am referring," he continued.  "Your friend Vardri is not a very
+careful person.  He is young, and shall we say, a little foolish.  It
+is always risky to say or write anything against the Cause one is
+supposed to be serving."
+
+"To say _or write_."  It dawned upon her all at once.  The piece of the
+letter she had missed, had been dropped in the stable up in the hills
+and found by Sobrenski.  It was all her own fault, sheer rank
+carelessness.  Emile had so often warned her against her fatal habit of
+leaving everything about.  She never locked up anything, jewellery,
+clothes, money or papers.
+
+Perhaps in the hurry of dressing that night, she had only taken with
+her the first page, and when she was out her rooms had been searched,
+and the rest stolen.  Sobrenski would stop at nothing to get the
+evidence he wanted.  If she accused him of having taken it he would
+simply deny the charge, and to seem anxious would be further evidence
+that the letter contained something that would compromise either Vardri
+or herself.  In any case it appeared that the mischief was done.  To
+expect either justice or mercy from her enemy was out of the question.
+She would try and fight him with his own weapon, feign ignorance, tell
+lies if necessary.
+
+"Vardri?  What has he done?"
+
+The note of surprise in her voice was well assumed and she could
+control her face, but her hands betrayed her.  Sobrenski had seen the
+blue veins stand out and the knuckles whiten unnaturally with the
+pressure on the black fan she carried to shield her eyes in the street.
+
+"Done?" he echoed contemptuously.  "Nothing so far.  He has only talked
+and written.  It is to provide against his doing anything important
+that the Committee have decided upon his removal.  There was a meeting
+held last night and the voting was unanimous.  Vardri has been
+condemned as a traitor to his vows, and a danger to everyone connected
+with our work."
+
+"Condemned without a hearing!" the girl flamed out.  "_Mon Dieu_!  Your
+justice!  What has he done?"
+
+"Have you a right to question the judgment of the Committee?"  The
+voice was like a scourge falling on bare flesh.  Arithelli drew her
+shoulders together involuntarily.
+
+"No!" she answered.
+
+"Yet you do it!  These womanly inconsistencies are a little fatiguing."
+
+Sobrenski caressed his beard with a narrow, bloodless hand, on the
+middle finger of which was a curious ring of twisted gold wire.
+
+He waited to see if she would make any further protest, but she set her
+lips firmly and refused to speak.  There was nothing more to be said on
+her side.  Evidently Sobrenski had found the letter, and when or where
+it had been found mattered not at all.  He continued:
+
+"The sentence has been passed and it falls upon you to execute it."
+
+The answer came back swiftly:
+
+"And if I refuse?"
+
+For once in his life Sobrenski was taken aback, and experienced a new
+sensation, that of surprise.  He looked at her with almost approval.
+If he was cruel he was also courageous, and able to appreciate the
+virtue in others.
+
+"You know what your refusal implies?" he questioned, more gently than
+he had yet spoken.  "You refused some time ago to carry a message.  You
+will perhaps remember that I gave you the choice between doing as you
+were told, or--" he gesticulated expressively.  "You were wise then.  I
+hope you will be wise now."
+
+Arithelli's thoughts were going at racing speed.  No one could be long
+in a room alone with Sobrenski without being impressed by his
+overpowering personality.  He affected her in a way that no one else
+ever did, in provoking her to futile outbursts of defiance and anger.
+She had never lost her head with anyone else, but he always made her
+incapable of reasoning, raging one minute, and cowed the next.
+Hitherto Emile had always been there to screen and protect her, to
+stand between her and her enemy.  She knew now why he had so often
+hoped to see her in her coffin.
+
+"I can't murder!  I undertook to work for the Cause, but not that--_Mon
+Dieu_! not that!"
+
+"We don't talk about murder," Sobrenski sneered.  "We merely 'remove'
+those who have proved themselves untrustworthy.  You undertook to obey
+orders, I believe.  You may contradict me if I am incorrect."
+
+He leant forward with the glittering eyes of the fanatic.  "You talk of
+murder and forget that to us human life is nothing.  Do you think you
+will save Vardri by refusing?  Am I to suppose that he has infected you
+also with the taint of disloyalty?  It is your business to loathe a
+traitor as we do.  You wear your badge, but do you never read the words
+on it?  Poleski used to tell me great things of your enthusiasm, your
+devotion.  Now I am putting you to the test.  You like to act a
+picturesque part, it seems, to wear boy's clothes, to sing, to be the
+only woman among us, to act the heroine.  We do not want acting here.
+This is Life, not the stage.  Now you are asked to give a practical
+proof of your loyalty!"
+
+The pitiless tongue lashed, and Arithelli shrank against the wall, her
+hands over her eyes.  There had been stories current among the younger
+members of the Barcelona Anarchists that Sobrenski possessed the power
+of hypnotism and did not scruple to use it.  Some of the most daring
+and successful outrages of the past years had been carried out under
+his direction, and executed by these youths.  He always made a point of
+choosing men who were highly strung and impressionable.  He was known
+to boast that after three interviews with him he could make anyone,
+either man or woman, into a will-less automaton.
+
+He exhorted, jeered, encouraged and derided, finally giving Arithelli
+five minutes in which to make her decision.  She did not keep him
+waiting, though he could scarcely hear the murmured words of assent.
+Her nerve was broken at last.  She would promise anything, do anything
+if only he would let her go.  Dazed with fear and misery, she watched
+him get up, unlock a drawer of the bureau and come across to her
+holding out something.
+
+"I shall arrange for you to be together one night up in the hut.  I
+don't know whether you have any idea of shooting, but you can hardly
+miss at such close range."
+
+The brutal words steadied her, and drove back the feeling of mental
+paralysis.  She realised suddenly all that her promise meant.  Vardri
+had given her love, and in return she was to give him Death!  Her own
+dawning love had enabled her to see more clearly what his devotion
+meant.  With the growth of a woman's soul she had also begun to
+experience womanly emotions, fear, anxiety, the need of sympathy and
+affection.
+
+She snatched the pistol from Sobrenski's hand, and he stepped back a
+pace, throwing up his arm instinctively as she raised, levelled and
+fired.
+
+The weapon clicked harmlessly, her hand dropped to her side, and she
+stood shivering, and wondering at her own madness.  The whole thing had
+been done without thinking, as an animal driven into a corner turns,
+snarling and showing its teeth.
+
+Sobrenski recovered himself first and laughed.
+
+"So you thought it was loaded?" he said.  "Do you take me for a fool?
+Allow me to congratulate you on your--failure!"
+
+Then changing his tone of sarcasm to command: "You must hide that
+pistol carefully.  Put it inside your dress or somewhere safe.  I
+suppose you would like to march down the Paséo de Gracia, carrying it
+in your hand, and wearing a tragic expression,--and get locked up by
+the first agent de police you meet!  You have pluck enough, but you
+should avoid these exhibitions of hysteria."
+
+He gripped her by the shoulder, swung her round, and pointed to the
+door, "_Allez_!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+  "My crown is without leaves,
+  For she sits in the dust and grieves,
+    Now we are come to our kingdom."
+            "Anthony and Cleopatra," KIPLING.
+
+
+Once more the procession of conspirators toiled on its way up the
+irregular mountain path.  The horses slipped and stumbled under their
+unskilful riders, the mules climbed steadily upwards.  No one spoke.
+
+As usual Arithelli led the way.
+
+Vardri, who had arrived last of all, rode forward to join her, but was
+curtly ordered to the rear by Sobrenski.
+
+They should see enough of each other later on,--when it was time.
+
+Before they started on their ride he spoke to Arithelli alone, and gave
+her his final instructions, and saw for himself that the pistol she
+wore at her belt was properly charged.  He never left anything to
+chance, especially in important undertakings such as the present one.
+
+"There will not be a long meeting to-night," he said.  "You will have
+an hour free to do your work.  You hear?"
+
+His eyes were fixed on hers, compelling an answer.  None came, though
+she bowed her head in token of acquiescence, and though he could hear
+no word Sobrenski was satisfied.  He had seen that shrinking attitude,
+that mechanical gesture before.  In the plot to assassinate General
+Morales there had been a young Spanish student who had given some
+trouble.  He had developed a conscience at the last minute, and vowed
+that he could not kill an old and defenceless man, that he would rather
+die himself.
+
+He had died, and so had Morales, and both by the explosion of the bomb
+that had been launched by the hand of the former.
+
+Sobrenski held rightly that those who meddled with politics on either
+side must dispense with such useless things as scruples.
+
+The night was still and sultry, with a full moon hanging low in the
+sky.  The weather had been unnaturally warm for the time of year, all
+day, down in the city.
+
+They were all glad when they had mounted above the sea-level.
+
+There was a little breeze met them, and the tired and patiently
+plodding horses raised their heads.
+
+Arithelli drew a long breath of relief as she shifted in her saddle,
+and glanced back to see if they were all in sight.
+
+The _manta_ in which she was wrapped stifled her, and the weight of her
+own hair under the wig and sombrero made her head ache and throb
+violently.
+
+As they rode she rehearsed her plans in her own mind, telling herself
+over and over again the things that she must say and do when she was
+alone with Vardri.
+
+To-night would see Sobrenski's triumph, his grand coup, and when it was
+all over perhaps she would have peace.
+
+How slowly they all seemed to ride, she thought.  She wondered how many
+of the other men knew that she was chosen to act the part of murderess.
+Some of them had been kind to her in a rough way, especially the older
+ones.
+
+But even if they did pity her a little, not one among them but would
+expect her to do the thing that they would consider obviously her duty.
+
+No one would raise a voice on her behalf, whatever their private
+sentiments.
+
+The majority of them would probably look upon her as a heroine, for she
+would have rid them of a spy, a traitor.
+
+She could only hope that she might keep her brain clear, her courage
+firm till the supreme moment.
+
+Once in the course of that awful day her nerves had given out in
+physical collapse, and her shaking hands had let fall the mirror of
+Agnès Sorél.
+
+It lay on the floor in her bedroom, broken in three places.
+
+Her early days in Ireland had given her a belief in the omens of good
+and evil, for in the "emerald gem of the Western world" superstition
+runs riot.
+
+The faith in it was in her blood, though it needed no broken mirror to
+tell her what dread thing awaited her, towards which she must advance,
+urged by fate.
+
+She had only written one letter, and that one was to Emile.  Now that
+he was gone there was no one else who cared.
+
+Something told her now that his last words had only been an attempt to
+comfort her, to ease her mind, and that she would wait in vain for his
+return.
+
+Estelle would weep for a little while, and drink a great deal to drown
+her tears, and then forget.  They were nearly at the hut now.  She
+could see it, a grotesque shadow thrown across the silvered earth.
+
+She slipped off and walked, leading her mule by the bridle.
+
+Behind her were subdued curses, the rattle of slipping hoofs and
+falling stones, as the animals climbed the last and steepest piece of
+road, which ended in the plateau on which the building stood.
+
+In front of it was a single large tree, but most of the ground close by
+bore nothing higher than dwarf shrubs and long grass.
+
+When the cavalcade drew up and dismounted, Vardri was discovered to be
+missing.
+
+He had been late in starting, lagged behind the others and dropped out
+of sight before they were scarcely clear of the town.  Being the last
+of the file his disappearance had not at first been remarked.
+
+Sobrenski refused to allow of time being wasted in a search.
+
+He ordered the rest of the men up into the loft, and Arithelli to her
+work of unharnessing.
+
+He himself remained standing in the shadow of the doorway, his eyes
+narrowed with anger, his thin lips compressed till they were merely a
+line.
+
+Here was a complication that he had not foreseen.  For the first time
+in his life his wit and cunning had been at fault.
+
+He must have been mad not to have kept a sharper lookout on Vardri, but
+he had reckoned he was secure with Arithelli as decoy.
+
+Could it be possible that she had been mad enough to warn Vardri?  If
+so, then why was she here herself?
+
+Either she had more courage or else she was more foolish even than he
+could have believed it possible for a female creature to be.  Women
+took good care of their own skins in general!
+
+If Vardri meant to try and escape, surely they would have gone together.
+
+Perhaps his, Sobrenski's, detailed descriptions of the fate of others
+who had attempted flight had made her decide that it would be safer to
+remain and throw herself on the mercy of himself and his companions.
+
+He might have miscalculated the force of her attraction for Vardri, but
+he felt perfectly certain that she was reduced to a state of mechanical
+imbecility.  She could not escape now at all events, even if she
+suddenly changed her mind.
+
+He would give them both five minutes, and then if Vardri did not
+appear--!
+
+He began to walk up and down outside, like some prowling animal
+awaiting its prey.
+
+At regular intervals his shadow crossed and recrossed the patch of
+light from the open door.
+
+Meanwhile Vardri was riding leisurely up the slope, reining back his
+horse, and stopping at intervals to put a fair distance between himself
+and the others.  He intended to make a chance of seeing Arithelli alone
+again, so he meant to wait till the whole crew, and especially
+Sobrenski, were safely embarked on their eternal discussions.  Then he
+would slip in and help her with the animals, and live in Paradise again
+for a little space of time.
+
+He had been to her rooms earlier in the day but she had sent down a
+message to beg him to excuse her.  She had a headache, and was lying
+down, so he had been obliged to go away unsolaced, and longing for the
+evening.
+
+Now that she had given him her promise to go with him to Austria, there
+was only to arrange the day and the hour of their departure.  For once
+he was alive to the necessity for prompt action.  There was her safety
+to be considered now.  When he had been alone it had not mattered how
+anything was done or not done, but now everything was different.  The
+world itself was another place.  He had already actually written and
+posted a tentative letter to his father, such a letter as he could
+never have written if only his interests had been concerned, but he
+found any sacrifice an easy one now, even the sacrifice of pride.
+
+There was no reason why they should not start to-morrow.  It would be
+safer to get out of the place by going round by the Mediterranean and
+thence across by way of Italy.
+
+Water-travelling was cheaper, too.  He laughed to himself to think how
+practical he was becoming.  How strange it would seem to live in a
+civilised fashion again, to not be obliged to look at every sou before
+it was spent, to have servants to wait upon one; enough to eat and
+drink, and the luxury of cleanliness.
+
+Yet the vagabond life had had its charm, too.  He had encountered
+kindness often, generally from those in more evil plight than his own,
+and there had been flowers and music and sunshine.  True, he had felt
+horribly ill and dejected on some days, and his wretched cough was an
+annoyance to himself and to other people, but at times he felt ready
+for anything, and more energetic than any three of those lazy Spaniards.
+
+Love and Arithelli would be a sure antidote for any misery or disease.
+For her he had created a House of Dreams, and now the dreams were on
+the verge of becoming realities.  Instead of the sand and stones of
+that desert that men call Life, a rainbow-coloured future lay stretched
+out before him.  Sunshine and the summertime of love, all that he had
+ever hoped for, were coming nearer.  And joy was hovering near at hand,
+till he could almost touch her flying robe.  Soon he would hold her in
+his arms, would possess her entirely.
+
+How different Arithelli was from all other women!  With her there was
+never caprice or fickleness.  Whatever she said was his law, whatever
+she wished to do was the right thing.
+
+Now he had abjured the Revolution, his father would be only too glad to
+have him back, to see him married to a woman of Arithelli's charm and
+breeding.  There had never been any quarrel with his family, except
+when he had joined the Red Flag party, and it was only natural that
+they should quarrel over that.  Love or the Revolution?  There would
+never be any more doubt now as to which he would choose.
+
+In the old days he had preferred starvation, and the freedom to act,
+and think as he liked.  He had gloried in being an outcast, in
+suffering for the Cause.  Life had been hard at times, but he had known
+men of ideals and enthusiasms and there had been a certain fascination
+in the excitement of being hunted.  But now that was all over and a new
+day was dawning for them both, for himself and for Arithelli.
+
+He spoke to his horse and stirred it into a quicker pace.
+
+They must be well out of the way and she would think he was never
+coming.
+
+Inside the stable Arithelli, tall and straight in her scarlet shirt,
+moved to and fro at her work, hanging up saddles and bridles, carrying
+pails of water, ranging on either side of the hut the horses and the
+mules.  Tortured as she was with anxiety, she did not forget the wants
+of her friends the animals.  It came across her mind how once when she
+had said to Vardri, "Let us see to the horses first," he had said half
+in jest, "If I were a Spaniard I should be jealous.  You always think
+of the animals before everything else."
+
+One by one the rest of the conspirators tramped heavily up the ladder,
+leaving her alone with Sobrenski, who stood with his back to the
+doorway, following her with his eyes as she moved to and fro in the
+shadows cast by the solitary lamps.
+
+Before he mounted the ladder in his turn, he came across the hut, took
+her by the shoulder and spoke to her.  "Be careful how you do your
+work, for if it is not well done others will do it for you."
+
+She could not answer; she shuddered at his touch; her hands went up and
+covered her face.
+
+Sobrenski turned and mounted the worn rungs of the narrow ladder with a
+lithe, active step.  He was quite sure of her now.  She would not fail
+to carry out his will.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+  "Il n'y a que l'amour et la mort."
+
+
+For a few minutes after he had gone, Arithelli stood motionless, still
+with her hands pressed tightly over her eyes, trying to command her
+brain to work clearly.  Her will and her limbs seemed paralysed.  She
+could only wait for Vardri's approach.  Once she prayed an inarticulate
+wordless prayer, that inspiration might be sent her to find a way out
+of this _impasse_ in which there seemed neither light nor opening.
+
+Time was passing, and every moment was bringing her nearer the most
+appalling destiny that could ever be meted out to any woman.  If she
+did Sobrenski's bidding she would be not only a murderess, but the
+murderess of the being she loved most in the world.  Vardri, who was so
+different from all the other men; Vardri, who could never bear anything
+to be hurt, or even to be made uncomfortable.  She knew that it was
+perfectly useless for both of them to attempt to escape.  Someone was
+most likely posted at the window of the loft, they would get no
+distance on foot without being overtaken, and if she attempted to lead
+out any of the horses or mules, the noise would probably attract
+attention.
+
+Her hands fell to her side, and her head went up as she listened
+intently.  So he was coming, after all.  In that undisturbed space and
+clear dry air, sound travelled quickly, and she could hear the
+approaching hoof-beats while he was still some way off.  With the
+knowledge of his approach the blood flowed again warmly in her veins
+and courage and decision came back to her.  Her senses, unnaturally
+acute, told her that Vardri had now dismounted and was leading his
+horse.  She could distinguish his footsteps, and then the monotonous
+regular footfalls of his mount.  She ran out into the patch of
+moonlight, casting a hurried backward glance at the side of the hut.
+Thank God! the window was on the other side!
+
+Vardri was coming slowly towards her, his horse's bridle over his arm.
+Before she covered the distance between them she made a gesture that
+enjoined silence and stopped his greeting.  "Don't bring your horse
+in," she whispered.  "Tie him up out of the way over there, a good way
+off the hut.  I'll explain presently."
+
+In another moment Vardri was beside her in the hut and had her in his
+arms.
+
+"What is it, _mon petit_?  There must be something wrong.  Has
+Sobrenski--?"
+
+"No, no, he has done nothing.  It's just that I don't want you to be up
+here too long to-night.  I want you to do something for me.  Will you,
+Vardri?"
+
+"Do you think you'll need to ask me twice to do anything for you, dear?"
+
+He stood with his hands on her shoulders, his dark eyes gazing down at
+her hungrily.  "Did you think I was never coming?  I stayed behind on
+purpose.  I felt that Sobrenski intended to prevent our talking
+together."  Arithelli snatched eagerly at his words.  They had given
+her the clue she wanted.
+
+"Yes, that's it.  It's dangerous for me if we are seen often together.
+I've done something so mad and foolish, Vardri, you must help me to put
+it right,--you _can_.  Those letters you have written me saying all
+sorts of things against the Cause,--I left a piece of one about
+somewhere,--I don't know where,--and Sobrenski found it.  He has just
+told me that in about half an hour's time before all the rest of them
+leave, he is going to send on one of the men in advance.  He will get
+down to the town before us, go to my rooms and yours and collect all
+the letters that have passed between us; and use them, as then he will
+have what he has always wanted,--the proofs that we are what he would
+call traitors.  And when he has these proofs, neither of us will be
+safe for an instant.  It will mean death to both of us sooner or later.
+But even Sobrenski can't murder us without sufficient evidence.  He
+will be obliged to make some formal parade of justice to put it all
+before the rest of the society.  If he doesn't get our letters he will
+not have sufficient evidence."
+
+"But if we go away together to-night, as we intended?  We've got a
+start.  We can take the best horses.  That is the best plan."
+
+Arithelli shook her head.  "Listen to me, dear, and believe in a
+woman's wisdom for once.  If we go to-night and together, we are bound
+to be recaptured before we are out of Barcelona.  By doing what I
+suggest we avoid suspicion, we give ourselves breathing-space, time to
+arrange a disguise, to think of all sorts of things that we have
+overlooked.  We have everything in our favour to-night, Sobrenski does
+not know you are here yet.  If you go soon you will get away without
+his having seen you at all.  Here is the key of my room.  Go there
+first, and you will find all your own letters in a wooden box in my big
+trunk.  That isn't locked.  Open it and burn them all.  Then go on to
+your own room, do the same with yours and stay there.  If they raid my
+room, they will find nothing suspicious.  You could pretend you were
+ill, and that's the only reason you haven't come tonight, and I am here
+doing my work as usual.  Nothing could be less suspicious.  Then when
+they are off their guard we can escape."
+
+The minutes were flying.  Death thrusting his lean face before the rosy
+face of Love.  Sobrenski's phrase sounded in her ears like the tolling
+of a bell.  "You have an hour free to do your work."  An hour, only an
+hour!  How long had they been there already?  Time and all else alike
+seemed blurred.  All her will must be concentrated upon one thing--to
+make Vardri leave her as quickly as possible.  Yet she dare not show a
+sign of haste or emotion lest he should suspect something amiss and
+refuse to go.
+
+"Dear, it is a wonderful plan this, of yours," Vardri was saying.  "But
+how can I leave you here alone with these devils?  It makes me cold to
+think of it."
+
+"You'll leave me because I shall be safer alone.  You _must_ see that,
+_mon ami_."  She clung to him, putting up her face towards his.  Every
+art of womanhood must be used to weave a spell to send him from her and
+to save him.  "Will you not do as I ask you?"
+
+"I'll do anything in the world for you," the boy broke out eagerly;
+"I'd have my hand cut off to save you a minute's pain."
+
+"I know, _mon ami_.  And this is such a little thing, and so much
+depends upon its being done quickly."
+
+What was that?  A step on the ladder?  She could not control a violent
+start.  No, it was only a creaking rung, a stamp from one of the mules.
+
+"But you haven't broken your promise to me.  You swear to come away
+with me soon?"
+
+"To-morrow if you will.  Once the letters are burnt we are almost safe.
+Only one day more.  It doesn't make any difference."
+
+"It does to me, _mon petit_.  Every moment, every hour without you is
+time wasted."
+
+"But you'll go, dear, before Sobrenski sees us together?"
+
+"My sweet, if it is for your good, of course I will go.  You're right
+about the letters; I ought to have known it wasn't safe to keep them.
+As you say, they've got no circumstantial evidence if those are
+destroyed, and it only means a few more hours' delay in our getting
+off.  I'll go, darling.  I'll get down the hills in no time.  It's the
+best horse of the lot, that one outside.  But before I go give me
+yourself for a few minutes."
+
+Arithelli let him lead her unresisting towards the corner of the hut,
+and lay her gently back upon a truss of hay that he had covered with a
+cloak.  She had not the strength to deny him their last few minutes
+together.  Every fibre in her own nature, the lover, the mother, the
+child, were all crying out for him.  How gentle he had been, how he had
+always cared for her.  No one had ever touched her like this before,
+spoken to her in this caressing voice.  Emile had been kind in his way,
+but he had been always rough.  Her own emotions had always lain buried
+deeply, and now they had been called to life she longed for the natural
+expression of her love through the medium of physical things, by word
+and touch.
+
+"Now for my reward," Vardri said.  "I want to take your hair down."
+
+Arithelli bent her head towards him without speaking and he drew the
+pins, and undid the braid with deft fingers, spreading it out till it
+covered her as with a veil.
+
+"If only I could paint you!  How beautiful you are to-night, but how
+still and cold!  Fatalité, tell me you love me a little, _mon coeur_!"
+
+She put her arms round his neck, laying her cheek against his.  "_Mon
+ami_, I love you!"
+
+He held her in his arms as one holds a child, rocking her to and fro.
+"_Voilà chérie_!" he whispered.  "After to-morrow I shall have you
+always, I shall never let you go again.  My dream is coming true."
+
+Arithelli listened with dry eyes and an aching heart.  She was past
+crying, and her brain felt curiously reasonable and alert.  She could
+not send him from her at once, yet with every passing second Death drew
+stealthily nearer and nearer.  Time swept on relentless and inflexible.
+
+"Perhaps you will be disappointed in me one of these days, find me
+depressing and full of moods.  I've always been so lonely, you know,
+till I met you.  _Je suis une âme detachée_."
+
+"Never again while I'm alive!  I think of you and with you.  When you
+are happy I know it, and when you are miserable I know it too.
+Fatalité!  Fatalité! believe that I don't want anything in return.
+I'll wait on you, work for you, lie, starve, steal, do anything.  I
+only want to know you're there, to have the right to serve you, to feel
+you don't hate me.  I couldn't go on living it I lost you.  Since the
+first day I saw you at the Hippodrome you've haunted me.  I led Don
+Juan down to the entrance to the ring.  You don't remember?  How should
+you?  I've never forgotten!  You smiled and thanked me.  You looked so
+strange beside Estelle and those other women."
+
+He was kneeling beside her, his lips pressed against the hollow of her
+arm, from which the loose red sleeve had slipped back to above the
+elbow.  Under his passionate words Arithelli sat like a being
+entranced, unseeing, unhearing.  The inscrutable eyes set in the rigid
+face gave her the likeness to some carven thing.
+
+"Fatalité!  Fatalité!"
+
+The sound of his voice came to her as from a distance.  She roused
+herself, and tried to smile.  "_Mon ami_, I'm a little tired to-night,
+a little nervous; I was thinking about the letters!  I shall feel so
+much safer when they're burnt."
+
+"I'll go at once--just one moment.  Arithelli, you do believe that I
+love you, and that I want nothing?  See, I'll not even touch your hand
+if it doesn't please you."
+
+The soft hand was laid gently on his.  "But if it _does_ please me,
+_mon camarade_--"
+
+"_Dieu_!  How sweet you are!  But don't call me '_Camarade_,' _mon
+petit_.  Those wolves above call each other that!"
+
+"I won't, if you hate it.  Yes, that's really love to give all and take
+nothing."  Arithelli spoke dreamily.  "Emile made me sing to him before
+he went away; you remember 'L'Adieu' of Schubert?  He loved it.
+
+  "La mort est une amie,
+  Qui rend la liberté."
+
+
+"C'est bien vrai ca!  I used to sing it without thinking at one time.
+How alike all those songs are.  Always Death;--Death and Liberty!"
+
+"Don't talk of those things, dear.  It's going to be Life for both of
+us--after to-morrow."
+
+"I was thinking of poor Emile."
+
+"He was always fond of you.  He'll be glad when he hears you're married
+and safe."
+
+"Yes, he'll be glad.  Don't talk any more for a minute, dear, then just
+say _au revoir_ to me and go as quickly as you can.  I want to be
+quiet.  It's good to be loved.  How gentle you are!  Emile was always
+so rough when he touched me."
+
+Vardri hung over her, caressing her with infinite tenderness.  Of all
+men in the world he was surely the happiest to have known this sweet
+and womanly Arithelli, the Arithelli that no one else had ever seen.
+He kissed the heavy, closed lids and stroked back the hair from her
+forehead.
+
+A faint intoxicating odour of jasmine hovered about her, for she was
+Eastern in her love of perfumes.  The stifling, dirty hut became a
+Paradise while she lay thus in his arms.
+
+Once again they kissed and clung together.  Though Arithelli's lips
+burnt, they scorched with the fires of despair rather than with those
+of passion.
+
+In silence Vardri helped her to her feet, and they walked together to
+the door.
+
+"You'll come to me to-morrow," Arithelli said.
+
+"To-morrow we shall be safe.  We'll be out of this hell altogether in
+another day or two, _à la bonne heure_!  You're not afraid, Fatalité?"
+
+"I shan't be--when the letters are safe.  Take care of yourself, _mon
+ami, et à bientot_!"
+
+"_Mon Dieu_! what pluck you have!  How I love you for it!  Go back and
+rest, dear, till those brutes come down.  Give me your hand again,
+Fatalité, _bien aimée! gardez-vous, mais gardez-vous_!"
+
+She answered him steadily.  "_À demain_.  _Adieu, mon ami_.  Ride as
+quickly as you can, but lead your horse for the first few minutes."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+  "Le jeu est fait, rien ne vas plus!"
+
+
+He was gone, and Arithelli was back in the hut again, and now the worst
+of it all was still to come.  If Vardri was to have a fair start she
+must wait out the hour alone, realising every moment of the time what
+awaited her at the end of it.
+
+A mad impulse seized her to rush up the steps to the loft, interrupt
+the meeting, defy them all and boast how she had schemed her lover's
+escape, and laugh at them and their plots, goad them into shooting her
+at once and finishing it all quickly.  She felt that she could not
+endure any more suspense and strain.  Anything would be better than
+this interminable, awful waiting in the semi-darkness and loneliness,
+with neither friend nor lover at hand, no single human to take her part
+or defend her.  Emile had gone and now Vardri, and she must face
+everything alone.  If she waited Vardri would have perhaps half an
+hour's grace and while they were dealing with her it would give him
+still another few minutes, and every minute counted.
+
+She fought down the temptation, and began to move about, speaking to
+the mules and, horses, taking down saddles and bridles.  She must not
+be too quiet, or they might suspect something, and come down sooner to
+see if she were still there.  She must pretend to be busy, play out the
+play to the end.
+
+She unhooked the lantern from its nail and placed it on the ground, and
+then stood still again to listen.
+
+The smothered hum of voices grew louder overhead.  It stopped suddenly,
+and she could only hear Sobrenski's slow, incisive tones.  No doubt
+they were listening to him as to one inspired while he preached his
+gospel of destruction.  Arithelli shivered, pressing her hands over her
+ears that she might shut out the sound of that hated voice that had
+bidden her outrage her sex.
+
+She stumbled towards the bed of hay, still warm with the impress of her
+own figure, and flung herself upon it face downwards and lay there
+whispering to herself over and over again Vardri's name as one whispers
+a charm.
+
+Would he forget her one of these days and marry someone else?  Had it
+been real, anything of this that she had lived through during these
+months in Spain?  Was she still that same "Arithelli of the Hippodrome"
+who had come gaily into Barcelona with her ridiculous dresses and her
+belief in herself and her career?  She had known an hour of love and
+passion, and that had been worth all the rest Emile had always told her
+that people were not meant to be happy long _ici-bas_.  She must pay
+now for her hour.  The gods were angry and must have a sacrifice.
+
+After she had been out in Barcelona only a week, Emile had taken her to
+one of the gambling-hells of the place, where the lights and mirrors
+and gilding hurt her tired eyes, and the croupiers called incessantly
+through the strained silence, "_Le jeu est fait_.  _Rien ne vas plus_!"
+
+It was like that with her now, "_Le jeu est fait_."  How that sentence
+heat in her brain!  She wondered if she were becoming delirious.  Then
+she was on her feet, and her hand went to the Browning pistol at her
+belt.  Sobrenski's figure had appeared at the top of the ladder.  He
+was shading his eyes with his hand, and peering forward into the gloom.
+Only one of them there!  The girl or Vardri, which was it?
+
+Then the whole place was in darkness, for Arithelli had overturned and
+extinguished the solitary lamp.  The excited whinny of a horse mingled
+with the sound of two shots fired in rapid succession, a rustling noise
+among the hay, a groan, and silence.  Before he set foot on the ladder
+Sobrenski shouted to the rest of the conspirators to bring a light.  He
+did not wait to look at the prone figure, but made straight for the
+door.  His business it was first to see whether his quarry were still
+in sight.
+
+All the other men were hustling each other in a hasty descent.  "_Que
+diable_!" one of them said.  "What is it now?  A spy?"
+
+The man who had lowered Arithelli from the window of the house in the
+Calle de Pescadores, made his way first to where Arithelli lay and
+stood beside her.  He could only see dimly the outline of a figure
+which might have been either that of a man or woman.  "Bring a light
+here," Valdez called impatiently.  "Which of them is it?"  Though he
+was a revolutionist he was still a human being, and he had always been
+as sorry for her as he had dared allow himself to be, and he hoped it
+was not the girl.  Another man came up carrying a lantern, and flashed
+the light on what rested motionless at their feet.  Arithelli lay on
+her face as she had fallen.  Her hair streamed over her shoulders and
+mingled with the dark folds of the cloak.  The hand that still held the
+pistol was flung wide.
+
+"It's not Vardri," the other man said.  "Is it--?"  Sobrenski cut
+across the question.  "A traitor," he said.  "What does it matter about
+the name?  Get back all of you and see to the horses.  There should be
+two of them and there's only one here.  We've got to find the other
+one."
+
+With a sudden brusque movement Valdez knelt down, turned the limp body
+over, and rested the head upon his knee.  "_Pardieu_!" he ejaculated as
+he let it fall gently back.  "It's Fatalité!"
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HIPPODROME***
+
+
+******* This file should be named 19943-8.txt or 19943-8.zip *******
+
+
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/9/9/4/19943
+
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+http://www.gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3.  YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
+page at http://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations.
+To donate, please visit:
+http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     http://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
+
diff --git a/19943-8.zip b/19943-8.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7b59a3f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/19943-8.zip
diff --git a/19943.txt b/19943.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9134131
--- /dev/null
+++ b/19943.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,7601 @@
+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Hippodrome, by Rachel Hayward
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Hippodrome
+
+
+Author: Rachel Hayward
+
+
+
+Release Date: November 28, 2006  [eBook #19943]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HIPPODROME***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Al Haines
+
+
+
+HIPPODROME
+
+by
+
+RACHEL HAYWARD
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+George H. Doran Company
+New York
+Copyright, 1913,
+By George H. Doran Company
+
+
+
+
+
+TO
+
+EDYTH AND ARTHUR APPLIN
+
+WITH LOVE AND HOMAGE.
+
+
+
+  "Car vois-tu chaque jour je t'aime davantage,
+  Aujourd'hui plus qu'hier, et bien moins que demain."
+      (_Rosemonde Rostand_)
+
+
+
+
+THE HIPPODROME
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+  "Aujourd'hui le primtetemps, Ninon, demain l'hiver.
+  Quoi! tu nas pas l'etoile, est tu vas sur la mer!"
+            DE MUSSET.
+
+
+Count Emile Poleski was obliged to be at the Barcelona Station at five
+o'clock in the afternoon one hot Friday in May.  His business, having
+to do with that which was known to himself and his associates as "the
+Cause," necessitated careful attention, and required the performance of
+certain manoeuvres in such a way that they should be unobserved by the
+various detectives to whom he was an object of interest.
+
+He looked round, scowling, till he found the man he wanted, and who was
+to all outward appearances the driver of one of the row of _fiacres_
+that waited outside the station.  Cigarettes were exchanged, and a tiny
+slip of paper passed imperceptibly from hand to hand, then he turned
+ostensibly to watch the incoming train from Port-Bou.  As he was on the
+platform it would be better to look as if he had come to meet someone,
+and as he had nothing particular to do just then it would make a
+distraction to watch the various types of humanity arriving at this
+continental Buenos Ayres, the city of romance, anarchy, commerce and
+varied vices.
+
+Emile Poleski called it _l'entresol de l'enfer_, and certainly he was
+not there by his own choice.  It was the centre of intrigue, and to
+intrigue his life, intellect, and the little money he had left from his
+Polish estates, were devoted.  To him life meant "The Cause," and that
+exigeant mistress left little room for other and more natural
+affections.
+
+In his career women did not count, at least they did not count as
+women.  If they had money to spend, or brains and energies that could
+be utilised, that was a different matter.  He had a trick of studying
+people as one studies natural history through a microscope.
+
+It was all very interesting, but when one had done with the specimens
+one threw them away and looked about for fresh material.
+
+The train came in, slackened speed and stopped, and its contents
+resolved themselves into little groups of people all hunting with more
+or less excitement for their luggage, and porters to convey the same to
+cabs.
+
+The figure of a girl who had just alighted and was standing alone,
+caught and held his roving eyes.  The pose of her abnormally slim body
+had all the grace of a figure on a Grecian vase in its clean curves and
+easy balance.
+
+Her head was beautifully set upon a long throat, and her feet were
+conspicuously slender and delicate in their high French boots of
+champagne-coloured kid.  Her face, which as far as he could see was of
+a startling pallor, was obscured by a white lace veil tied loosely
+round her Panama hat, and left to fall down her back in floating ends;
+and she wore a rather crumpled, cream-coloured dress.
+
+She stood, looking round, as if uncertain how to act, evidently in
+expectation of someone to meet her.  No one appeared and she moved off
+in search of a porter.  Emile followed at a reasonable distance.  Books
+he found desperately dull, but humanity in any shape or form was
+attractive to him, and the girl's appearance appealed to a deeply
+embedded love of the exotic and mysterious.
+
+He watched with cynical amusement as she tried to explain her wishes in
+French to a porter, who spoke only the dialect of Catalonia.  Her voice
+finally decided Emile on his line of conduct.  Low-pitched it was, with
+subtle inflections, and with a hoarseness in the lower notes such as
+one hears in the voices of Jewish women.
+
+A woman, whose vocal notes were of that enchanting _timbre_, was likely
+to prove interesting.
+
+He advanced a few steps nearer, saying in French, "I speak the
+language.  Can I be of any use?"
+
+The girl turned, giving him a comprehensive glance, and bowed slightly
+in acknowledgment.
+
+"Many thanks, _Monsieur_!  I know scarcely any Spanish.  Perhaps you
+would tell me where one could get lodgings.  It seems rather hopeless
+for this man and myself to continue arguing in different languages, so
+if you would not mind--"
+
+When they were both in the _fiacre_ she did not speak, but leaned back,
+her hands in her lap, her feet crossed, looking straight in front of
+her with hazel-green eyes, expressionless as those of the Sphinx.
+Count Poleski congratulated himself in silence over his discovery.
+Here was a woman so unique that she asked no questions, did not
+volunteer after the manner of most women a flood of voluble
+information, apparently took everything for granted, and was in no way
+embarrassed by himself or his company.
+
+In some respects she appeared a young girl, but her composure was
+certainly not youthful.
+
+"So you're out from England," he said at last.
+
+"From Paris," she answered him serenely.  "I'm Arithelli of the
+Hippodrome."  There was a girlish pride in her accents, and she looked
+at him sideways to observe the effect of her announcement.
+
+"_Ma foi_!  So it's that, is it?  Then I've heard something about you.
+I know the Manager pretty well.  He said you were _un peu bizarre_."
+
+"_Peut etre plus qu'un peu_," Arithelli retorted quickly.  "I see you
+think he's right."
+
+Arrived at the lodgings she sat still, waiting in the cab with the same
+apparent indifference while Emile wrangled with the landlady.  At
+length he came back to her: "You had better try these for a week," he
+said.  "They're forty _pesetas_.  She will want the rent in advance as
+you have no recommendation."  For the first time Arithelli seemed
+disturbed.
+
+"I'm afraid I can't pay it.  I'm to have five pounds a week at the
+Hippodrome, but of course I can't ask for that in advance.  I had a
+second-class ticket out here, and now I've only got four-and-sixpence
+left."
+
+She held out a small blue satin bag, displaying a few coins.  "Perhaps
+I'd better go and explain to the Manager."  Emile shrugged his
+shoulders.  Obviously the girl was very young.
+
+"On the whole I think you'd better not," he said.  "You know nothing
+about either myself or the Manager, and it seems you've got to trust
+one of us so it may as well be me."
+
+When he had arranged matters he departed, saying casually, "I'll come
+in again to-night about nine o'clock to see how you are getting on.
+Don't do anything insane, such as wandering about the streets, because
+you feel dull.  It won't hurt you to put up with the dulness for a bit.
+You'll have plenty of excitement if you're going to live in Barcelona."
+
+"_Tiens_!" said Arithelli to herself.  "What manners and what dirty
+nails!  _C'est un homme epouvantable_, but very useful.  But for him I
+should have been prancing round this place all night, looking for
+rooms."
+
+She dragged her trunk towards her, and proceeded to unpack the
+collection of gaudy dresses that she had bought with so much pride at
+the _Bon Marche_ in Paris, and which were all in the worst possible
+taste.
+
+Perhaps she had been impelled to a choice of lively colours as being
+symbolical in their brightness of the new life on which she was about
+to embark.  There was a green cloth rendered still more hideous by
+being inlet with medallions of pink silk, a cornflower blue with much
+silver braid already becoming tarnished in the few times it had been
+worn, and a mauve and orange adorned with flamboyant Eastern embroidery.
+
+When she had tumbled them all out they showed a vivid patch of
+ill-assorted tints.  Arithelli shivered as she sat back on her heels on
+the floor, and looked round the sordid room.  The excitement of her
+arrival had worn off, and the element of depression reigned supreme in
+her mind.  Certainly the apartment, which was supposed to be a
+bed-sitting-room, but which was merely a bedroom, was not enlivening to
+contemplate.  No carpet, dirty boards, a large four-poster bed canopied
+with faded draperies against the wall facing the window.  There was a
+feeble attempt at a washstand in a small alcove on the left, furnished
+with the usual doll's house crockery affected on the Continent,--no
+wardrobe and no dressing table.
+
+It all looked hopeless, she told herself disgustedly.  Surely there
+were better rooms to be found in Barcelona for forty _pesetas_ a week!
+Either lodgings must be very dear or else Emile Poleski had meant to
+take a large commission for his trouble in finding them!
+
+She was stiff and tired after the long journey and want of proper food,
+and every trifle took upon itself huge dimensions.  She was daintily
+fastidious as to cleanliness, and everything seemed to her filthy
+beyond belief.  The universal squalor customary in Spanish life had
+come as an unpleasant shock.
+
+When she started from Paris she had conjured visions of a triumphal
+entry into her new career.  Now she felt rather frightened and
+desperately lonely, and the horrible room appeared like a bad omen for
+the future.  But, she reflected, after all, things might have been
+worse.  She had found one friend already.  Certainly he had
+disagreeable manners, especially after the artificial and invariable
+politeness of the Frenchmen she had met while travelling, but at least
+he promised to be useful.  She picked herself up off the floor and
+began to consider the disposal of her garments.  Three or four wooden
+pegs, the only accommodation to be seen, were obviously not sufficient
+to hold all her clothes.
+
+Presently there was an interlude, provided by the advent of the
+landlady.  Her dishevelment accorded well with the general look of the
+house; her slippers clicked on the carpetless boards at every shuffling
+step, and she carried a half-cold, slopped-over cup of coffee.  To
+Arithelli's relief the woman was mistress of a limited amount of French
+patois, and in answer to a demand for a wardrobe of some kind, said she
+would send up her son.  He was a carpenter and would doubtless arrange
+something.  She gave a curious glance at the girl's witch-like beauty,
+a mixture of suspicion and barely-admitted pity in her thoughts.
+
+As to Emile's share in the drama she had naturally formed conclusions.
+After a respectable interval her son arrived, and having delivered
+himself of a remark in Spanish and being answered in French, proceeded
+to hammer a row of enormous nails into the wall at regular intervals.
+Arithelli sat upon her trunk, which she considered cleaner than the
+chairs, and watched the process, her green eyes assuming a curious
+veiled expression, a hank of copper-tinted hair falling upon her
+shoulders.
+
+There was something uncanny in her capacity for keeping still, and she
+had none of the usual and natural fidgetiness of a young girl.  In
+whatever position of sitting or standing she found herself she was
+capable of remaining for an indefinite period.
+
+When the carpenter's manipulations had ceased she hung up her dresses
+carefully, put the rest of her things back into the trunk, as being the
+safest place, and sitting down again began to cry in a low, painful
+way, utterly unlike the light April shower emotion of the ordinary
+woman.
+
+Here she was in Barcelona, and the fulfilled desire seemed likely to
+become already Dead Sea fruit.  Supposing she got ill, or failed to
+satisfy the audience.  She would see her name to-morrow when she went
+out in large letters on the posters of the Hippodrome:
+
+"_Arithelli, the beautiful English equestrienne_," and underneath some
+appalling picture of herself in columbine skirts, or jockey's silk
+jacket and cap and top boots.
+
+She had been crazy with delight over her success in getting the
+engagement from the manager in Paris, and it had not occurred to her
+that her appearance had had a great deal to do with her having been
+accepted.  She had signed a contract for a year; and looking forward a
+year seemed a very long time.  There had been opposition at home.
+
+Her father had said, "I don't approve, but at the same time I don't
+know in the least what else you can do.  It's Hobson's choice.  You can
+ride, and you've got looks of the sort to take in a public career."
+
+Her mother had been frankly brutal.  Now that there was no money, she
+said, she could not have three great girls at home doing nothing.  She
+had given them all a good education and they must try and make some use
+of it.  Neither of the younger sisters, Isobel and Valerie, were old
+enough to do anything for themselves, so Arithelli at the age of
+twenty-four had taken her courage, which was the indomitable courage of
+her race, in both hands, and launched herself on the world.  The
+bare-backed riding of her early days in Galway had proved a valuable
+asset, and there was not a horse she could not manage.
+
+Her slim figure seemed born to the saddle, and her nerve was as yet
+unshaken.
+
+The man who had engaged her had been more than a little astonished at
+the composure with which she showed off the horses' paces, and went
+through various tricks.  As she was young and inexperienced, he would
+get her cheaply; she could be taught all the stereotyped acts with very
+little trouble, and her morbid style of beauty would be a draw in Spain.
+
+There was nothing of the English miss about her appearance and few
+people would have believed her to be only twenty-four.  She had no
+freshness, no _beaute de diable_.  Her beauty was that of line and
+modelling.  Her quietness was partly the result of a convent education.
+An old Irish nun had told her once that good looks were a snare and a
+delusion of the Devil, and that hers would never bring her happiness.
+
+At least they had got her an engagement, and a circus had always
+represented to her the very height of romance.
+
+She wondered how she could manage for money till she got her five
+pounds next Friday.  It was lucky that all her habits, and so on, were
+provided by the management.  She wished to-morrow would arrive, for she
+felt eager to begin work, and see the horses.  She had quite forgotten
+all about Emile's promised visit, and was just pulling down the rest of
+her hair preparatory to getting ready for bed, when he walked in
+without any preliminary knock.
+
+"How are you getting on?  All right?"  Then after a momentary
+inspection of the many garments that festooned the dirty walls, he
+added: "I don't think you've got very good taste in clothes!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+  "All women are good; good for something, or good for nothing."
+            CERVANTES.
+
+
+The next morning Emile made his entrance with the same complete
+disregard of ceremony.  Arithelli was still in bed and only half awake.
+She raised herself slightly and looked at him with sleepy eyes.
+
+"Oh!" she said.  "I didn't hear you knock."
+
+There was the same entire lack of embarrassment in her manner that she
+had shown on the previous night.  Almost before she had finished her
+sentence she shut her eyes again, and leant back yawning.  It seemed a
+matter of the greatest indifference to her whether he was there or not.
+Emile's interest rose by several degrees as he sat down on the edge of
+the bed.
+
+"I didn't knock," he said, speaking English fluently enough, but with
+the hard, clipped accents of the Slav.  "I can't bother about all that
+humbug.  If you're straight with me I'll be straight with you, and we
+may as well be friends.  I dare say you think you're very good-looking
+and all that, but it doesn't make any difference to me.  You're here,
+and I'm here, so we may as well be here together."
+
+"I'm so sorry," Arithelli replied, "but I'm always so stupid and sleepy
+in the mornings.  Do you mind saying it all over again?"
+
+And very much to his own surprise Emile Poleski repeated his remarks.
+It struck him that there was something of the boy, the _gamin_, about
+her in spite of her exotic appearance.  That was so much the better and
+would suit admirably with his schemes for her.  It was better that she
+should not be too much of a woman; for in the realms of anarchy there
+is no sex, though comradeship is elevated to the dignity of a fine art.
+
+For chivalry and love making there is neither the time nor the desire,
+and those who are wedded to _La Liberte_ find her an all-sufficient
+idol for purposes of worship.  Human life is held of small account, to
+join the Cause being equivalent to the signing of one's own death
+warrant.  One would probably have to die to-morrow if not to-day, and
+whether it were sooner or later mattered little.  Emile's fierce
+devotion to the cause of his oppressed country had been the means of
+leaving him stranded in Barcelona at the age of forty, without hopes,
+illusions or ideals.  His estates in Russia had been confiscated, his
+parents were dead, the woman he had loved was married.
+
+Now he lived in a dirty back street, in a single room, on two pounds a
+week, morbid, suspicious, cynical, keeping his own counsel, owning no
+friends, and occupying body and brain with plots, secret meetings,
+ciphers and the usual accompaniments of intrigue.  The Brotherhood
+consisted of fifteen men, though occasionally the number varied.  Two
+or three would disappear, another one come.  There was no feminine
+element.  An Anarchist seldom marries.  To him a woman is either a
+machine or the lightest of light episodes.
+
+Emile had not the least desire to make love to the girl whom he had for
+his own purposes befriended.  He was a quick and subtle judge of
+character, and had seen at a glance that in her he would find a study
+of pronounced interest.  Also she might prove of some utility.  It was
+one of the tenets of the fraternity to which he belonged never to waste
+any material that might come to hand.  In the finely-cut face before
+him, with its Oriental modelling and impassivity, he read brains,
+refinement and endurance.  Her hair was plaited in two long braids, and
+drawn down over her ears, showing the contour of a sleek, smooth little
+head.
+
+She had relapsed into silence after disposing of the slovenly meal he
+had induced the landlady to provide.  The only thing that seemed to
+worry her was the superfluous dirt that adorned the cups.
+
+At length she spoke:
+
+"And what sort of a place is this Barcelona?"
+
+"_L'entresol de l'enfer_," answered Emile curtly.  "What are your
+people doing to allow you to come here alone?"
+
+"They don't know I am here.  I ran away, you see.  If I get on well,
+I'll write and let them know, and if not--"
+
+"_Alors_?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know.  But I will get on.  Don't you think I ought to make
+a success at the Hippodrome?"
+
+Emile ignored the _naive_ conceit of the last remark.  "But what are
+you doing at the Hippodrome at all?" he demanded.
+
+"I am riding," she answered with an elfish smile in which her eyes took
+no part.
+
+"Obviously!  What are you going to do about _dejeuner_?  The landlady
+won't bring you up all your meals."
+
+"I don't know," was the unconcerned answer.
+
+"You'll have to go to one of the _cafes_, and you had better let me
+show you which are the most desirable ones.  _Enfin_! have you any
+intention of getting up this morning?"
+
+Arithelli yawned again.  "I suppose I must go round and present myself
+to the Manager.  I'm to rehearse a fortnight before I make my
+appearance in public."
+
+"Then I had better come with you," Emile replied with decision.  "As I
+told you yesterday, I know the Manager fairly well."
+
+An hour later they walked together through the streets on their way to
+the Hippodrome.  Emile was a bad advertisement for the secrecy of his
+profession, for he looked a typical desperado.  His velvet coat had the
+air of having been slept in for weeks, and had certainly never been on
+terms of acquaintanceship with a brush; and, besides the usual
+Anarchist badge, a red tie, a blood red carnation flamed defiance in
+his buttonhole.
+
+Under a battered sombrero he scowled upon the world; a dark skin,
+fierce moustache, and arching black eyebrows over hard, grey eyes.
+
+There are few people who look their parts in life, but Emile might
+without addition or alteration, have been transferred to the stage as
+the typical villain of a melodrama.
+
+Arithelli had arrayed herself in the cornflower blue frock, which she
+carried with a negligent ease, and she still wore the Panama hat with
+the flowing veil.  As a matter of fact it was the only piece of
+headgear she possessed; for she had been reckless over dresses and
+boots in Paris and had found herself drawn up with a jerk in the midst
+of her purchases by her small stock of money coming to an abrupt end.
+
+Of her carriage and general deportment, which were noticeably good even
+among Spanish women, Emile approved.  The crude blue of her dress, the
+tags and ends of tinselled braid set his teeth on edge.  In his "Count
+Poleski" days he had known the quiet and exquisite taste of the
+_mondaines_ of Vienna and St. Petersburg, and like most men he
+preferred dark clothes in the street.  Later on he proposed to himself
+the pleasure of supervising her wardrobe, except her boots, which met
+with his fullest approbation.
+
+He noticed that she did not talk much but observed in silence.  He felt
+that nothing escaped those heavy-lidded, curious eyes.  "Is everything
+dirty in Spain?" she said at last.
+
+"How fussy you are about dirt!" retorted Emile disagreeably.
+
+"Yes.  My mother is a Jewess, you know.  I expect we notice these
+things more than the dirty Gentiles."
+
+Her calm assertion of the superior cleanliness of the tribe of Israel,
+amused Emile, who had been accustomed to hear the usual contempt of the
+English-speaking races for anyone possessing a strain of Jewish blood.
+So it was the Jewess in her that accounted for her haunting voice.
+
+The Manager was a hatchet-faced and haggard man who looked as if he
+went to bed about once a week, on an average, and existed principally
+on cigarettes and _absinthe_.  The simultaneous arrival of Emile and
+Arithelli roused him from his normal condition of bored cynicism to
+comparative animation.
+
+Like the landlady he naturally made his own conclusions.
+
+"When did you arrive?" he demanded of Arithelli.  Emile, not being
+afflicted with a sense of the necessity for elaborate explanation,
+removed himself a few paces and began to roll a cigarette.
+
+Arithelli stood her ground, listened to the comments on her appearance
+which the Manager felt himself entitled to use, returned his cynical
+survey with a level glance, and answered his questions with an
+unruffled composure.
+
+It was arranged that she should rehearse every day for two hours in the
+morning, and another two hours between the afternoon and evening
+performances.  For the first act she could wear a habit of any colour
+she cared to choose, and a smart hat; for the second act, which
+included jumping over gates, and the presence of the inevitable clown,
+she would have to wear short skirts.
+
+"_They_ won't suit me," she said.  "You see how long and thin I am, and
+look at my long feet.  I shall look a burlesque."
+
+The Manager glared at her.
+
+"I quite believe you will," he snapped.  "I suppose you think you're
+going to do the leaping act in a court train and feathers!  Is there
+anything more you would like to suggest?"
+
+The intended sarcasm was not a success.  Arithelli considered gravely.
+
+"I don't think so, thank you," she said at last.  "But if I _do_ think
+of anything else I'll tell you.  And I _should_ like to see the horses."
+
+She was filled with a genuine delight by the four cream-coloured
+pure-bred Andalusians, El Rey, Don Quixote, Cavaliero and Don Juan.
+They turned intelligent eyes upon her as she entered their stalls,
+neighing gently as if they recognised a friend.  Both the men
+experienced the same feeling of surprise at her evident knowledge and
+understanding of animals.  In five minutes she had shown that she knew
+as much about their harness and food as a competent groom.
+
+The astute Manager, upon whom no sign of intelligence was wasted, saw a
+good opportunity for getting a little extra work out of his youthful
+leading lady.  He informed her that she must be down at the stables
+every morning at eight o'clock to inspect the horses and see them fed
+and watered.  As a matter of fact the inspection should have been one
+of his own duties, but the girl was not likely to cavil at any little
+additional work that had not been exactly specified in her contract.
+Besides, if she did, he could soon make it uncomfortable for her.
+Arithelli made no objection.  Though she hated getting up early she
+would never have grudged a sacrifice of comfort made on behalf of any
+animal.  When all the business was completed, Emile took her to the
+Cafe Colomb for lunch.
+
+Before they left he knew the details of her history.
+
+The big house in Ireland, with its stud of horses and unlimited
+hospitality, and the rapidly vanishing fortune.  Her mother, a Viennese
+by birth, a cosmopolitan by travel and education, a fine horsewoman,
+and extravagance incarnate.  Her father, good-natured, careless, manly,
+as sportsmanlike and unbusinesslike as most Irishmen.  When his horses
+died he bought more, keeping always open house for a colony of men as
+shiftless and as easy-going as himself.
+
+As the children grew up the money became less and less.  They were sent
+to Convent schools in France and Belgium, then to cheap schools in
+England.
+
+At length the final crash came, and the big, picturesque, rambling
+house in Galway was sold, and they came to London with an infinitesimal
+income partly derived from the grudging charity of relatives.
+
+Arithelli cleaned the doorsteps and the kitchen stove, blackleaded the
+grates and prepared the meals, which more often than not consisted only
+of potatoes and tea.
+
+Their mother, who hated all domestic work, and could never be induced
+to see that their loss of money was due to her own extravagance,
+retired to bed, where she spent her days in reading Plato in the
+original, and writing charming French lyrics.
+
+When Arithelli ran away she had gone straight to an old friend of her
+mother's, the widow of an ambassador in Paris.  She had made up her
+mind to earn her own living.  She would carve out for herself a career.
+Having decided that riding was her most saleable accomplishment, she
+had gone round to the riding school where the managers of the
+Hippodromes of Vienna, Buda-Pesth and Barcelona waited to select
+_equestriennes_.
+
+Luck, youthful confidence, and her tragic, unyouthful beauty, had all
+ranged themselves together to procure her the much desired engagement.
+
+"I made up my mind to get taken on," she concluded.  "_Et me voila_!  I
+did all sorts of desperate jumps that day.  I felt desperate.  If I
+hadn't got it, there was only the Morgue.  I couldn't have gone home."
+
+Emile listened in silence, and drank _absinthe_ and considered.
+
+That night at a meeting of the Brotherhood he took the leader,
+Sobrenski, aside and said:
+
+"It was decided the other day that we wanted someone to take messages
+and run errands.  Someone who could go unnoticed into places where it
+would be suspicious for us to be seen.  You suggested a boy.  Fate has
+been so kind as to show me a woman who seems to be in every way
+suitable--or at least with a little training she will become so."
+
+"A woman!" echoed the other.  "Are you mad?"
+
+"I conclude her to be a woman because of her clothes.  Otherwise she
+seems to be a mixture of a boy and wood-elf.  The combination appears
+to me to be a fascinating one.  She is of good family, half Irish,
+speaks three languages, asks no questions, and seems to have an
+extraordinary capacity for holding her tongue.  It is on that account
+that I questioned her sex.  Her appearance is excessively feminine.  Of
+course I do not propose to enrol her among us at once.  As I have said
+before, there are many ways in which a woman would be useful."
+
+Sobrenski pulled doubtfully at his reddish, pointed beard.  "Does she
+know anything about the Cause?"
+
+"I fancy not, but she appears to have the right ideas, and after I have
+judiciously fanned the flame!--girls of that age are always wildly
+enthusiastic over something--so she may as well devote her enthusiasm
+to us."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+  "Out of the uttermost end of things
+    On the side of life that is seamier,
+  There lies a land, so its poet sings,
+    Whose people call it Bohemia.
+
+  "It is not old, it is not new,
+    It is not false, it is not true,
+  And they will not answer for what they do,
+    Far away in Bohemia."
+            "Love in Bohemia," DOLF WYLLARDE.
+
+
+"I think," Arithelli said with deliberation, "that all your friends are
+very fatiguing.  They have such bad tempers, and do nothing but argue."
+
+"They live for the serious things of life," retorted Emile.  "Not to
+play the fool."
+
+"Thanks!  Is this one of the serious things of life, do you suppose?"
+She stuck the large needle with which she had been awkwardly cobbling a
+tear in her skirt, into the seat of a chair.
+
+"What are you doing that for?" demanded Emile.
+
+"Oh, pardon, I forgot."  She extracted the needle.  "I don't think I'm
+unwomanly but I'm not a good sewer.  Emile! don't you think we might
+have some music?  I really am beginning to sing '_Le Reve_' quite well."
+
+Her education in Anarchy had commenced with the teaching of
+revolutionary songs.  Emile, who was himself music-mad, had discovered
+her to be possessed of a rough contralto voice of a curious mature
+quality.  It would have been an absurd voice for ballads in a
+drawing-room, but it suited fiery declamations in praise of _La
+Liberte_!
+
+They were sitting in Emile's room now, for they made use of each
+other's lodgings alternately, and there was a battered and rather
+out-of-tune piano.  Sometimes, after the evening performance, there
+would be a gathering of the conspirators, all more or less morose,
+unshaven and untidy; and while Emile played for her, Arithelli would
+stand in the middle of the room, her green eyes blazing out of her pale
+face, her arms folded, singing with a fervour which surprised even her
+teacher, the lovely impassioned "_Reve du prisonnier_" of Rubinstein.
+She was always pleased with her own performances, and not in the least
+troubled with shyness.  Also she was invariably eager to practise.  She
+shook down her skirt, went across to the piano and began to pick out
+the notes.
+
+  "_S'il faut, ah, prends ma vie.
+  Mais rends-moi la liberte!_"
+
+
+Emile was sewing on buttons.  Though he did not look in the least
+domesticated, he was far more dexterous at such work than the
+long-fingered Arithelli.  In fact it was only at his suggestion that
+she ever mended anything at all.
+
+"Do you ever by chance realise what you are singing about?" he demanded.
+
+"Of course I do.  I'm a red hot Socialist.  I've read Tolstoi's books
+and lots of others.  I got in an awful scrape over political things
+just the little time I was in Paris.  It was when the Dreyfus case was
+on.  Madame Bertrand was terrified at the way I aired my opinions.  You
+see politics are so different abroad to what they are in England."
+
+Emile agreed.  The girl was developing even more than he had hoped.
+
+"Ah!  This is the first time I've ever heard about your political
+opinions."
+
+"You've never asked me before.  One doesn't know everything about a
+person at once."
+
+Again Emile agreed.  Then he said abruptly, "Well, if you have all
+these ideas you'd better join the Cause."
+
+"I'd love to!  Shall I have to go to meetings with Sobrenski and all
+the rest of them?"
+
+"Probably.  But you'll not be expected to talk.  You may be told to do
+some writing or carry messages."
+
+"Is that all?"  She seemed rather disappointed.  Emile felt for a
+moment almost inclined to develop scruples.  She evidently regarded
+Anarchy at large as a species of particularly exciting diversion.
+
+"Who are the other women mixed up with it?" she asked.
+
+"There are no other women.  You should feel honoured that we are having
+you."
+
+Emile stood up, having completed his renovating operations.  "You want
+to sing, eh?"  Arithelli assented eagerly.  "You will work?" Emile
+demanded.
+
+"Yes!"  Her eyes had become suddenly like green jewels, and she looked
+almost animated.  She was more interested in Emile's music than in any
+other part of him.  His wild Russian ballads sung with his strange
+clipped accent and fiery emphasis, fascinated her.  She was content to
+listen for an indefinite period of time, her long body in a restful
+attitude, her feet crossed, her hands in her lap, as absolutely
+immovable as one who is hypnotised.
+
+Emile, for his part, was equally interested in her exploits in
+vocalism, which he found as extraordinary and unexpected as everything
+else about her.  Her singing voice was so curiously unlike her speaking
+voice that it might have belonged to another person.  It had tremendous
+possibilities and a large range, but it was hoarse and harsh, and yet
+full of an uncanny attraction.  In such a voice a sorceress of old
+might have crooned her incantations.  Where did this girl get her soul,
+her passion, he wondered; she who was only just beginning life.
+
+He flung over an untidy pile of music, and dragged out the
+magnificently devilish "_Enchantement_" of Massenet.  "Try this," he
+said abruptly.  "It's _your_ kind of song."
+
+For half-an-hour he exhorted, bullied and instructed, losing both his
+composure and his temper.  Arithelli lost neither.  "I don't understand
+music," she observed calmly.  "But show me what to do and I'll do it.
+Mine's a queer voice, isn't it?  A regular croak."
+
+"You've got a voice; yes, that's true, but you don't know how to
+produce it, and you've no technique.  You want plenty of scales."
+
+"Wouldn't that take all the rough off, and make it just like anyone's
+voice?"
+
+Emile stared angrily at the exponent of such heresy, and was about to
+annihilate her with sarcasm, when he suddenly changed his mind.  After
+all, she was right.  It was what she called "the rough" that helped to
+make her voice unlike the voices of most women.
+
+"Is that your idea?  A good excuse for being lazy!  If you don't sing
+scales then you must work hard at songs."
+
+"Yes, I know."  She put her hands behind her back and leant against the
+piano.  "There was a man in Paris, a friend of the manager.  He heard
+me sing once.  He knew I wanted to take up a profession, and he offered
+to train me for nothing, and bring me out on the stage.  I was to sing
+those queer, dramatic, half-monotone songs in which one almost _speaks_
+the words.  He meant to write them specially for me, and I was to wear
+an oriental costume.  He said that every other voice would sound _fade_
+after mine."
+
+Emile glanced at her sharply, but her tone and manner was both
+absolutely void of conceit.  "Well, why didn't you accept his offer?"
+
+"I don't know.  I suppose because it was fated I should come here.  He
+wanted me to make my _debut_ at the _cafes chantants_, but I didn't
+like the idea somehow.  He said my voice was only fit for the stage,
+and would sound horrible in a room."
+
+Emile twisted his moustache upwards, and his eyebrows climbed in the
+same direction.  "So!  Do you think then that your life at the
+Hippodrome is going to be more what you English call respectable, than
+the _cafes chantants_?"
+
+"There are the horses here.  If I don't like anything else I can always
+like them."
+
+Emile decided that the man in Paris had been apt in his judgment of
+this fantastic voice.  Clever of him also to have noticed that she was
+Oriental.  The setting of her green eyes was of the East.  And horses
+were the only things she cared about--so far.  Like most people whose
+lives are a complicated tangle of plots, Emile was not particularly
+interested in animals.  His life, thoughts and environment were morbid,
+and the dumb creation too normal and healthy to appeal greatly to him.
+He discovered that his pupil was able to play in much the same
+inconsistent fashion that she sang.  With a beautiful touch, full of
+temperament and expression, she possessed a profound ignorance of the
+rudiments of music.  She could not read the notes, she said, but she
+could copy anything he played if she heard it two or three times.
+Emile found her astonishingly intelligent as well as amiable, and
+though the music lessons were not conducted on scientific principles,
+they produced good results.
+
+He would give her plenty of music with which to occupy herself till the
+time came when she would be fully occupied in serving the Cause.  As he
+had said, there were no other female conspirators in their circle.
+Sobrenski, the red-haired leader, detested women, and thought them all
+fools, who generally added the sin of treachery to their foolishness.
+Emile himself had taken no interest in any woman since he had lived in
+Barcelona.  He too had found them treacherous.  Since he had lost his
+little childish goddess, Marie Roumanoff, he had had no desire to play
+the role of lover.  If he wanted companionship he preferred men, for as
+companions women bored him.
+
+But Arithelli was not a woman--yet.  She appeared able to keep own
+counsel, to do as she was told, and to judge by the way she rode, her
+courage would be capable of standing a severe test.  Also it had
+occurred to him that she possessed the art of being a good comrade.  It
+would amuse him to watch her develop.  At present she was full of
+illusions about the charm of life in general.  Everything for her
+showed rose-tinged.  Well, it was not his business to dispel illusions.
+At present it was all "_Le Reve_," but after the dream would come
+awakening.  He took care to leave her very little alone during the
+first few days, and arranged her time according to his own ideas, and
+escorted her backwards and forwards from her rehearsals at the
+Hippodrome.
+
+When she was free he took her for long walks up the hills where they
+could look down upon the gorgeous city, which, as far as natural
+loveliness went, might have been compared to Paradise rather than to
+the Hell to which he invariably likened it.
+
+The beautiful harbour, the dry air, the sunlight and splashes of vivid
+colour--everything was intoxicating to her.  She said very little, but
+Emile felt that she missed nothing, and lacked nothing in appreciation.
+For himself the place must be always hateful, for he was in exile.
+What was the golden sunlight to him when he longed for the snows and
+frozen wastes of Russia, that sombre country so like the hearts of
+those by whom it is peopled.
+
+One day he took her for an excursion to Montserrat, three hours'
+journey from Barcelona.  They left the train at Monistrol, and started
+to walk through the vineyards and pine woods towards the famous
+mountain that towers up to heaven in grey rugged terraces of rock.  All
+round, for miles, were undulating waves of green, here and there the
+brown towers of some ancient castle, or the buildings of a farmstead;
+and below on the plain the glitter of the winding river.  They climbed
+to the wooded slopes of Olese, where they sat down to rest.  Arithelli
+threw herself on the short, dry grass, with her arms under her head,
+and drew a long breath of pleasure and relief.
+
+"I love all this; it makes me feel so free."
+
+Emile sat with his back against a huge plane tree, and rolled
+cigarettes, watching her under his heavy eyebrows.  She looked in her
+proper place here, he thought.  There was something wild and
+animal-like about the grace of her attitude.
+
+"So you're out of a convent?" he said, hurling out the remark with his
+usual abruptness.  "_Tiens_!  It's absurd!"
+
+"But it's true.  Convent schools are cheap, you see, that's why we were
+sent there.  No, I'm not a Catholic.  Most of the girls made their
+abjurations, but I never did.  They told lies there, and they spied.  I
+hated that.  The nuns spied on the children of Mary, and the children
+of Mary spied on the ones who were not the children of Mary, and--" she
+stopped.
+
+Emile told her to continue.  "I should like to hear more about
+your--your religious experiences," he said.  "Besides, it will do you
+more good to talk than to go to sleep."
+
+Arithelli complied at once, with unruffled good nature.  "Oh, of course
+I'll tell you if you like," she said amiably.  "I stopped because I
+thought you would probably be bored, _ennuye_, you know."
+
+She described the nuns mumbling their prayers, and punctuating them
+with irate commands to the children; the many and various rules, the
+_Mere Superieure_, the food, the clothes, the eccentricities of
+_Monsieur le Directeur_.  She had the rare and unwomanlike art of witty
+description, though it assorted badly with her tragic face and
+unsmiling eyes.  As she talked her voice rippled and broke into
+suppressed laughter.
+
+"It was all rather dull, _n'est-ce-pas_?" said Emile, who felt more
+amusement than he had any intention of showing.  "You'll find the Cause
+more exciting."
+
+Before any practical steps were taken to make her a member of the band
+it was necessary to stimulate her enthusiasm, her imagination.  He knew
+that for all her outward calmness she had no lack of fire.  The coldest
+countries sometimes produced the most raging volcanoes.
+
+"It's the only thing you care about--isn't it--the Cause?" she said.
+"Tell me more about it.  As I'm going in for it I ought to understand.
+Of course I like anything that's 'agin the Government.'  All the Irish
+have always been rebels and patriots.  We've helped your country too."
+
+Emile did not require a second invitation to induce him to expound his
+views.  "I suppose you think we throw bombs about by way of a little
+distraction?" he asked sarcastically.  "What have we suffered before we
+took to throwing bombs?  Before I came here I saw men and women, old
+and young together, shot down in the streets of St. Petersburg.
+Because they rioted?  No!  Because they wished to offer a protest
+against the brutalities of the Government officials.  Are our petitions
+ever read, our entreaties ever answered?  There were other things too,
+but they didn't generally get into the newspapers.  Women stripped in
+barrack rooms,--and that in winter,--the Russian winter,--and beaten by
+common soldiers.  Not women of the streets and slums, but women of the
+higher classes.  Mock trials held with closed doors, the crime,--to
+have incurred the displeasure of someone in favour at the Court,--the
+end,--Siberia!  A student is known to be quiet, a great reader and
+interested in the condition of the serfs.  He is watched, arrested, and
+on the false evidence of the police ends his days in the mines.
+Entreaties, reason, appeal!  Have we not tried them?  Now we have only
+one weapon left--retaliation.  Sometimes we are able to avenge our
+martyrs.  The two fiends who guarded Marie Spiridonova were shot by the
+members of her Society.  She was only a girl too--about the same age as
+you.  We Anarchists do not serenade women and make them compliments,
+but we think it an honour to kiss the hand of such as Marie
+Spiridonova.  She was tortured, starved, outraged, and came through
+worse than death to be transported to a convict settlement.  Now she is
+in the Malzoff Prison.  She will never see the world again, but it may
+be years before the life is ground out of her by labour and privations.
+Her case will soon be forgotten, except by a few, and thousands of
+other women have gone the same road.  The details of the tragedy may be
+a little different, the thing itself is the same.  One day I shall go
+back to my own country.  In the meantime I carry on the campaign here.
+
+"It's a losing cause.  But if we lose we pay.  We don't ask for mercy!"
+
+      *      *      *      *      *      *
+
+They sat together that evening at a _cafe_ on the Rambla, the strolling
+place of the Spanish beauties, who promenaded there in an endless
+stream, with waving fans and rustling draperies, carnations and roses
+burning in dark, elaborately dressed hair.  Tziganes made wild, witch
+music.  At the _cafes_ people laughed and drank.
+
+Suddenly Arithelli leant across the little table, raising her glass.
+"To the Cause!" she whispered under her breath.
+
+For an instant the two pairs of eyes flamed into each other; then those
+of the man, hard and steel-grey, softened into something like
+admiration.  Their glasses clinked softly together.  "To the Cause!" he
+repeated.  "_Mon Camarade_!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+  "These were things she came to know, and to take their measure,
+  When the play was played out so for one man's pleasure."
+            SWINBURNE.
+
+
+A few days later, Arithelli was duly initiated, and given the badge of
+the Cause, a massive buckle with a woman's figure, and on either side
+the words _Honneur et Patrie_.  At the suggestion of the leader Emile
+had been made responsible for her behaviour.  If she betrayed them in
+any way his life was to pay forfeit.  There was a fellow conspirator
+working with her at the Hippodrome, a young Austrian of high rank named
+Vardri.  His father had turned him out of doors, penniless, because of
+his political views; and he was now, half-starved, consumptive and
+reckless, employed in harnessing the horses and attending to the
+stables.  There were two men under thirty, but the majority were
+middle-aged.  They all seemed to Arithelli to have the same wild,
+restless eyes.  They called her "_Camarade_," and "_Amigo_," and
+treated her not unkindly, but with an utter indifference to her sex.
+All their sayings showed the most absolute disregard for human life.
+
+"If a vase is cracked, break it.  If your glove is worn out, throw it
+away."
+
+If they heard that some member of the band had found his way to the
+fortress of Montjuich there was callous laughter and a speculation as
+to whose turn it would be next.
+
+Their meetings were held in divers places.  Sometimes they would engage
+a room at the Hotel Catalonia and hold what were supposed to be classes
+for astronomy.  Sobrenski was the lecturer, the rest posing as
+students.  If anyone came in unexpectedly it all looked beautifully
+innocent--the big telescope by the open window, the books and papers
+and charts, and Arithelli at the desk at the end of the room taking
+shorthand notes of the lecture.
+
+There were seldom more than three or four _rendezvous_ held in the same
+place, and more than once there were alarms and rumours of a visit from
+the police.
+
+As the days wore on Emile found new reason to congratulate himself upon
+his discovery of "Fatalite," as he had nicknamed the girl.  She had
+shown herself possessed of a charming temper, a fine intelligence, and
+a most complete understanding of the law of obedience.
+
+She made no comments on anything she was asked to do, but delivered
+messages and ran errands after the manner of a machine in good working
+order.  Even Sobrenski, who hated all women, was obliged to admit her
+usefulness.
+
+She was on pleasant terms with everybody down to the strappers,--the
+men who harnessed the Hippodrome horses,--who adored her.  Even the
+cynical Manager was impressed by her pluck and skill, though he
+considered it his privilege to regale her with comments on her personal
+peculiarities.
+
+The time arrived for her first performance at the Hippodrome.  She made
+her appearance in the ring in a turquoise blue habit, trimmed
+hussar-fashion with much braid, and a plumed Cavalier hat, the dusky
+shadows under her eyes accentuated, and her face powdered.  The Manager
+would not allow her to use rouge, so under the glaring electric lights
+she appeared more than ever spiritual and unearthly.
+
+Her type, he said, did not require colour; and the people preferred
+anything morbid in the shape of looks.
+
+Emile, who was among the audience on the first night, thought she
+looked like a thorough-bred racer as she made a dignified entrance to a
+clanging stately gavotte crashed out by the band.  He had given her
+dresser a couple of _pesetas_ to have her well turned out, and the
+result was exceedingly satisfactory even to his critical eyes.
+
+Her little head with its piled red hair was carried marvellously high,
+and she swayed daintily on the back of the high-stepping Don Juan.  She
+bowed gravely to the various parts of the house, but she had no
+stereotyped smile either for the boxes or for the lower seats.  Her
+slender figure gave the impression of great strength for a young girl.
+
+"Steel in a velvet sheath, _ma foi_!  Body and soul!" was Emile's
+inward comment.  "So much the better for the Cause."
+
+A Spanish crowd usually gives but a languid reception unless roused by
+something either horrible or sensational, but her bizarre appearance
+had the effect which the Manager had foreseen.
+
+In the second act she apparently changed her personality with her
+clothes, and whirled in astride over two horses with neither saddle nor
+bridle, guiding them and keeping them together by the pressure of her
+feet.  She had full skirts, to her knees, of white satin, and
+pearl-coloured silk stockings.  Her satin bodice was cut heart-shaped
+and there was a high jewelled band round her long throat.  Her hair
+hung down in a thick plait, tied with a bow of blue velvet.
+
+The horses tore round the ring at full gallop; she jumped over gates
+and through hoops, and ended her performance by leaping off one of the
+horses which was caught by a groom, and flinging herself on to the
+other, face to the tail, for a final reckless canter round the arena.
+
+The brilliance and nerve with which she carried through the trick,
+roused the enthusiasm it deserved, and Arithelli passed out panting and
+triumphant to the accompaniment of music and cheers, and showered roses
+and carnations.
+
+The part of her work that she most abhorred was the eight o'clock
+compulsory visit to the stables.  A circus life is not prone to
+encourage the virtue of early rising, and she was by nature indolent in
+a panther-like fashion, and was never in bed till half-past one or two
+in the morning.  If she had known a little more she could have
+protested on the grounds that her position of leading lady did not
+involve the feeding of her animals.  She did it as she had done other
+things without complaint, and presently Emile came to the rescue.  He
+knew as much about the habits and requirements of horses as he knew
+about shop-keeping, being entirely ignorant of both.
+
+"How much are the brutes to have?" he asked of the Manager.  "And what
+on earth do you give them?"
+
+"Oh, I generally give 'em fish," was the sarcastic answer.  "What are
+you doing here, Poleski?  This is the girl's business.  I thought she
+was keen on her horses."
+
+"She is also keen on her bed," Emile answered.  "She does her share of
+work."
+
+The Manager grumbled, but the new arrangement was allowed to stand.
+
+Arithelli did not consort with the other female members of the
+Hippodrome.
+
+The one exception was Estelle the dancer, with whom Emile allowed her a
+slight acquaintance.  He neither approved of women in general nor of
+their friendships.  Estelle was the _bonne amie_ of the sardonic
+Manager, who occasionally beat her, after which ceremony it was her
+custom to drink _absinthe_.  Sometimes, for this reason, she was unable
+to appear on the stage.  She would come into Arithelli's dressing room
+and weep, and smoke innumerable cigarettes, and when things had been
+going well, they made a _partie carree_ at the Cafe Colomb.
+
+By way of advertising herself and her performance Arithelli was given a
+high, smartly painted carriage in which she drove in the fashionable
+promenade of Barcelona, the Paseo de Gracia, with three of the
+cream-coloured horses lightly harnessed and jingling with bells.
+
+On these occasions Emile played the part of lady's maid and escort.  He
+selected her dress, fastened it, scolded her for putting her hat on
+crooked, and laced up her preposterously high boots.
+
+Then he adjusted the battered sombrero, lit a cigarette and drove
+beside her, scowling as usual.
+
+The appearance of both was sufficiently arresting.  Arithelli drove as
+she rode, recklessly, and yet with science.  Her thin wrists and long
+girlish arms were capable of controlling the most fiery animal.
+
+She had made Emile her banker, and always handed over to him her weekly
+salary, some of which went to the expenses of the Cause as well as a
+certain portion in fines, for she had no idea of time and was never
+ready for anything.
+
+Nearly every night before she was half-way into her habit the call-boy
+came screaming down the passage, calling with the free-and-easy manners
+prevalent behind the scenes:
+
+"Hurry up, Arithelli, or there'll be a row!"
+
+The question of a disguise for her was discussed at one of the meetings
+of the Brotherhood, and it was decided that she should appear as a boy.
+Her height would be an advantage, and her long hands and feet would
+also help the illusion in a country where every woman possesses small,
+plump and highly arched extremities.  Besides, when they had to ride
+out to places at night, she would be less noticeable.  One girl among a
+crowd of men might attract suspicion, though in the daytime she was
+more useful as a woman.
+
+It naturally fell upon Emile to provide the details of her
+transformation, and he presented himself at her lodgings one afternoon,
+bearing an ungainly parcel which he deposited on the table.
+
+"You'd better try these on," he said.  "There is a complete suit of
+boy's clothes, a wig and everything you'll want.  You will have to put
+your own hair out of the way somehow."
+
+It was the drowsy hour of the _siesta_, when no one moved out if he
+could help it, and all work and play were at a standstill.  Arithelli
+was sitting, as was her custom, absorbed in her own thoughts and
+dreams.  For a moment she stared with uncomprehending eyes.  She felt
+tired, she wanted to be alone, and she had not heard a single word.
+Emile shrugged irritably and repeated his remarks.
+
+"Oh, yes," said Arithelli.  She rose slowly, took up the parcel and
+retired into seclusion behind the curtains, with which she had screened
+off the alcove and so made herself an improvised dressing room.  The
+rest of the apartment she had altered to look as much like a sitting
+room as possible, with the exception of the obtrusive four-poster,
+which could not be hidden and which upon entering appeared the most
+salient feature visible.  There was some tawdry jewellery lying about,
+and several pairs of the pale-hued Parisian boots she invariably
+affected.  Emile made and lighted the inevitable cigarette, while he
+fidgeted about, turning over the few French and English novels he could
+find with an air of disapproval; for her taste in literature did not
+commend itself to him any more than did her taste in finery.
+
+At one period of his life he had steeped himself in books, knowing the
+poetry and romance of nearly every nation.  Now he disliked them.  If
+she wanted books he would choose them for her.  She would read the
+love-songs of the revolutionists to their goddess Liberty, the haunting
+words of those who had suffered for a time, and escaped the Siberian
+Ice-Hell.  The fanaticism of his race and temperament flamed into his
+cold eyes as he sat and brooded, and he hardly noticed that Arithelli
+had slid into the room in her noiseless fashion, and was standing
+before him.
+
+Emile, though little given to being astonished, marvelled at the
+unconcern with which she submitted to his critical inspection.  She
+stood and walked easily, and looked neither uncomfortable nor unnatural
+in her boyish array, in which the perfect poise of her body showed
+triumphantly.
+
+The black wig, under which she had skilfully hidden her red hair, made
+her look more pale than ever.  The wide sombrero, tilted backwards,
+made a picturesque framing to her oval face, and the _manta_ or heavy
+cloak, worn by all Spaniards at night, hung, loosely draped over her
+left shoulder.  Emile promptly twisted it off.
+
+"This won't do," he said.  "The _manta_ is never worn like that.
+Besides it's not enough of a disguise.  Watch how I put it on."  With a
+few rough yet dexterous movements he arranged the dark folds so as to
+hide her shoulders and the upper part of her body.
+
+Then he stood back a few paces.  "But your green eyes!  A disguise for
+_them_ will be impossible.  One sees them always."
+
+  "_Les yeux verts.
+    Vont a l'enfer!_"
+
+"Do you know that, _mon enfant_?"
+
+"I've heard it before.  They've already come as far as _l'entresol_,
+according to you."
+
+Emile grinned.  He enjoyed skirmishing, and felt that he had met his
+match in words.  Before he could think of another retort she added:
+
+"I can see in the dark with my green eyes, so they're useful at all
+events."
+
+"Then you'll find plenty of use for them when you're working for
+us--and the Cause.  When you have to ride upon the hills at night you
+will find them of great service.  You'll have to ride astride too, so
+it is better for you in every way to be dressed like this."
+
+Presently he left her with a few words of praise for her successful
+appearance.  His first feeling of surprise at her coolness still
+lingered.  He had expected a scene in a quiet way, a refusal, at least
+expostulation.  All his first impressions of her were being verified.
+Well, he hoped she would continue in her present ways.  Undoubtedly she
+was an original, certainly she gave no trouble.
+
+When she heard the street door shut Arithelli sat down, hiding her face
+in her hands.  Once she shivered involuntarily.  Directly she found
+herself alone the mask of her assumed nonchalance had fallen suddenly.
+As long as there was an audience she had worn a disguise on her soul as
+well as her body.  She had been feeling moody and depressed all day,
+and this last episode was the climax.  Everything she had was to be her
+own no longer.  It was all to be for the Cause--even her green eyes!
+What power it possessed over these men.  They admitted it to be a
+losing Cause, yet it was all they thought about, the sole thing for
+which they lived--and died.  She had not thought it would be like this
+at first.
+
+She remembered how gaily she had discoursed of Tolstoi and Prince
+Kropotkin, and of their writings which had revealed to her a new world.
+Her first interview with Sobrenski had shown the relentlessness of the
+man she was to serve.  She felt that he would sacrifice all alike, men
+and women, to his idol, and would never stop to care whether the victim
+were willing or unwilling.  The fact of her sex would gain her no
+consideration at his hands.  Lately she had been impressed with the
+sensation of being surrounded by an impassable barrier drawn round her,
+a circle that was gradually becoming narrowed.  She had begun to know
+that she was being incessantly watched.  If Emile were occupied with
+the business of the Society, and could not fetch her from the
+Hippodrome himself, he never failed to send an understudy in the shape
+of one of his allies, generally one of the older men.  When she emerged
+from the performers' entrance a silent figure would come forward to
+meet her.  Often they exchanged no words throughout the walk home, but
+she was never left till her own door was reached.
+
+If she went anywhere to please herself, to a shop, or to see Estelle,
+she was expected to give a full account of her doings.  It was an
+understood thing that she should not go to the _cafes_ or public
+gardens alone, nor speak to anyone not already known and approved by
+Emile.  With all these conditions she had complied.  Already one
+illusion had vanished.  She had thought to find freedom in Barcelona.
+
+She had indeed found "_La Liberte_."
+
+But the Fates had chosen to be in an ironical mood, and while making
+the discovery she had herself become a slave.  In all her day there was
+no hour that she could call her own.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+  "I have gained her!  Her Soul's mine!"
+            BROWNING.
+
+
+"You slouched last night in the ring, Fatalite," Emile said.
+
+Arithelli flung up her head.  "I didn't!"
+
+"You looked like a monkey on a stick," proceeded Emile stolidly.  "You
+were all hunched up.  I wonder Don Juan didn't put you off his back on
+to the tan."
+
+"Don Juan knows better!  You see animals are usually more kind than
+people."
+
+She was too proud to admit that the long hours, hard work, and want of
+proper food and sleep had lately given her furious backaches, which
+were a thing unknown to her before, and a cause of bitter resentment.
+She had a healthy distaste for illness either in theory or practice.
+That night she sat Don Juan erect as a lance, passing Emile in his
+accustomed place in the lower tier of seats with a shrug and scornful
+eyebrows.
+
+She had felt more than usually inclined to play the coward during the
+last few weeks.  The heat, worry and over-fatigue had begun, as they
+must have done eventually, to affect her nerves.  When she had felt
+more than usually depressed and listless Emile had taken her to one of
+the _cafes_ and given her _absinthe_ which had made her feel recklessly
+well for the moment, and ten times more miserable the next day.  He had
+also advised her to smoke, saying that it was good for people who had
+whims and fancies, but smoking did not appeal to her, and she never
+envied the Spanish woman her eternal cigarette.
+
+She felt as if she would like to sleep, sleep for an indefinite period.
+She was wearied to death of The Cause, and the Brotherhood, with their
+intrigues and plots and interminable cipher messages.
+
+She had been three months in Barcelona, and now fully justified Emile's
+name for her.  Tragic as a veritable mask of Fate, she looked ten years
+older than the girl he had met on the station platform.
+
+The longer she worked for the Cause the more she realised that Anarchy
+was no plaything for spare moments, but a juggling with Life and Death.
+
+At first they had given her but little to do--a few documents to copy,
+some cipher messages to carry.  Then the demands upon her leisure had
+become more frequent.  She found she was expected to make no demur at
+being sent for miles, and once or twice there had been dreadful
+midnight excursions to a hut up in the mountains.
+
+The realisation of the folly of trying to escape from the burden that
+had been laid upon her affected her nerve and seat during her
+performances in the ring.
+
+For the first time she felt her courage failing her when she entered
+Sobrenski's house in answer to his summons.  When he had given her the
+despatch she made an objection on the grounds that the time taken in
+conveying it would absorb her few hours of rest.
+
+"It's too far," she protested.  "I can't go there to-day."
+
+"Then you can go to-morrow," answered Sobrenski in the accents of
+finality.  He had never cared about the girl's inclusion in their
+plots, and took his revenge in exacting from her considerably more than
+his pound of flesh.
+
+Moreover he suspected her of treachery, and disliked her for the
+quickness of her wit in argument.
+
+Even his unseeing eyes told him she looked both ill and haggard, but if
+she were there, well, she must work like the rest of them.
+
+Arithelli hesitated for a moment, and when she spoke for all her pluck
+her voice was a little rough and uneven.  "I'm tired of being an errand
+boy!"
+
+Sobrenski looked at her, drawing his eyebrows together.  Everyone of
+the band had a nickname for her, and his own very unpleasant one was
+"Deadly Nightshade."  Some of the others were "Sapho" and "Becky
+Sharp," which latter Emile had also adopted as being particularly
+appropriate.
+
+"Oh, very well," he answered.  "Shall it be the messages or a bullet?
+You can take your choice.  Perhaps you would prefer the latter.  It
+makes no difference to me.  This comes of employing women.  When
+Poleski brought you here first I was opposed to having you.  Women
+always give trouble."
+
+"Would you have got a man to do half the work I do?" she flashed out
+with desperate courage.
+
+"Then _do_ your work and don't talk about it," retorted Sobrenski
+sharply.  "If you are absolutely ill and in bed, of course we can't
+expect you to go to various places, but as long as you can ride every
+night at the Hippodrome, you can certainly carry messages."
+
+He turned his back on her and took up some papers from the table, and
+Arithelli went out, beaten and raging.
+
+Emile found her lying on the bed, her hands clenched by her side, her
+proud mouth set in bitter lines.  As he came in she turned away from
+him, to face the wall.
+
+"_Tiens_!" he observed, "you are a lazy little trollop."  Emile was
+proud of his English slang.
+
+Finding there was no answer he changed his tone.  "Hysterics, eh?  They
+won't do here.  Turn over, I want to talk to you."
+
+The girl moved mechanically, and Emile surveyed her.  There were slow
+tears forcing themselves under her heavy eyelids.
+
+"I wish I were dead!"
+
+"Probably you will be soon.  So will the rest of us."
+
+"What brutes you all are!"
+
+"Because we don't care whether we die to-day or to-morrow?  _Souvent
+femme varie_!  Just now you seemed so anxious,--besides, if one belongs
+to the Cause one knows what to expect."  Emile strolled towards the
+uncomfortable piece of furniture by the window, that purported to be an
+armchair, and sat down.
+
+"I loathe the Cause!  I didn't belong to it from choice.  Why did you
+make me join?"
+
+"Because I thought you would be useful.  You _are_ useful and probably
+will be more so."
+
+"Suppose I refuse to do anything more?"
+
+"They will not give you the choice of refusing twice."
+
+"Emile, I believe you are trying to frighten me.  Tell me what they
+would do."
+
+"As I introduced you to the Brotherhood, I should naturally be the one
+chosen to execute judgment on you.  _Enfin_, my dear Arithelli, I
+should be called upon to shoot you.  We don't forgive traitors.  If we
+let everyone draw back from their work simply because they happened to
+be afraid, what would become of the Cause?  Also let me remind you how
+you came to me boasting of your love of freedom.  'I'm a red-hot
+Socialist.'  That's what you said, didn't you?  Perhaps you have
+forgotten it.  Well, I haven't.  Socialism doesn't consist of standing
+up in a room to sing."
+
+Arithelli made no answer.  She lay like a dead thing, and after a pause
+the slow cynical voice went on.
+
+"There was another woman in our affair about two years ago.  Her name
+was Felise Rivaz.  She got engaged to one of the men, and then it
+suddenly occurred to her that comfortable matrimony and Anarchy didn't
+seem likely to be enjoyed at one and the same time.  So she persuaded
+the man to turn traitor and run away to England with her, where they
+proposed to get married.
+
+"Their plans came out,--naturally,--those things generally do.  We all
+spy upon each other.  They both felt so secure that they came together
+to a last meeting--I can show you the house if you like.  It's down in
+the Parelelo, the revolutionary quarter.
+
+"They strangled the woman, and cut off her arm above the elbow--I
+remember she had a thick gold bracelet round it with a date (a _gage
+d'amour_ from her lover I suppose)--and they made him drink the blood.
+He went mad afterwards.  The best thing he could do under the
+circumstances."  Emile shrugged.
+
+"There are plenty more similar _histoires_.  But perhaps I have told
+you enough to convince you of the futility of attempting to draw back
+from what you have undertaken."
+
+Still there was neither movement nor answer.  Emile got up, and came to
+the bed.
+
+"_Allons_!  It's time you were dressing.  You'll be late again, and one
+of these days you'll find yourself dismissed.  You must just go on and
+put up with it all.  Life mostly consists of putting up with things."
+
+But even this consoling philosophy failed to have a rousing effect.
+
+For the first time in her life Arithelli had fainted.
+
+      *      *      *      *      *      *
+
+When she came to her senses that evening Emile sent the landlady with a
+message to the Hippodrome, telling the Manager to substitute another
+turn, and then made Arithelli get into bed.  Her dress and boots came
+off and reposed upon the floor.  The rest of her clothes were left on.
+
+These details did not worry Emile.  Then he found a book and sat
+reading till she had drifted into a heavy sleep, the sleep of
+exhaustion.
+
+In his own way he was sorry for her, and his feelings were by no means
+as brutal as his words.  At the same time he did not believe in a
+display of sympathy.  According to his ideas it was demoralising, and
+cured no one of complaints, imaginary or otherwise.
+
+Also it was likely to make people hysterical.  Therefore when Arithelli
+woke at six o'clock in the morning, and sat up panting, with a hand at
+her left side, he elevated both shoulders and eyebrows.
+
+"_Qu'est ce-qu vous avez donc_?  You're all right now."
+
+He knew perfectly well that there was no pretence of illness.  The
+strained eyes, the blue shadows round the mouth told their own tale.
+
+"Oh, Emile, my heart feels so queer!  I'm sure it must be all wrong."
+
+"_Ma foi_!  _Ces femmes la_!  _Il y a tou jours quelque chose_!  First
+a faint, then a heart!  How often am I to tell you, Arithelli, that
+that part of your--your--how do you say it?--anatomy--is quite without
+use here?  Have you any brandy in the room?"
+
+"There's Eau de Cologne on the washstand."
+
+He mixed water with the spirit and gave her a liberal dose that soon
+helped her to look less ghastly.
+
+She lay back feeling almost comfortable, wishing Emile would see fit to
+depart, but Count Poleski returned again to the subject of her
+misbehaviour.
+
+Like most men he was not at his best in the early morning, and the
+night's vigil had not improved his temper.
+
+He sat scowling after his manner, black eyebrows meeting over grey
+eyes, hard as flint.  "If you are going in for this kind of
+performance, what will be the use of you?" he enquired sarcastically.
+
+Perhaps after all Sobrenski had been right in employing no women.
+
+"Even the best machine will get out of order sometimes," the girl
+replied wearily.
+
+"And when that happens one sets to work to find another machine to take
+its place."
+
+"I didn't know about the horrors; you ought to have told me.  It isn't
+fair."
+
+There was neither passion nor resentment in the low voice.  "What shall
+I do?" she went on, after waiting for Emile to speak.
+
+"Put up with it, or better still go in for the Cause seriously."
+
+"Don't you call this serious?  Blood and brutalities and slave-driving?
+You talked about _l'entresol de l'enfer_, but I'm beginning to think
+I've stepped over the threshold."
+
+"_Ce n'est que le premier pas qui coute_!"
+
+Arithelli bit her lips.  "I don't feel in the mood for arguing now.  I
+wish you would leave me alone."
+
+"On condition that you won't go in for any more hysterics, I'll go and
+settle with the Manager that you don't have to appear to-night.  It's
+lucky there happens to be a new turn with those trapeze people.  The
+audience won't miss you.  Has Sobrenski given you anything to do
+to-day?"
+
+"I don't know.  I can't remember.  Oh, yes, I was to go to the Baroni's
+at two o'clock."
+
+"I'll see to that.  A cipher message?"
+
+"Yes.  It's fastened under my hair."  She dragged herself into a
+sitting position and extracted the little wad of paper with shaking
+hands.  Emile took it.
+
+"Good!  I shall be back at five o'clock.  You can get up later and come
+round to my rooms.  Do you understand?"
+
+"Yes!"
+
+When he had gone she cowered down into the big bed shivering.  Every
+bone in her body ached as if she had been beaten.  She had the
+sensation of one who has been awakened from a bad dream.  Was it all
+real or not?
+
+Last night and its doings seemed centuries ago.  She still heard
+Emile's voice as if from a distance, telling the story of the lovely
+siren woman who had been strangled, and then the room rocked, and the
+walls closed in upon her.
+
+His words worked in her brain: "_Go in for the Cause seriously.
+Remember it's liberty we are fighting for.  A life more or less--what's
+that?  Yours or mine?  What does it matter?  Do you wonder we don't
+make love to women?  It's a goddess and not a woman before whom we burn
+incense.  Blood and tears, money and life!  Is there any sacrifice too
+great for her altar?_"
+
+And she had been both frightened and fascinated.
+
+This was what Anarchism made of men like the cynical Emile.  It had
+never occurred to her before that even Sobrenski, whom she regarded
+solely as a brutal task-master, was himself a living sacrifice.
+
+She drowsed and brooded through the day, and having arrived at Emile's
+room and finding it empty, she "prowled," as she herself would have
+expressed it, among his few belongings, for she possessed a very
+feminine curiosity.  Under a pile of loose music she found the portrait
+of a little blond woman, beautiful of curve and outline, in a lace robe
+that could only have been made in Paris or Vienna.
+
+The picture was signed _Marie Roumanoff_, and on the back was written
+"_Tout passe, tout casse, tout lasse!_"  There were songs too scrawled
+with love-messages in Emile's handwriting.
+
+She pored over them with a vivid interest quite unmingled with any
+thought of jealousy.  Emile always said that no revolutionist ever
+wasted time or thought on women.
+
+After all, if she were shot to-morrow who would care?  She had written
+to her people and sent them photographs and newspapers with the
+accounts of her triumph.
+
+Success was a sure road to approbation.  If she had failed she would
+not have written.
+
+The Hippodrome engagement could not last forever.  A little
+carelessness, a loss of nerve, and her career would be at an end.
+
+Sometimes when she had been singing "_Le Reve_," she had really meant
+it all.
+
+"_S'il faut, ah, prends ma vie_!"
+
+Only a few days ago Emile had stormed at her in his rasping French,
+because she had, with the vehemence of youth, denounced the Anarchist
+leader as a relentless brute.
+
+"You think yourself over-worked and ill-used--you!" he said as he
+strode up and down the room twisting his fiercely pointed moustache.
+"Look at Sobrenski.  He works us all, but does he ever spare himself?
+Look at Vardri?  Rich, well-born, starving at the Hippodrome on a few
+_pesetas_ a week.  I thought you had better stuff in you.  Are you
+going to turn out English milk-and-water?  You're _not_ English, you
+say?  No, I suppose you're not, or you wouldn't talk about 'dirty
+Gentiles.'  If you think Anarchy is all '_Le Reve_' you'll soon find
+yourself mistaken.  If some of us dream dreams we have also to face
+actions and realities."
+
+Perhaps the episode of Marie Roumanoff belonged to the days before he
+joined the Brotherhood and became an exile from his country.
+
+She knew that once upon a time he had owned land and estates in Russia,
+and Emile the Anarchist of Barcelona had been known as Count Poleski.
+
+She kept her discoveries to herself, and when Emile returned he found
+her crooning over the piano.  She appeared to have quite recovered her
+boyish good spirits, and demanded a singing lesson, for under his
+tuition her passion for music had developed and increased.
+
+"It's so nice to have a change from the heat and dust and those
+horrible electric lights," she said.  "Let's enjoy ourselves and try
+over all your music.  What a lot you have, and it all seems to have
+been bought in different places.  Rome, Paris, Vienna, Dieppe, London!
+Fancy your having been in London!"
+
+Emile's collection of songs covered a wide field and ranged from the
+gypsy ballad of "The Lost Horse," to "The Bridge," in the performance
+of which he revelled.
+
+Arithelli sat in a corner and rocked with inward laughter over his
+atrocious English, and evident enjoyment of the morbid sentiments.  For
+in spite of her face Arithelli had a fine sense of the ridiculous.
+
+"You don't say the words properly," she said.  "You make such mouthfuls
+out of them!"
+
+"And what of you?" Emile retorted in great wrath.  "You with your
+French all soft, soft like oil!"
+
+"Yes, that's the Irish half of me."
+
+"And your Italian so _rauque_ so hard--!"
+
+"That's the Jewish half of me.  Oh, don't let's quarrel!  I do want to
+learn to sing properly."
+
+"Then don't fold your arms," her instructor said sharply.  "I suppose
+you think it looks dramatic, but how can you learn to sing what you
+call 'properly,' with your chest all crushed up like that?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+  "When I look back on the days long fled,
+  The memory grows still dreamier.
+  Oh! what fantastic lives they led,
+      Far away in Bohemia.
+
+  "There were laws that were only made to break,
+  In a world that never seems half awake
+  Till the lamps were lit--there were souls at stake.
+      Far away in Bohemia."
+            DOLF WYLLARDE.
+
+
+Barcelona in August was like the Hell to which Emile likened it.
+
+The rich escaped from the heat to their villas up in the mountains,
+those whom business, or lack of money, kept in the city, existed in a
+parched and sweltering condition.  Arithelli still kept her place among
+the performers at the Hippodrome, though after the fashion of circus
+artists her name had been changed.
+
+She was now "Madame Mignonne" from Paris, and wore a golden wig, and
+came on the stage riding a lion in the character of a heathen goddess
+in the spectacular display which always ended the performance.
+
+She pined for the _haute ecole_ and trick riding in which she so
+excelled, and felt unholy pangs when she saw her beloved white horses
+being driven in a chariot by a fat, vulgar English woman, arrayed in
+scanty pink tunic and tights.
+
+She was not afraid of the lion, who was old and toothless enough to be
+absolutely safe, but her new role was not a great success.
+
+The golden hair did not suit her any better than did the classical
+draperies, and she grew daily thinner.  As a matter of fact she was
+practically going through the process of slow starvation.
+
+She had never, even in her healthily hungry days, been able to eat the
+abominable Spanish dishes--meat floating in oil, and other things which
+she classed together under the heading of _cochonneries_.
+
+She generally lived on fruit, a little black bread, coffee, and
+_absinthe_.
+
+Emile would try and bully her into eating more, and occasionally
+essayed his talents as a _chef_, and cooked weird looking things in his
+rooms over a vilely smelling English oil stove, but the Jewess in
+Arithelli found him wanting in the "divers washings" she required of
+the saucepans, and they generally ended these Bohemian repasts with a
+quarrel.
+
+She went about her work in a half-stupefied state, as one who is
+perpetually in a trance.  She was past fear now.  Nothing mattered.
+Midnight rides on a mule up in the mountains, meetings in the low
+quarter of the town, the danger of being arrested while carrying a
+despatch.
+
+"_C'est ainsi que la vie_!"  Emile's motto had become also her own.
+
+She was once more a perfect machine.  Even the only thing that
+Sobrenski could find to say against her was that her appearance was too
+conspicuous for a conspirator and that her hands and feet would betray
+her through any disguise.
+
+Emile, though still outwardly as unsympathetic as ever, was not blind
+to the change in her looks and manner.
+
+Putting the Cause out of the question, he did not wish "Fatalite" to
+get ill.  Her company amused and distracted him.
+
+He liked to hear her views on life, and to colour them with his own
+cynicism, and he enjoyed teaching her to sing and hearing her argue.
+
+For all her quiet she was curiously magnetic and had a way of making
+her absence felt.  She was never noisy or exacting and had none of the
+pride or vices of her sex, and though she was often depressed she was
+never bored, and in consequence bored no one.
+
+They had many traits in common, including fatalism and morbidity, for
+the Slav temperament is in a hundred ways akin to that of the Celt.
+
+In spite of his jeering remarks Emile thoroughly appreciated the girl's
+pluck, and knew that if she failed it would be purely from physical
+reasons.
+
+"Iron in a velvet sheath," he had described her, and iron did not
+bend--it broke.
+
+After some consideration he approached the very unapproachable Manager.
+"It's time you gave your leading _equestrienne_ a holiday," he
+observed.  "She's getting ill.  If you don't let her have a rest soon
+she'll be falling off in public, or having some fiasco.  She was half
+dead the other night after the performance."
+
+The Manager made profane remarks in the dialect of Silesia, of which
+place he was a native.  He was fresh from quarrelling for the hundredth
+time with Estelle, and was in the last frame of mind to desire rest or
+peace for any inhabitant of the globe.
+
+By himself and everyone else at the Hippodrome, Arithelli was
+considered the property of the Anarchist, and Emile had taken very good
+care to disabuse no one of the idea, but had rather been at some pains
+to create such an impression.
+
+For her it was the best protection, and kept her free from the insults
+and attentions of other men.
+
+Bouquets and jewellery he was willing that she should receive; they did
+no harm and the latter could always be sold.
+
+In cold and dispassionate argument he explained to the irate Manager
+the folly of ruining good material by injudicious use.
+
+"You pay her as little as you can considering she is a draw.  She does
+the work of three people, including keeping the books when you are not
+in a condition to wrestle with arithmetic.  If you had your way she
+would be cleaning out the stables."
+
+"Bah!" sneered the other.  "It would do her good--take the devil out of
+her--hard work doesn't hurt that type.  She's all wire and whipcord,
+your She-Wolf, Poleski.  Has she been snarling at you?"
+
+"You'd better give her a week off," proceeded Emile, unmoved.  "The
+audience will be getting tired of her if you're not careful; she has
+been on too long without a break.  Get a fresh _artiste_ and take it
+out of her salary.  I shall give her a week's cruise round the harbour
+and see what that will do."
+
+"Well, try and put a little flesh on her bones," said the Manager
+rudely.  "I never saw such lean flanks!  She's got the expression of a
+death's head.  It's a good thing the Spanish don't care for cheerful
+grins or she wouldn't be here two days."
+
+And so it came to pass that on the following Sunday Arithelli found
+herself sitting on the deck of a yacht anchored far out in the harbour,
+with the shores of Barcelona only a faint outline in the distance.
+
+They had come aboard the previous day.
+
+Emile had made her no explanations beyond saying that he was going to
+take her for a sea trip, and after her custom she had asked no
+questions.
+
+The yacht, which was an uncanny looking craft, painted black and called
+"_The Witch_," she knew by reputation, and had often seen it slipping
+into the harbour after dusk.  It was the property of two Russian
+aristocrats, friends of Emile's, who helped the Cause by conveying
+bombs and infernal machines, and taking off such members of the band as
+had suddenly found Spain an undesirable residence.
+
+Arithelli was not in the least interested in either of the men, the
+dark, handsome, saturnine Vladimir, or the fair-haired, pretty,
+effeminate youth to whom he was comrade and hero.
+
+But she liked their smartness and well-groomed air, and their spotless
+clothes, after Emile and his dirty nails and slovenly habits, and she
+appreciated to the full the surrounding refinement and comfort, and
+enjoyed the daintily served meals, the shining glass and silver and the
+deft, silent waiting of the sailors.
+
+She had been given a luxurious cabin which seemed a paradise after her
+dirty, carpetless bedroom, and in it she could laze and lounge in peace
+without the eternal practising and rehearsals and running errands that
+her soul loathed.
+
+The hot sun glared down upon her, as she sat watching the racing waves.
+
+She was a fantastic, slim, _bizarre_ figure with her coppery hair, over
+which a lace scarf was tied, and high-heeled slippers on her beautiful
+slender feet.
+
+In her ears dangled huge turquoises, showing vividly against the white
+skin that was coated thickly with scented powder.
+
+The manager had told her that she must not get tanned or red or it
+would spoil her type, and she now "made-up" habitually in the daytime.
+
+Her whole array was tawdry and theatrical, and utterly out of keeping
+with her surroundings.
+
+The two owners of the yacht, who wore immaculate white linen clothes
+and canvas shoes, expressed to each other their disapproval of her
+whole get-up, and particularly of her clicking heels.  In common with
+most men, they abominated an _outre_ style of dressing and too much
+jewellery, and above all such finery at sea.
+
+The girl must be mad!  Didn't she know that a schooner was not a circus
+ring?  If she were such a fool Poleski should have taught her better
+before bringing her on board.
+
+They agreed that he had sense enough in other things, and had certainly
+trained her not to be a nuisance.
+
+After _dejeuner_ Emile had hunted up the least doubtful of the French
+novels they possessed and sent her up on deck to get the benefit of the
+sea air of which she was supposed to stand in need.
+
+"_Va t'en_, Arithelli," he said.  "You don't want to be suffocating
+yourself down in a stuffy cabin.  You're here to get lots of ozone and
+make yourself look a little less like a corpse.  Besides, we want to
+talk."
+
+She felt very much depressed and neglected as she sat dangling "_Les
+confessions d'une femme mariee_," which were virtuous to dulness and
+interested her not at all, in a listless hand, long and delicate like
+her feet, and decorated with too many turquoise rings.  Below, in the
+cabin, she could hear the noise of the men as they argued and shouted
+at each other in a polyglot of three different languages.
+
+Arithelli felt more than a little resentful.  Why had they shut her out
+and prevented her from hearing their discussions?
+
+The men at the other meetings had always wanted her in the room.
+
+She had been entrusted with all their secrets and there was no question
+of betrayal.  She knew too much about the consequences now to try that.
+
+When Emile came up from below she asked him why he had insulted her by
+turning her out.
+
+Did he not trust her, or did he think she had not enough intelligence.
+
+For answer he laughed cynically, "I'll make use of you and your
+intelligence fast enough--when I want them.  You were cavilling at
+being overworked the other day."
+
+Of Vladimir and Paul she saw nothing in the daytime, for they both
+ignored her, but in the evenings they all sat together up on deck, and
+Paul sang and played the guitar while Arithelli would listen entranced
+and faint with pleasure.
+
+A love of melody was the birthright of her race, and the boy had a
+genius for music.  He seemed to have but two ideas in life--that, and a
+devotion which almost amounted to idolatry for the older man.
+
+They would walk up and down for hours, Vladimir with his hand on Paul's
+shoulder talking, gesticulating and commanding, while the other, his
+eyes on the ground, listened and assented.
+
+Sometimes Vladimir would speak to him in Russian with an accent that
+was in itself a caress, and Arithelli, who watched them curiously,
+noticed and wondered to see the boy flush and colour like a woman.
+
+She always looked forward with the keenest pleasure to those evenings.
+
+The days bored her, inasmuch as she was capable of being bored, and she
+hated the glare and glitter of the sun and sky.
+
+It was too much like the blue-white lights of the Hippodrome.  With
+night came the glamour of Fairyland, that magic country in which
+Ireland still believes, and which is ever there for those who seek it,
+"East o' the Sun, and West o' the Moon."
+
+The yacht drifting idly at anchor in smooth water, the stars in their
+bed of velvet black, the magic of air and space.
+
+The incense-like scent of Turkish cigarettes and black coffee, the
+little group of men lounging in their deck chairs, the resonant, full
+notes of the guitar, and Paul's voice rising out of the shadows.
+
+If he had sung standing on the platform of a brightly lit concert hall
+half the charm would have vanished in that distraction which the
+personality of a singer creates.
+
+In the illusion of his surroundings the man himself did not exist.
+
+There was only the voice--the singer.  Hungarian folk-songs that fired
+her blood and made her restless with strange longings; "_La vie est
+vaine_," eternally sweet and haunting; then some wickedly witty song of
+the _cafes_, and melodies of Gounod full of infinite charm.  Last of
+all came always "_Le Reve_," in which Emile and Vladimir joined as if
+it were some National Anthem, and which left her quivering with
+excitement.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+  "There would no man do for your sake, I think,
+    What I would have done for the least word said;
+  I had wrung life dry for your lips to drink--
+    Broken it up for your daily bread."
+            SWINBURNE.
+
+
+When the week of dreams and rest was over she went back to the
+Hippodrome with somewhat of relief in her feelings.
+
+At least the work prevented her from thinking.  Though she was
+physically less languid, the sea air had neither succeeded in putting
+any more flesh on what the Manager called her "lean flanks," nor had it
+made her look much more cheerful.  He had the sense to let her take her
+place as _equestrienne_ once more, and had announced her reappearance
+in flaming posters.
+
+The stablemen and helpers were all delighted to see her again, and in
+token of their satisfaction presented her with a hideous and unwieldy
+bouquet, in which all colours were arranged together so as to give the
+effect of a kaleidoscope.  They liked her for her sweet temper and
+invariable courtesy, and respected her for her knowledge of horses.
+
+Estelle came and embraced her and was voluble over the failings of her
+"_bon ami_," the sardonic manager.
+
+Arithelli received a hearty round of applause as she rode into the ring
+on her favourite "Don Juan," whose wavy tail and mane were decorated
+with turquoise ribbons that matched her habit.
+
+At least she was happy on horseback, and she loved the animals and they
+her.
+
+Even the performing sheep and monkey, and the toothless lion came in
+for a share in her affections.  She had a new and difficult trick to go
+through that night, but this particular sort of danger only made her
+feel exhilarated.
+
+Emile's stories of blood and horrors had sickened her, but the chance
+of breaking her neck over a high jump held no terrors.
+
+She made her exit, gaily waving her silver-handled whip, and Vardri,
+who was standing at the entrance of the ring, came forward quickly to
+lift her off her horse before the groom could reach her.
+
+"You're wanted to-night in the Calle de Pescadores," he whispered, as
+she rested her hand on his shoulder to jump down.  "As soon as
+possible, and go in carefully--there's a scare about spies."
+
+He felt her body stiffen and the little smile that came so rarely died
+in an instant, leaving her once more "Fatalite."
+
+She nodded by way of assent and bent down to gather up her habit.
+
+The ring-master was only a few feet away, and they could never be
+certain as to who was to be trusted.
+
+Vardri stood looking after her as she walked away with her head well up
+and her shoulders thrown back as usual.
+
+The two had become good friends with the comradeship induced by the
+similarity in their misfortunes.
+
+Both were young, reckless and without money beyond what they earned,
+though, whereas Arithelli had been more or less tricked into her
+present position, Vardri had been infatuated with the Cause from the
+time he was old enough to take an interest in anything.  The worship of
+the goddess Liberty had left with him room also for the adoration of a
+human being, and in a boyish chivalrous way he had tried to make things
+easier for Arithelli.
+
+He managed to bring her occasional flowers and music out of his
+starvation wages, and was always jealously careful of the way in which
+her horses were groomed and turned out.  They had a curious resemblance
+to each other, and when Arithelli was dressed in boy's clothes for her
+journeys up in the mountains, they might have been two brothers.  One
+was dark and the other fair, but both had the same haggard,
+well-modelled faces, the same pale skins, and thin, supple figures.
+
+They were exactly of a height, too, and when Arithelli disguised
+herself, she pushed her red hair under a sombrero and black wig.
+
+Even Sobrenski's lynx eyes had been at fault in the semi-darkness of
+the hut, and he had sworn at her in mistake for Vardri.  As the dresser
+took off her habit, she asked the woman whether Monsieur Poleski had
+been behind the scenes during her turn, and was there a note or message?
+
+It appeared that there had been no sign of Emile, and she hesitated for
+a moment, hardly knowing what to do.
+
+The order for her presence in the Calle de Pescadores, which of course
+had been sent by Sobrenski, had told her to come at once.
+
+On the other hand, Emile had always told her to wait for him in her
+room till he came to fetch her.  If she went through the streets alone
+there would be a row, and if she were late at the _rendezvous_ there
+would also be a row.
+
+"_C'est ainsi que la vie!_"
+
+She lifted her thin shoulders after the manner of Emile and decided to
+start at once.  She wiped all the make-up from her face with a damp
+towel, swaying a little as she stood before the glass.
+
+The excitement of her reception and the ensuing episode had made her
+heart beat at distressing speed.
+
+"You're not ill," she adjured her pale reflection.  "It's all
+imagination.  Emile says all these complaints are.  Any way, you're not
+going to give in to it."
+
+She shut both ears and eyes as she sped through the restless city that
+even at this hour was astir with life.
+
+She was only glad that there was no moon.  Roused for once out of her
+naturally slow and indolent walk, she was soon in the poor quarter and
+climbing the stairs to the third floor of a horrible little house, the
+back of which looked out on the dark slums of the quarter of the
+Parelelo, the breeding-place of revolutions; the district between the
+Rambla and the Harbour.
+
+The house was like the one that Emile had described when telling her of
+the murdered woman, Felise Rivaz.
+
+The very air reeked of intrigue and hidden deeds.
+
+She looked round first of all for Emile, but he was not there, and only
+half the usual number of conspirators were assembled.
+
+Vardri, who had left the Hippodrome the minute he had delivered his
+message, was sitting on the end of the table swinging his feet and
+whistling softly.
+
+He had bribed one of the "strappers" to finish his work, and slipped
+out, only arriving a few minutes before her.
+
+He had risked dismissal, but that was no great matter.
+
+The Cause came first, and he feared danger for Arithelli, knowing that
+if there was anything specially risky to be done she would be the one
+chosen.
+
+Sobrenski was always harder on her than on the others.
+
+He watched her with the hungry, faithful eyes of an animal, and got up
+from his seat with instinctive courtesy.  Like all the rest he wore the
+Anarchist badge, a red tie, and the hot, vivid colour showed up the
+lines of ill-health and suffering about his eyes and mouth.
+
+In spite of his disreputable clothes and wild hair, there still
+remained in him the indefinable signs of breeding, in the thin, shapely
+hands that rested on his knee, and in the modulations of his boyish and
+eager voice.
+
+None of the others took the least notice of the girl's entrance.
+
+Nearly all of them were as well-born as the young Austrian, but to them
+she was simply a comrade, a fellow, worker, not a woman.
+
+She gave him a little friendly gesture and went quietly to a seat
+against the wall, where she sat in one of her characteristic attitudes,
+her feet crossed, and showing under her short dark blue skirt.
+
+Emile had made her buy this one plain and unnoticeable garment for use
+on these occasions.
+
+After she had been in the room a minute, Sobrenski turned from the man
+to whom he had been talking in a careful under-tone, and bolted the
+door.
+
+"Listen, all of you," he said.  "We have received information that this
+house will be watched to-night.  Whether the spy is one who was
+formerly one of us, we do not know--yet.  It appears that it is Poleski
+who is the suspect.  They have some evidence against him that is
+dangerous.  If he is seen coming in here to-night, they will arrest
+him.  The next time we will change the place, but for the present all
+that can be done is to warn him against coming here.  Fortunately he
+will be later than usual, because he does not leave the Cafe Colomb
+till after midnight.  Someone must be sent there to stop him.  It will
+not do for any of us to be seen coming out, so she"--he indicated
+Arithelli--"must go."
+
+Arithelli wasted no time in response.  She was only too eager to get
+out of the abominable place, and was already half way to the door when
+Sobrenski stopped her.
+
+"Not that way!" he said.  "What are you thinking of?  You will walk
+straight into the arms of the spies who are probably watching the house
+by this time.  No, you must go by the window at the back; the rest of
+us will stay here all night."
+
+"This house gives on the quay by a lucky chance," remarked one of the
+older men; "we should be well trapped otherwise.  There are several
+feet between it and the water."
+
+Vardri's eyes had never moved from the girl's face.  He knew that her
+heart was affected, and she had told him once that she would never
+attempt to go on the tight-rope or trapeze because the mere thought of
+a height always terrified her.
+
+In answer to Sobrenski's gesture, she moved towards the window, which
+another of the conspirators was cautiously opening.
+
+Vardri pushed himself forward into the group.  "She can't go down
+there," he said hoarsely, "It's not safe--look at the height!"
+
+"She'll go down well enough if she holds onto the rope."
+
+"The rope may break or fray through on the sill."
+
+"She takes her chance like the rest of us."
+
+"The rest of us--we're _men_!"
+
+"There are neither men nor women in the Cause.  Do you need to be
+taught that now?  Stand back!"
+
+"I'll go down in her place."
+
+"You will do nothing of the kind.  Which of us is the leader here?"
+
+Sobrenski had twisted the girl's arms behind her back, and he was
+holding her by the wrists.  He expected her to scream or struggle, but
+she remained absolutely passive.
+
+One of the men was making a slip-knot in a coil of rope.
+
+Vardri's blood was hot as he looked on.  Blind with helpless rage, he
+was conscious of nothing but the little set face and defiant head.  He
+had come suddenly into his heritage of manhood at the sight of her
+alone, defenceless and roughly handled by brute beasts who called
+themselves men.
+
+He was mad, too, with a man's jealousy.  From the earliest moment he
+had seen Arithelli he had given her homage as a woman.  The _gamin_,
+the "Becky Sharp" that Emile and the others knew, he had never seen,
+and he had always resented her numerous irreverent nicknames.
+
+He could do nothing, nothing!
+
+Get himself shot or strangled, perhaps, and what use would that be to
+her?
+
+"Come!" said Sobrenski, turning her towards the window.
+
+For the first time since she had entered the room, Arithelli spoke:
+"Leave me alone for a minute.  No, I won't move--_parole d'honneur_!"
+
+When she was released, she put out her left hand.  "_Mon ami_, what's
+the use of arguing?  I'm the errand boy, _vois-tu_?  My work is to
+carry messages.  If you make a scene it's only the worse for me.  It's
+good of you to want to go instead.  I shall not forget."
+
+The voice, subtle and sweet as ever, the intimacy implied by the
+familiar "thou" acted like a charm to the boy's wild fury.  Before her
+courage and dignity it seemed out of place to make any further protest.
+
+He crushed the long and lovely hand against his lips with mingled
+passion and reverence.
+
+There was a red streak across the wrist.
+
+"A fine melodrama!" sneered Sobrenski.  "Keep all that for the stage,
+it isn't needed here.  _Allons_!  We can't waste any more time, there
+has been too much wasted already."
+
+Vardri walked to the furthest end of the room, turning his back upon
+the group at the window, and thrust his fingers into his ears to deaden
+the sound of the scream for which he waited in tortured anticipation.
+
+Excitable and neurotic, like all consumptives, his imagination made of
+those waiting moments a veritable hell.
+
+She would never get down in safety--an old and hastily knotted rope, a
+disregard of all ordinary precautions, and her body in the hands of men
+who handled human lives more carelessly than most people would handle
+stones.  He bit his lip till the blood ran down to his chin.
+
+Here he stood doing nothing, he who would have been tortured to save
+her!
+
+The window was shut and one of the men said: "She's down all right
+after all.  I thought by the look of her she would have fainted.  She
+has some pluck, Mademoiselle Fatalite!"
+
+"Yes," answered Sobrenski.  "Here's the coward and traitor."
+
+Vardri wheeled round, looking straight into the cold eyes of his
+leader.  He had heard the last words.  She was safe, that was all that
+mattered, and for himself he was reckless.
+
+"Traitor, am I?  Yes, if the Cause is to include the ill-treatment of
+women!"
+
+"Women?  Again women?  Are our meetings to be used as love trysts.
+There was a certain episode two years ago--Gaston de Barres and Felise
+Rivaz--you remember it?  Ah, I thought so!  Then let it be a
+warning--in the future you will be suspected and watched.  There is no
+need for me to dilate upon the punishment for treachery, all that you
+knew when you joined us.  You may consider yourself lucky to have
+escaped so easily to-night.  Through the few minutes' delay you have
+caused, Poleski may have been arrested."
+
+Vardri shrugged and sat down.  Like Arithelli, he recognized the
+futility of mere words upon certain occasions.
+
+Moreover, now that the flame of his indignation had died down, he had
+begun to feel wretchedly ill and spiritless with the reaction that
+comes after any great excitement.
+
+He sat shivering and coughing till the dawn, while the other men talked
+in low voices or played cards.  One or two slept fitfully in
+uncomfortable attitudes on the floor.
+
+No one grumbled at the discomfort or weariness of the vigil.
+
+They who looked forward to ultimate prison and perhaps death itself
+were not wont to quarrel with such minor inconveniences as the loss of
+sleep.
+
+Sobrenski had pulled the solitary candle in the room towards him and
+sat writing rapidly and frowning to himself.
+
+His fox-like face framed in its red hair and beard looked more
+relentless and crafty than ever in the revealing light, and the boy
+shivered anew, but not from physical cold.
+
+He did not fear the leader of the Brotherhood for himself, but for
+Arithelli--Arithelli, the drudge, the tool, the "errand boy," as she
+had called herself.
+
+Perhaps in time even she would become a heartless machine.
+
+Human life had seemed so cheap and of so little account to him once,
+but since he had loved her--
+
+She could never live among such people and in such scenes, and still
+remain unscarred.
+
+Again the little desperate face rose before him.
+
+If they did not succeed in killing her soon by their brutalities, she
+would commit suicide to escape from the horrors that surrounded her.
+
+It had never occurred to Vardri to be jealous of Emile.
+
+With the curious insight that love gives he had formed a true idea of
+the relationship between the oddly-assorted pair.  He had never thought
+of himself as her lover.
+
+To him she was always the Ideal, the divinity enthroned.
+
+He was content to kiss her feet, and to lay before them service and
+sacrifice.
+
+Yet, though he might build a wall of love around her, he knew it could
+give her no protection against the realities of her present life.
+
+She had given him dreams, and in them he could forget all other things,
+the things that the world calls real.
+
+Everything had vanished as a mist--the dirty room, the chill of the
+dawn, his own physical wretchedness.
+
+He heard only the honey-sweet voice, saw only the outstretched hand of
+friendship.
+
+"_Mon ami_," she had called him, he who had never aspired higher than
+to be known as her servant.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+  "For all things born one gate
+  Opens, . . . and no man sees
+  Beyond the gods and Fate."
+            SWINBURNE.
+
+WHEN Emile arrived at the Hippodrome, only a few minutes after his
+usual time, he found no one but the dresser, who was clearing away the
+litter of clothes, jewellery, powder-puffs and flowers.
+
+Arithelli had vanished.
+
+She had never before failed to wait for him, and he knew she would not
+have started alone without some very good reason.  He questioned the
+dresser and found she knew nothing beyond that "La Nina," as she called
+the girl affectionately, had left immediately after her last turn.  She
+had asked if the Senor had been in yet, but hearing he had not, she had
+dressed and gone at once.  She had not even stayed to put on a cloak,
+and had left her hair still in a plait, and only a _velo_ over it.  She
+had seemed in great haste (but that was always so with the English!)
+and had looked ill.  The Senor must not be alarmed, she added, folding
+Arithelli's blue habit with wrinkled, careful hands.  True, Barcelona
+was an evil place for one so young as "La Nina," but the blessed
+saints--
+
+Emile gave her a _peseta_, and left her to her invocations.  In the
+long passage that led from the dressing-rooms he ran into Estelle, who
+was just sufficiently drunk to be excitable and quarrelsome.  She still
+had on her dancer's costume of short skirts of poppy-coloured tulle,
+and scarlet shoes and tights.  She was further adorned with long,
+dangling, coral ear-rings, and a black bruise on the left side of her
+face under the eye, the outward and visible sign of her last encounter
+with the Manager.
+
+She saluted Emile with a vindictive glare from her black eyes, and
+tried to push past him.  She hated him in a spiteful feminine way for
+his complete appropriation of Arithelli, of whom, thanks to him, she
+now saw very little.  She had quarrelled with all the other women
+employed in the Circus, but Arithelli had always helped her to dress,
+and given her cigarettes and listened to her woes.
+
+Emile blocked the way, catching the dancer by the wrist as she
+attempted to slip by, leaving his question unanswered.  He repeated it,
+and after a minute's sullen refusal to speak, Estelle stamped her foot
+savagely upon the floor, and collapsed into a state of hysterical
+volubility.  No, she had seen nothing, nothing! she protested in
+French.  Scarcely ever did she see her little friend now, and whose
+fault was that?  Would Monsieur Poleski answer her?  As Monsieur
+Poleski did nothing of the kind, she continued to rage.  All men were
+brutes!  Yes, all!  She had no friends now and if she did console
+herself--what would he have?
+
+Emile decided that she was speaking the truth, and that there was no
+use wasting time in making other enquiries.
+
+One thing seemed certain--that Arithelli had left the building.  From
+the Hippodrome he went next to her lodgings, also with no result.  He
+could only now suppose that Sobrenski had sent her off at a moment's
+notice on some unusual errand.  The possibility of her having gone to
+the house in the Calle de Pescadores did not occur to him.  According
+to the last arrangement they were not expected there till after
+midnight.  It was only eleven now.  He would go to the Cafe Colomb, and
+spend the hour there.  It was no use to search for her further, and as
+he assured himself there was not the least reason to become alarmed.
+She was not likely to lose her head, and she knew her way about the
+place.
+
+The Colomb was more or less a recognised resort of the many
+revolutionaries with whom the city abounded.  The proprietor was known
+to be in sympathy with their schemes, though he took no active part in
+them himself.  He was considered trustworthy, for notes and messages
+were often left in his charge, and his private room was at the disposal
+of those who wished for a few minutes' secret interview.  When Emile
+entered he was greeted by several of the men who sat in groups of two
+and three at little tables, busy with Monte and other card games.
+
+The smoke of many cigarettes obscured their figures, and clouded the
+mirrors with which the place was lined from floor to ceiling.  Emile
+sat down alone and ordered an _absinthe_.
+
+When called upon to join in the play, he refused with a scowl and a
+rasping oath in his native tongue, and as the evening grew on towards
+midnight he was left to himself and his meditations.
+
+His thoughts were still with Arithelli, the weird witch-girl, whose
+eyes were like those of Swinburne's fair woman,
+
+  "Coloured like a water-flower,
+  And deeper than the green sea's glass."
+
+He, who now never opened a book, had once known that most un-English of
+all poets by heart.
+
+In her many phases Arithelli passed before him, as he stared moodily at
+the shifting opal-coloured liquid in his glass.  He thought of her as
+he had often seen her, fighting through her work at the Hippodrome, the
+little weary head always gallantly carried, and then when she had
+dismounted and was in her dressing-room, the rings round her eyes, her
+shaking hands and utter weariness.  He remembered her consideration for
+her horses, her loathing of the ill-treatment of all dumb things so
+common here.  Once he had found her in the market-place, remonstrating
+in her broken Spanish with the country women for the inhuman manner in
+which they carried away their purchases of live fowl, tied neck to
+neck, and slung across a mule, to die of slow strangulation under the
+blazing sun.  All the animals at the Hippodrome had been better treated
+since she had been there.  It was characteristic of the man that he
+laughed at her to her face for her campaign against the national
+cruelty, and in secret thought of her with admiration.
+
+In many ways sexless, in others purely a woman, to every mood she
+brought the charm of individuality.
+
+_Tiens_!  He was falling in love, he jeered to himself, cynically.  In
+love with that tall, silent creature, who was never in a hurry and
+never in a temper, and who walked as if she had been bred in Andalusia.
+
+Absurd!  He was only interested.  She had brains, and she never bored
+him.
+
+Besides, she was only twenty-four, and one could hardly allow a girl of
+that age to be thrown warm and living to the wolves and vampires of
+Barcelona.  Perhaps he had been wrong in letting her do some
+things--drink _absinthe_, for example.  One lost one's sense of mental
+and moral perspective in a place like this.  At least he had guarded
+her well.  If he had not met her that day at the station, she might
+have fallen into worse hands than his own.  Things could not go on
+indefinitely as they had been going.  What was to be the end of it all?
+
+Eventually she would fall in love, and a woman was no more use to the
+Cause once that happened.  No vows would be strong enough to keep her
+from a man's arms once she cared.  She would not love lightly or
+easily, and where would she find love, here in Barcelona?
+
+Half unconsciously, he found himself comparing Arithelli with the woman
+who had betrayed him.  Emile never lied, even to himself, and he knew
+now that Marie Roumanoff had almost become a shadow.
+
+A plaything she had been, a child, a doll, a being made for caresses
+and admiration.  To a woman of her type camaraderie would have been
+impossible.  He had not wanted it, and it had not been in her nature to
+give it.
+
+A man, who had been sitting opposite, got up, gesticulated, put on his
+hat at a reckless angle, and, with a noisy farewell to his companions,
+swaggered out.
+
+In the mirror that faced him Emile saw the quick furtive glance
+bestowed upon him, though he sat apparently unconscious of it.
+
+Something at the back of his brain suggested to him that he knew the
+man's face, that he had seen him before.  A spy probably.  It was
+nothing unusual for any of them to be "shadowed," and for their
+out-goings and in-comings to be noted.
+
+The highly gilded French clock on the mantel-piece at the far end of
+the room announced the hour as being a quarter to twelve.  Emile
+stooped down to pick up his sombrero which had tumbled off a chair on
+to the floor, when he remained with outstretched hand, arrested by the
+sound of a woman's voice which came through the partly opened door of
+the proprietor's private room and office.  A woman's voice?  It was
+Arithelli's unmistakably.
+
+He recovered himself and the sombrero together, and twisted round in
+his seat so as to get a view of the door, which was on his left hand,
+half way down the long room.  It had a glass top, across which a dark
+green curtain was drawn.  Emile knew that it was possible to enter this
+room without passing through the _cafe_.  There was another door which
+led into a passage through the kitchen and back part of the house, and
+from thence into a side-street, or rather a small alley.
+
+He had often been that way, and it was generally used by the
+frequenters of the place when they had reason to guard their movements.
+
+He listened again.
+
+The voice was even more hoarse than usual and more uncertain.  Though
+he could not hear the words, the broken sentences gave an impression of
+breathlessness.  When she stopped speaking he heard the voice of the
+proprietor raised in an emphatic stage-whisper.  Yes, Monsieur Poleski
+was within.  Mademoiselle was fortunately in time to find him.  If
+Mademoiselle would give herself the trouble to wait but for one
+moment--.
+
+The little man fancied himself an adept at intrigue, and his methods
+were often a cause of anxiety to those he befriended.  His nods and
+gestures and meaning glances as he emerged would have been enough to
+arouse suspicion in the most guileless.
+
+He stood blinking his short-sighted eyes through the haze in his effort
+to attract Emile's attention without being detected.  The latter got up
+and sauntered towards him.
+
+"_Bon soir, Monsieur Lefevre_," he said carelessly.  "We have a little
+account to settle, you and I, is it not so?"
+
+Fat Monsieur Lefevre rose gallantly to the occasion.  He bowed Emile
+into the room, locked the door by which they had entered, and with
+another bow and a muttered apology scuttled through the passage into
+the back regions.  Two minutes later he made his reappearance in the
+_cafe_ by the front way, and went to his place behind the counter with
+the satisfied face of a successful diplomatist.
+
+His little sanctum was typical in its arrangement of the Parisian
+_bourgeois_.
+
+Numerous picture post-cards of a famous chanteuse of the Folies
+Bergeres proclaimed Monsieur's taste in beauty.  For the rest,
+everything was neat and rather bare of furniture.  There were chairs
+symmetrically arranged like sentinels along the walls, tinted lace
+curtains, a gilded mirror, and a few doubtful coloured pictures, all of
+women.  An unshaded electric light flared in a corner.  Arithelli stood
+resting one hand on the round polished table in the centre of the
+apartment.  Her dark blue dress was torn in two places, and smeared
+with patches of dust.  The _velo_, or piece of drapery worn on ordinary
+occasions instead of the mantilla, hung down her back in company with
+the long plait of hair, which had come untwisted at the ends.  Her face
+was strained and haggard, and the tense attitude spoke of tortured
+nerves.
+
+She was still struggling for breath, and appeared almost unable to
+speak, but Emile was not minded to allow her much time for recovery.
+
+Patience was not numbered among such virtues as he possessed.
+
+"_Tiens_!" he began.  "What is it now, Fatalite?  You look as if you
+had been having adventures.  Have you been getting into mischief?  And
+where have you been?"
+
+"In the Calle de Pescadores out at Barcelonetta.  Sobrenski sent me
+with a message to you.  The place is being watched.  If they see you go
+in you may be arrested.  The others got to hear about the spies, and
+went early.  They are going to stay there all night because it isn't
+safe to leave."  Her tone was that of one who repeats a well-learned
+lesson.
+
+Emile shrugged.  "Spies?  So that's it!  There was a man just now in
+the _cafe_ who looked like it.  Probably he is waiting to go outside
+now to 'shadow' me.  He may wait till--!  And how did you get out?"
+
+"They let me down from a window at the back of the house.  I got on to
+the quay and came here by the long way and through the Rambla."  There
+was a pause, and then she said in the same mechanical voice, "Sobrenski
+said I was to tell you not to come.  It isn't safe."
+
+Emile did not answer.  He could see that she was trembling violently
+and on the verge of an hysterical crisis.  He rather hoped she would
+break down.  It would seem more natural.  Women were privileged to cry
+and scream, not that it was possible to imagine her screaming.  He
+dragged forward a chair from the immaculate row against the wall.
+
+As he did so he noticed that she kept her left hand behind her back as
+if to conceal something.
+
+"Sit down," he ordered.  "What's the matter with your hand?  Are you
+hurt?"
+
+The girl retreated before him.
+
+"No!" she answered defiantly.
+
+But Emile's quick eyes had seen a crumpled handkerchief flecked with
+red stains.
+
+"Don't tell lies, Fatalite!" he said sharply.  "Give me your hand at
+once."
+
+Arithelli obeyed, holding it out palm upwards.
+
+Emile looked, and ripped out a fiery exclamation.  The smooth flesh was
+scarred and torn across in several places, and was still bleeding.  The
+mark of Sobrenski's grip on her wrist had turned from crimson to a dull
+discoloured hue.
+
+"It doesn't hurt so very much," she said.  "Only I can't bear the sight
+of blood.  All Jewish people are like that.  I can't help it.  It makes
+me feel queer all over."
+
+She turned her head aside with a shudder.  Emile muttered another
+expletive, adding:
+
+"Then if you feel like that, don't look."
+
+He told her again to sit down, tore her handkerchief into strips,
+soaked them in water from a carafe, and bandaged up the wounds in a
+rough but effectual fashion.
+
+She said nothing during the process, but kept her head still turned
+away so that he could not see her face.
+
+"Voila!" said Emile.  "That will be all right to-morrow.  What did they
+do to you?"
+
+"I cut my fingers on the window sill when they let me down.  There was
+a piece of iron or a nail or something.  I don't remember.  It didn't
+hurt at the time."
+
+"H'm!" commented Emile.  "But this?" he touched her wrist lightly.  "It
+looks like--"
+
+"That?  Oh, Sobrenski did that.  He--"
+
+"Well?" said Emile.  He waited but there came no answer, so he
+continued the interrogation.  "You didn't make a scene, Fatalite?"
+
+He heard her flinch and draw in her breath as she covered her face with
+her free hand.  Her low painful sobbing reminded him of the
+inarticulate moaning of an animal.
+
+Even in her grief, her abandonment, she was unlike all other women.
+Emile stood beside her in watchful silence, and neither attempted to
+interfere nor to console her.  He was wise enough to know that to a
+highly strung nature like hers too much self-repression might be
+dangerous, and he was humane enough to be glad that she had the relief
+of tears.
+
+At length he said quietly, "I didn't know you could cry, Fatalite.  I
+didn't know you were human enough for that."
+
+She still fought desperately for composure, thrusting a fold of the
+torn _velo_ between her teeth.  The naked light shone on her bent head,
+and on her glittering rope of hair.
+
+A strange impulse suddenly moved Emile to finger a loose strand with a
+touch that had in it something of a caress.
+
+Gamin she had been, _equestrienne_, heroine, and now she was only a
+sorrowful Dolores.
+
+At last words came.
+
+She stood up and faced him, shaking back her hair.
+
+"Emile!  Emile!  I must give it up.  I can't go on!"
+
+"And you can't turn back, _mon enfant_."
+
+"I'll run away."
+
+"Do you think they wouldn't find you?  You know enough about our
+organisation now.  No one who has once joined us is ever allowed to
+escape.  You would be found sooner or later, and then--you remember
+what I told you once?  That I am responsible for you to the
+Brotherhood?"
+
+He spoke calmly, patiently, as if he were explaining things to a child.
+
+If his associates could have seen the cynical Emile Poleski of ordinary
+life they would have found reason to marvel!
+
+The gesture of uncontrollable horror told him that she understood only
+too well.  What should the upholders of the Cause care for ties, for
+friendships, for pity?
+
+If she were recaptured Emile would be her executioner.  He might
+refuse, but that would not save her and he would be shot as well.  Why
+should he suffer because she had lost her courage and turned traitress?
+
+She tried to collect her senses, and to think properly.  Everything
+felt blurred and far off.  One thing alone seemed certain--that there
+was no way out of the _impasse_.
+
+Emile had walked to the glass-door and unlocked it.  Then he came back
+to her.
+
+"It's time we were going," he said.  "It will not do to be here too
+long.  As our friend the spy is patrolling the street outside in
+readiness for my appearance, we will go out the other way.  The Calle
+Santa Teresa is nearly always deserted.  It's just as well you should
+be seen with me.  They don't know yet that you are working for us, so
+it will look less as if I were _en route_ for a meeting.  But before we
+start, have you decided to be wise and to save me from an unpleasant
+duty?"
+
+"Yes.  I'll stay.  At least while you are here."
+
+"While I am here?" the man echoed.  "Et alors--?"
+
+"Then?"  She threw out her arms in a hopeless gesture.  "Who knows?
+Who can read the future?  And after all, as you have said, 'What does
+one life more or less matter?'"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+  "Ninon, Ninon, que fais-tu de la vie!"
+            DE MUSSET.
+
+
+Arithelli awoke next day in her comfortless room, and lay wondering
+over the waking nightmare of the past hours.  Everything seemed so
+different in the morning.  There was no thrill of excitement now,
+nothing to make her blood run quickly.  She only felt flat, dull,
+stupid, and disinclined to move.  How strange and unlike himself Emile
+had been.  She had lost her nerve, raved, and threatened to run away,
+and he had neither sneered nor abused her.  Her hand, still wrapped in
+stained linen, had now begun to burn and smart considerably, and was
+proof sufficient of the reality of her experience.  Her spine and the
+soles of her feet tingled as she lived again through the horror of the
+descent from the window.  She could never endure a repetition of that
+ordeal.  Next time she would refuse and they could add one more murder
+to the list of their crimes.
+
+She dragged herself up and dressed slowly.  She remembered that there
+was to be a gala performance at the Hippodrome that night in honour of
+the presence of one of the Infantas, her husband and suite, who were
+passing through the town, and had announced their intention of being
+present.  For all the performers it meant more work and an extra
+rehearsal.
+
+When Emile came in they shared their coffee and rolls together.  She
+was thankful that he made no reference to her passionate outburst of
+the night before.  He was outwardly as curt and dictatorial as ever,
+and neither of them discussed the affairs of the Brotherhood.
+
+"I must go down to practise," Arithelli said after a while.  "Shall you
+be there to-night?  You know there is to be a grand performance in
+honour of the loyalties?"
+
+"No," answered Emile, "I shall be busy.  Besides, the Royalties will be
+safer if I'm _not_ there!  We don't trouble ourselves about these
+particular ones though.  They're not important enough."
+
+"I'm sorry you're not coming," Arithelli answered.
+
+Emile ungratefully disregarded the implied compliment, and threw out a
+blunt, "Why?"
+
+"I don't quite know.  I think there is going to be something unlucky."
+
+"You're going to tumble off, you mean?  Better not!  You don't want to
+get turned out, do you?"
+
+Arithelli turned to a mirror on the wall.
+
+"Do I look very ghastly?" she asked.
+
+"Not much more than usual.  None of us look very fresh out here, do we?
+Do you think your hat is on straight, you untidy little trollop?  Well,
+it isn't!  Hurry up,--it's late.  No, I'm not going down there with
+you.  I'll stay here, and do some writing."
+
+The rehearsal that morning seemed interminable.  For the first time
+since she had ridden in public Arithelli bungled over her tricks.  She
+jumped short, miscalculated distances, and once barely saved herself
+from a severe fall.
+
+The ring-master, with whom she was a great favourite, shook his head
+reproachfully at her, as he paused to rest and wipe his heated
+countenance.  He was a greasy and affable personage, whose temper was
+as easy as his morals.  He was more soft-hearted than most of his
+compatriots, and he honestly liked Arithelli and admired her riding.
+
+"What have you there, Mademoiselle?" he enquired pathetically.  "Never
+have I seen you like this before.  You fear the grand people, is it not
+so?  You have no heart, no courage!  But again!  Again!"
+
+In the midst of his exhortation the Manager descended suddenly upon the
+scene.  As a matter of fact he had been watching for the last ten
+minutes from one of the entrances, and he had seen her failure to
+accomplish her jumps successfully.
+
+"This won't do for to-night," he said angrily.  "We want your best
+work, not your worst.  Do you suppose I'm going to stand your laziness?"
+
+Arithelli was sitting at ease upon Don Juan's back as he paced slowly
+round the ring.  She did not look up or answer, which enraged the
+Manager still further.  Her silence was one of the things about her
+that always annoyed him most?  She was the only woman he had never been
+able to bully into a state of collapse.
+
+He turned on the ring-master, who was grinning to himself.
+
+"_Allez-vous en_!  I'll see to this."
+
+Senor Valdez looked uncomfortable.  For an instant he felt almost
+inclined to expostulate on Arithelli's behalf, but the Manager's rages
+were well known to his employes, and the little man had no intention of
+losing his present position.  He flung down his long whip, and retired
+muttering vengeance.
+
+The Manager strode into the centre of the ring, picked up the lash and
+drew it through his fingers.
+
+He swore at Arithelli, he swore at Don Juan, and he started the
+rehearsal all over again.
+
+Arithelli clenched her teeth and rode doggedly forward.  The arena swam
+before her, and her limbs felt weak and heavy as those of one who is
+drugged, and her lacerated hand added to her difficulties.  That she
+should presume to be ill, had not entered into the Manager's
+calculations.  If he had realised the fact he would have said that
+people who were ill were of no use in a circus, and the sooner she left
+it the better.
+
+The treadmill continued until Arithelli would have welcomed an accident
+as a break in the grinding monotony.  The exercise instead of making
+her hot, had made her shiver as if with great cold.  She felt as if she
+had been practising for days instead of hours.  It was of no use!  She
+could not go on any longer.  She slipped from her standing position on
+the broad pad saddle to Don Juan's back, and without waiting for the
+word of command, reined him to a standstill in front of the Manager.
+
+"You must let me go," she said.  "I can't do any better now."
+
+The Manager stepped back a pace, and dropped his whip with sheer
+astonishment.  For an instant he stared with open mouth, then he found
+speech.
+
+"You sit there, do you, and tell me you refuse to work!  You with your
+insolence!  When you fall and that long neck of yours goes _crack_" (he
+snapped a finger and thumb together in expressive pantomime), "then I
+shall laugh--_nom d'un chien_!--how I shall laugh."
+
+Arithelli waited in silence, a faint smile curling her lips.  One hand,
+laden with rings, moved caressingly up and down Don Juan's silky mane.
+She had hitherto answered abuse with maddening indifference.  Now she
+flung back her head and mocked him.
+
+"So you hope I'll fall," she said.  "Perhaps I hope so too.  Do you
+think I care, that I'm afraid of breaking my neck?"
+
+Her voice was not raised a tone from its ordinary level, but passion
+and contempt vibrated in every accent.  An unwilling admiration stirred
+the man's dull brutality.  He could dismiss her to-morrow, but he would
+never find another woman who would be her match for physique and
+endurance.  Besides, others would know their value and demand a larger
+salary.
+
+He pointed to the performers' exit.  "_Allez_!"
+
+As she rode past, Arithelli made him a little bow.  It was the salute
+of a courteous duellist to his adversary.  To his profound surprise the
+Manager found himself acknowledging it, with like dignity.
+
+At eight o'clock that evening she sat before the glass in her
+dressing-room and awaited the shouted summons of the impish call-boy,
+who respected no one on earth, and to whom she was never "Mamzelle" or
+"Senora," but only Arithelli.  The dresser had gone out for an instant,
+leaving the door ajar, and a noisy burst of applause swept along the
+passage.
+
+The audience was in a particularly good temper, and ready to be amused
+at anything.  In view of the royal guests the Manager had provided
+several exciting novelties.  There was a wonderful troupe of performing
+horses who did everything that a horse is popularly supposed to be
+incapable of doing; there was a gypsy girl from Seville with a
+marvellous bear, whose intelligence appeared to be of a superior
+quality to that of the average human being; there were new jokes, new
+tricks, fresh costumes.
+
+As Arithelli rode in she heard her name called, and her state of frozen
+misery suddenly gave way to a hot thrill of excitement.
+
+Her head went up like a stag, and her nostrils dilated.  She inhaled
+again the familiar warm scent of freshly strewn tan and hay and
+animals.  It had intoxicated her as a child of twelve, when she had
+been taken to see a travelling circus in Ireland, and it intoxicated
+her now.
+
+The seats were a packed mass of people, and in the upper places and
+from the royal box, bright colours flamed, and jewels and restless fans
+glittered and moved.  In honour of the occasion every woman had draped
+herself in the graceful mantilla, either black or white, and even the
+poorest wore a scarlet or orange silk-fringed _crepe_ shawl.
+
+The usual precautions as to detectives and a guard of soldiers had been
+taken, but the buxom and amiable Infanta was popular among the lower
+orders, so that no revolutionist outbreak was feared.
+
+Her charities were famous, her diamonds and Paris toilettes equally so.
+She smiled graciously at Arithelli as horse and rider bowed before her,
+and pulling out a few blossoms from the bouquet that rested on the
+ledge, threw them into the arena.  As the girl looked up and the level
+unsmiling gaze met hers, the older woman started back.
+
+"_Santa Vierge_!" she muttered, hastily crossing herself.  "She looks
+in Purgatory already, with those strange eyes!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+  "The nights that were days, and the days that were nights,
+    Griefs and glories and vain delights,
+  With Fame before us in fancy flights,
+    We mocked each other and cried 'All's well'!"
+            LOVE IN BOHEMIA.
+
+
+Of her first act Arithelli had no fear.  She knew that she was safe in
+trusting to the skill and training of her horse to accomplish
+successfully all the stereotyped movements of the _haute ecole_.  She
+had only to sit still and look graceful, and guide him through his
+paces as he waltzed, turned or knelt.  She carried a whip for show, but
+she had never used it.  A word, a caress had always been enough, and
+she would have been beaten herself rather than touch the beautiful
+creature that carried her.
+
+In the next act it would be all different.  Everything depended on her
+own balance and accuracy.  It would be all trick work then, not riding.
+As she slid out of her habit and into the ugly ballet-skirts she
+loathed, her courage vanished and she trembled as she faced the
+audience for the second time, transformed in white satin and pale blue,
+the thinness of her neck and arms painfully apparent.
+
+The flying rush through the air as she jumped the hurdles and gates
+made her feel horribly dazed and giddy, and unable to collect her
+senses in time for the next leap.  As she descended lightly in her
+heelless silk slippers upon Don Juan's back after the fourth hurdle had
+been passed, she swayed and only by a violent effort recovered herself.
+Her heart seemed to be beating right up in her throat and choking her.
+She put up one hand and pulled at her turquoise collar till the clasp
+gave way and thrust the blue stones into the low-cut bodice.  The band
+sounded louder than ever, the light danced and waved.  Round and round
+and round again, while the ring-master's whip cracked monotonously.
+
+The rhythm of the waltz beat in her brain as the music in some
+delirious dream.  She wondered dully why there was so little applause
+now.  Was she doing so badly?  Once she had jumped too low and knocked
+against a hurdle instead of clearing it properly.  The grooms had
+helped her by lowering everything as much as possible, but all they
+could do had not been able to disguise her unwonted awkwardness.
+
+She would have a few minutes' rest when the clown came on, and perhaps
+that would help her to go through the rest of the act without an
+absolute breakdown.
+
+The interlude was all too short, the signal came and she sprang up and
+poised herself mechanically.  Again the waltz music struck up and Don
+Juan's hoofs fell with a soft thud upon the tan.  The hurdles and gates
+had all been cleared successfully, and now she must dismount and let
+her steed go round alone while she ran across from the opposite side of
+the ring and vaulted from the ground to the saddle.
+
+It was the trick she had found impossible to get through at the
+rehearsal, the trick she most dreaded.  Everything depended on her
+coolness and steadiness.  She must start exactly at the right time, and
+measure the distance with unerring precision.  For the first time in
+her life she feared the audience.  She knew too well the fickle nature
+of a Spanish crowd.  To a performer who failed to please them they
+would be merciless.  People who screamed aloud for more blood when the
+sport had been tame at a bull-fight, people who habitually tortured
+their animals, were not likely to show consideration to one who was
+paid to entertain them.  They would applaud furiously one minute and
+hiss furiously the next.
+
+As she stood alone, waiting, she glanced instinctively towards the
+place where Emile always sat, and wished he had been there.  He would
+be angry with her if she failed, but she felt somehow that he would be
+sorry for her as well.  Perhaps he might even make excuses for her, for
+he was the only person who knew about the episode of the previous
+night, and her injured hand.  Sometimes she had loved the swaying crowd
+of human beings for whose amusement she risked her life and limbs.  Now
+she hated the eager watching faces.  They only wanted to see her fall,
+she told herself.
+
+She ran blindly across the open space.  The next instant she was on her
+feet on the ground again and Don Juan had stopped short.  Her upward
+leap had carried her on to his back, but she had not been able to keep
+her balance.
+
+There was dead silence and then the hissing in the audience broke out,
+vehement and unrestrained.
+
+That she had pleased them hitherto went for nothing in her favour now.
+She had been clumsy, ungraceful, had failed--that was enough.
+
+Arithelli herself scarcely heard the sounds of execration, as she stood
+swaying with one hand over her eyes to shut out the horrible glare.
+She was conscious only of that and the strident noise of the band, and
+the sensation of choking she had felt once before.  The instinct of all
+animals to hide themselves in the dark when ill, was strong upon her.
+
+The fat little ring-master who alone had the sense to see there was
+something wrong, advanced and spoke to her in an agitated whisper.  She
+gave him her hand and he led her out, leaving her hurriedly to go back
+and apologise to the irate spectators, and to claim their indulgence on
+the score of her sudden faintness.
+
+      *      *      *      *      *      *
+
+Would she ever get to her room, Arithelli wondered, as she struggled
+down the passage.  It had never seemed so long before.  Her hand went
+up to her throat again.  She longed for something cool to drink to
+relieve the aching and dryness.  It must be caused by the heat and dust
+of the ring, she thought.
+
+A man's voice sounded behind her, and then hurrying footsteps.  She
+pulled her long blue cloak round her and went on without answering or
+turning her head.  It could only be the Manager coming to upbraid her.
+
+An arm was flung round her protectingly and she turned with the face of
+a hunted animal, and looked up into the wild dark eyes of Vardri.
+
+"What has happened?  You're ill!  It's no wonder.  _Mon Dieu_, those
+brutes last night . . ."
+
+He pulled her head back against his shoulder, dropping his voice to a
+murmur of exquisite gentleness.  "_Mon enfant--ma petite enfant_!"
+
+"You saw me fall?" she whispered.
+
+"The men told me when they brought Don Juan out.  I didn't see what
+happened.  Were you hurt or only faint?"
+
+"Oh, my hand?  That's nothing.  Emile says it will heal in a day or
+two.  But I felt so stupid. . . .  Vardri, you don't think I'm going to
+be ill, do you?  I've never been ill in my life . . . never!"
+
+The boy made some incoherent answer.  Her piteous entreaty tore at his
+heart.  Every fibre in his starved body ached with the desire to give
+her the rest and peace she needed above all things.
+
+What could he do without money?  His own miserable wages barely served
+for necessities.  He was only a useless vagabond, an outcast.  He
+ground his teeth together at the thought of his own impotence.
+
+"Courage, little one.  They will cheer you again to-morrow.  They are
+cruel, these Spaniards, and fickle.  You must not care."
+
+It did not seem strange to either of them that he should be holding her
+in his arms.  After last night everything had changed.  Love, Youth,
+and Nature were hard at work weaving the bonds that drew them together.
+
+The fact that she suffered his caresses had given him the right of
+manhood to protect her, to be her champion, to fight her battles.  If
+he could do nothing else for her, at least he could fight.  For him the
+crown of happiness could be found in loyal service.  Of love-making in
+its ordinary sense, Vardri neither thought nor dreamed.  To have found
+his Ideal, the one woman, surely that was enough.  The innate
+fastidiousness that goes with good breeding had kept his life clean,
+his hands unsoiled.
+
+He had hated the other women in the Circus, and felt sorry for them at
+the same time; and on their side they liked him and regarded him
+somewhat as a fool.  Their voices, their coarse expressions, their
+light jokes all jarred on him.
+
+He pitied them, for their lives were as hard as his own, and when he
+could he helped them, for among the wanderers in Bohemia there is an
+ever-abiding comradeship.  The element of fanaticism in his nature,
+which had once been absorbed by the Cause, now spent itself upon a
+human being.
+
+The firm yet gentle clasp in which he held her, was the outward symbol
+of the love and courage that made him tense as steel.  To every man
+there comes his hour, and his was now.  Both for her sake and his own
+he dare not keep her with him.  That they had been left undisturbed so
+long was a miracle.  Besides, as she was ill, the sooner she was in bed
+the better.
+
+He half led, half carried her to the door of her dressing room, and she
+thanked him with a smile, a gesture.  Her throat hurt so much that all
+speech was an effort.
+
+"You must go now," she whispered.  "You will get into trouble again
+through me."
+
+The boy threw a quick furtive glance along the whitewashed passage.
+With characteristic recklessness he had forgotten that the chances of
+his summary dismissal were looming exceedingly near.
+
+He had left half his work undone the previous night, he had appeared
+late that morning, and now he was in a part of the building to which
+all the grooms and stable helpers were forbidden entrance.
+
+"You'll let me bring you home," he pleaded.
+
+Arithelli shook her head.  "You can't."
+
+"Is Emile coming for you?  You shall not go alone, that I swear!"
+
+"Emile will send someone.  They never let me go alone.  If you will,
+you may do this.  If I am not down at the stables at half-past eight
+to-morrow, will you find Emile and ask him to come to me.  He will be
+there doing my work."
+
+"And you will sleep and be well to-morrow?  To-morrow you will ride
+again, and there will be the applause."
+
+Even as he spoke he knew his words were foolishness.  The feverish
+skin, dry lips and eyes that were like burning holes in the thin oval
+face were signs and tokens enough for the most unseeing of men.  And
+Vardri had suffered sufficiently himself to be able to recognise
+genuine illness.
+
+She slipped from his arms.
+
+The little dreary laugh made him shiver.
+
+"_Mille remerciments, mon camarade_.  I'm a failure, and failures are
+best left alone.  _C'est ainsi que la vie_!"
+
+      *      *      *      *      *      *
+
+Hers was the sole fiasco in an otherwise successful performance.
+
+The final spectacle was a lurid representation of the destruction of
+Sodom and Gomorrah.
+
+This species of scriptural tableaux was frequently given, and was
+greatly to the taste of the spectators.
+
+Such scenes were regularly presented in the theatres and heartily
+enjoyed by the superstitious and devout populace, who found in them
+nothing incongruous or repulsive to their piety.
+
+In this particular display the Manager had excelled himself, and
+achieved above all things a most vivid realism.
+
+The gentleman who impersonated the patriarch Lot had a distinctly
+modern air, and resembled a third-rate Anarchist in depressing
+circumstances.
+
+He was dark and swarthy, and possessed a ferocious expression, and on
+the whole suggested a caricature of Emile in his worst frame of mind.
+
+He appeared in company with his reluctant spouse, whom he dragged along
+by the hand, she meanwhile obviously unwilling to leave the urban
+delights of the Cities of the Plain for a pastoral and dull existence
+in the desert, and as she was several sizes larger than her husband,
+she seemed likely to get the best of the encounter.
+
+She was the same fat Englishwoman who had driven Arithelli's horses in
+the chariot.  She was by no means young, she had applied her rouge with
+a lavish hand, and her golden wig was an outrage.  Her airs and graces
+were those of a well-fed operatic soprano.
+
+She advanced in jerks, she clutched at her plump anatomy and she rolled
+her eyes appealingly at the gallery, which responded with delighted
+yells.
+
+In her train came a small flock of dejected-looking, but real sheep,
+which were seemingly inspired by sufficient intelligence to wish to
+avoid the coming catastrophe.
+
+The city (or cities) was represented by coarsely-painted scenery, and,
+owing to some defect in the perspective, appeared to be only a few feet
+from the travellers, though doubtless intended to fill the distant
+horizon.
+
+The fleeing pair jerked slowly across the stage in time to subdued but
+brassy music from the Hippodrome band, the sheep followed, and thunder
+and lightning were heard and seen.
+
+Flashes and bangs resounded, the doomed city rocked upon its
+foundations, and the audience joined in the uproar.
+
+Sacks full of flour descended from Heaven and burst, converting the
+fleshly Mrs. Lot into the traditional pillar of salt, and the house and
+the curtain were brought down together.
+
+Restored to good-humour, the audience had forgotten the disgrace and
+failure of their favourite _equestrienne_.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+  "I am tired of tears and laughter
+    And men that laugh and weep,
+  Of what may come hereafter
+    For men that sow and reap.
+  I am weary of days and hours,
+    Blown buds of barren flowers,
+  Desires and dreams and powers,
+    And everything but sleep."
+            SWINBURNE.
+
+
+If anyone had told Arithelli that she was in for a sharp attack of
+diphtheria, she would have felt surprised and not very much
+enlightened.  Her ignorance of everything connected with illness was
+supreme, and since childhood she had had no recollection of medicine
+and doctors.  Her parents indulged in theories on the subject of
+complaints, the principal one being a large disbelief in their
+existence.  To them anything unhealthy or ailing was an aversion, a
+thing to be avoided rather than pitied.
+
+For accidents, sprains and breakages their pharmacopoeia suggested and
+did not go beyond two ideas,--salt and water and Nature.
+
+The Oriental strain in her character helped her to endure where an
+ordinary woman would have fussed, cried, or grumbled.  At home if she
+had had a fall or did not look her best she had been expected to
+consider herself in disgrace, and to keep out of the way till such time
+as she had completely recovered her looks and spirits.
+
+When she returned to her lodgings, it did not occur to her to rouse the
+landlady and demand remedies or attentions.  The walk home had been a
+nightmare, and now she had all she wanted--solitude and the blessed
+darkness.  She threw off her dress and boots, and walked the room hour
+after hour.  She still heard the brazen band, and saw the flaming
+lights and her ears echoed to the dreadful sounds of hissing.
+Sometimes she had drunk feverishly of the very doubtful water against
+which Emile had so often cautioned her.  When it was nearly dawn she
+gave in, and lay huddled up on the bed, half-delirious with the pain
+and feeling of suffocation.
+
+Two streets away, and in a room more squalid than her own, Vardri was
+also enduring his own private Purgatory.  Hers was physical, his
+mental.  That was all the difference.
+
+Long before half-past eight he was down at the stables and there
+received the dismissal he had fully expected, being ordered off the
+premises by the head groom, who had received directions the night
+before to give Vardri a week's wages, and turn him out of the place
+without delay.  It was no use protesting.  The Manager was not yet
+visible, and even if he had been Vardri knew there was no appeal.
+
+There had been complaints about his negligence more than once, and of
+course he had been missed on the previous evening.  None of the
+"strappers" would have reported him, but one of the clowns, a Spaniard
+with whom he had fought for ill-treating a horse, had seen him leaving
+the vicinity of the dressing-rooms, and had carried the information to
+headquarters.
+
+The informer had chosen his time well, and had found the Manager raging
+over Arithelli's mishap, and ready to dismiss anyone with or without
+reason.
+
+Vardri turned his back on the place whistling defiance, and with his
+courage fallen below zero.  He would have liked to say good-bye to the
+horses, and to some of the men who were his friends.  He had never
+disliked the actual work, and it was at the Hippodrome that he had
+first met Arithelli.  Her misfortune and his had come together.  At any
+other time it would not have been quite so bad.  A few months ago he
+would not have cared whether he lost his place or not.
+
+There had been nothing much in life then, and one could always find a
+short way out of it _via_ the water or an overdose of something.
+
+But now the world was changed, and he craved for Life and the fulness
+of Life, for he had tasted happiness and stood for a moment in the
+outer courts of the House of Love.  He had no friends who could have
+helped him, and no qualifications for earning his living at any other
+trade or profession.  He had begun life with a luxurious home, a
+refined and useless education, and the mind of a dreamer, an idealist.
+None of these things were valuable assets in his present career.
+
+Like Arithelli he spoke several languages more or less fluently, and
+like her again possessed both understanding and a love of horses, but
+what avail were these things when he had neither money, references nor
+influence, and as a further disadvantage he was known to be an
+associate of the revolutionaries, and his tendency to consumption would
+keep him out of many kinds of employment.
+
+He turned over the few coins in his hand.  Just enough to keep him for
+a week and then--the deluge!
+
+He waited, prowling up and down the street, impatiently until Emile
+appeared in the distance.
+
+A few minutes later, the two men were at the door of Arithelli's
+lodgings.  The landlady met them on the stairs, hag-like in the
+disarray of the early morning, and evidently terrified out of such
+humanity as she possessed by the fear of infection.  She had gone up
+with the early morning coffee and found Arithelli raving aloud and
+tearing at her throat.  Her first thought had been to turn the girl out
+of doors, or, as she was obviously incapable of moving, to send for a
+priest and a nursing sister, and have her taken to the public hospital.
+A wholesome fear of Emile prevented her from giving utterance to these
+charitable impulses.
+
+She invoked every saint in the calendar, whose name she could remember,
+and crossed herself with automaton-like energy.
+
+She could not, she protested, be expected to nurse such a dangerous
+case of fever as this undoubtedly was.  There was her son, the adored
+of her old age.  _Santa Maria_!  If he also were stricken!
+
+Emile pushed her on one side.  "I'll talk to you presently," he said in
+her own dialect.  "If you are going into hysterics with fright you'll
+catch anything that is catching.  If you behave sensibly you won't."
+
+The window was fully open and the green shutters thrown back, and the
+fierce sunlight streamed into Arithelli's room, which showed more than
+its normal disorder.  The tray with the _cafe complet_ was on the floor
+where the landlady had left it on her hasty stampede downstairs,
+half-a-dozen turquoise rings lay strewn over a little table, where they
+had been thrown when they were dragged off, boys' clothes trailed over
+the back of one chair, and a blue skirt over another.  The only orderly
+thing visible was the immaculate row of fine kid boots, long, narrow,
+pearl-grey, tan and champagne-coloured.
+
+Arithelli lay on the big bed under the faded canopy.  She had wrapped
+herself in a thin blue _peignoir_, and her face was half hidden in
+tangled hair.  The tumbled bed-clothes were pulled to one side and
+dragging on the dusty boards.  She was quite unconscious of anyone's
+presence, and moaned softly in a strangled fashion.
+
+The two men stood without speaking, and watched the writhing, restless
+figure.  Vardri turned away first with a smothered exclamation.  Would
+he always be obliged to see her tortured in some way or another?  The
+Fates were sending him more than any man could bear to look upon.
+
+"What are you going to do?" he said roughly in French, "I can't stand
+seeing this!"
+
+Emile showed no signs of surprise at the other's manifest anxiety,
+possibly because his own was as deep, though his method of expressing
+it was different.  He felt helpless, and, being a man, resented the
+feeling, so by consequence his always rugged manner became even more
+unpleasant than usual.
+
+"Well," he rejoined, "what can you expect in this filthy place?  This
+street isn't so bad, but of course she has so often been down in those
+slums in the Parelelo.  The Calle de Pescadores alone is enough to give
+anyone a fever.  I think Sobrenski has made a point of sending her down
+every poisonous street in the place.  Ireland's a clean country, you
+see, compared with this, so she hasn't much chance, and as she starves
+herself half the time that won't make things any better."
+
+"She must have some woman to look after her.  I suppose the landlady
+here will be no good?"
+
+"Not unless you pay her.--Who's going to do that?"
+
+"There's Estelle."
+
+"Estelle!"  Emile exploded a fierce Russian oath.  "Do you want _more_
+hysterics?"  Vardri was tramping up and down the room with the
+noiseless agility of an animal, his fingers mechanically at work at a
+cigarette.
+
+"She must have a doctor too.  Isn't there an English doctor here?"
+
+"Probably.  Do you propose to pay him too?"
+
+The dryly sarcastic voice, the practical question brought Vardri down
+from the clouds to the hard facts of life.  Illnesses and doctors were
+expensive things.  He had no money, and Emile very little.
+
+"I'll get a _Soeur de Charite_ from one of the convents.  She'll come
+for nothing.  Nursing is their work.  I was--I mean I'm a Catholic.
+She's a Catholic, too, isn't she?"
+
+"No, she hates them.  She was educated in a convent, where as far as I
+can gather from her own account she acquired more learning than piety.
+Under the present circumstances I can only suggest the horse-doctor."
+
+"What's the use of--?"
+
+"I believe he began by doctoring human beings, but like the rest of us
+out here, he is a little under a cloud.  He prefers animals now.  They
+don't tell tales.  Human beings do.  Besides, he's English, or rather,
+Irish.  Better go and tell him to come up.  You know his rooms.  Tell
+him it's infectious, and he can bring up a few cigarettes for me if he
+feels generous.  Don't trouble about your _Soeur de Charite_.  I'll see
+that the woman here makes herself useful."
+
+Vardri flung himself out of the room and down the rickety stairs at
+breakneck speed, thankful beyond measure for the relief of action.
+
+Emile subsided into a chair and smoked furiously and meditated upon the
+untoward situation.  Being of a practical turn of mind he began to make
+calculations.  Vardri had told him briefly of how Arithelli had failed
+in the trick-riding, fallen off her horse, and been hissed out of the
+ring.  The loss of popularity might mean the end of her career.  In any
+case he could see she was desperately ill, and there was small chance
+of her being about under three weeks, and even then she would not be
+able to work at once.  Meanwhile they had exactly two pounds a week to
+live upon.
+
+Truly women added to the complications of life!  He might borrow money,
+but that was a thing to be resorted to only in the last extremity.
+Most of the members of his Circle were as poor as himself or poorer.
+They were all bound together by the tie of brotherhood, and no one
+would have grudged or refused a loan, but Emile scrupled to borrow from
+those who were in greater privation than himself.
+
+Sobrenski was fairly well off, but he lived like an ascetic and gave
+everything to the Cause; besides, Sobrenski was out of the question.
+To appeal to him on Arithelli's behalf would only be to give him a
+chance for refusal and a jeer at female conspirators.
+
+Her turquoise rings Emile collected from the table, and put them into
+his pocket; her collar of turquoises he rescued from the floor, where
+it had fallen when she took off her bodice.  The jewels could all be
+turned into the money they needed so badly.  Of course she had not
+saved a single _peseta_.  Emile had the handling of her salary, and he
+knew that anything left over from the expenses of food and lodging went
+in clothes and her particular vanity, dainty boots.
+
+She was lavishly generous to the Hippodrome staff, and there was always
+a certain tribute claimed from all its adherents by the Cause.
+
+He did not hunt further for valuables.  If there was either money or
+jewellery in Arithelli's possession it was sure to be found in quite a
+conspicuous place.
+
+The varied life of the city surged to and fro beneath the window, the
+varied noises floated up into the room, and under the faded red brocade
+curtains, Arithelli turned from side to side and moaned with closed
+eyes.  A seller of fruit passed, crying his wares.
+
+Emile went down into the street and bought a couple of oranges, and
+squeezed the juice into the cup that had been destined for the coffee.
+
+He had not the least idea as to what particular malady Arithelli had
+developed, but he knew that fever and delirium always went together,
+and that with fever there is invariably thirst.  He lifted her up and
+pushed the pillow higher to relieve her breathing, but he could hardly
+do more than moisten her parched and bitten lips.  Then he "tidied" the
+bed with masculine pulls and jerks till it was even more untidy than
+before, and went back to his chair.  There was nothing more to be done
+for her in the way of alleviation till the doctor came.
+
+He took up a book, and tried to shut his ears and distract his
+thoughts.  As he stared unseeingly at the printed pages, there suddenly
+flashed into his brain the name of Count Vladimir, the owner of "_The
+Witch_."  Here was the very man to whom he could confidently apply for
+help in the present difficulties, for the Russian had made it his
+business in life to bestow his wealth in assisting the revolutionaries.
+Emile decided that he would write tomorrow, when he had acquired
+certain particulars as to the address he wanted.
+
+Fatalite had done good work for the Cause, he argued, therefore let
+those who supported the organisation keep her till she was able to work
+again.
+
+The next task he would have to undertake would be that of bullying or
+bribing the landlady into a promise to undertake at least some of the
+duties of a sick-room.  The rest of the nursing he proposed to do
+himself.  He grinned as he lit another evil-smelling cigarette, at the
+thought of Vardri's proposal.
+
+He possessed an artistic sense of the fitness of things, and the
+suggested _Soeur de Charite_ appealed to him as being quite out of the
+picture.  Besides Arithelli had no respect for priests or nuns; Emile
+remembered her inimitable descriptions of the spying "Children of
+Mary," and she should not be worried with either if he could help it.
+
+Yes, certainly the incapable old landlady would be preferable to a
+white-capped _religeuse_, for the latter, though not likely by virtue
+of her training to be scared by the physical atmosphere, would
+undoubtedly be appalled by the mental and moral one.  Most likely she
+would take advantage of Arithelli's weakness to persuade her of the
+danger of her present way of living.  The Church of Rome is never slow
+at seizing the chance of making a convert, and the power of the Church
+in Spain is a byword.
+
+Though Emile had a profound scorn for conventions, he had at one time
+had his place among that class of human beings that calls itself
+"Society," and he knew its rules and ways as he despised its
+hypocrisies.  He could look at Arithelli's position quite judicially,
+and as an outsider.  The world, religious and otherwise, would
+certainly not give her the benefit of the doubt.
+
+She was young, she was possessed of a weird and haunting beauty, she
+had no women friends, no relations, and no companions but a set of
+law-breakers, all of whom were men.  No one would believe that she was
+untouched, unawakened, that she had been treated as a boy, and her
+womanhood not so much respected as ignored.  If anyone put the wrong
+ideas into her head, Emile reflected, it was sure to be one of her own
+sex.
+
+Having matured his plans he descended to the kitchen regions,
+manufacturing impressive threats _en route_.
+
+Here an answer to his problem presented itself, or rather herself.  The
+landlady had a niece who came in daily to assist in household matters,
+and take part in a duet of feminine gossip.
+
+She was a solid young woman of unmoved countenance, who was quite
+prepared to nurse the ten plagues of Egypt, providing she received
+sufficient remuneration.  She proposed to get married at the earliest
+opportunity and what Emile offered her would be of great assistance in
+providing her bridal finery.
+
+The two came to an agreement rapidly, and Emile climbed the stairs
+again, triumphant.
+
+He began to feel anxious about the doctor.  Two hours had passed and
+there was no sight of him.  He might be out, or he might be drunk.
+Emile knew the little weakness of Michael Furness, and as Vardri had
+not returned it meant that he was still searching.
+
+At last the horse-doctor arrived, grunting and ruffling up his crest of
+curly black hair.  He had a large heart by way of counterbalance to his
+many failings, and he was interested in Arithelli, for he had come
+across her once or twice in the stables, and had heard various
+picturesque stories of her exploits.  He might have been a success in
+his own profession, but for the two temptations that beset every
+Irishman--whisky and horses.
+
+He had left his practice in the city of Cork, as Emile had said,
+somewhat under a cloud, and had given up whisky for the _absinthe_ of
+the _cafes_, and had not regretted the exchange.  He made his
+examination quickly, handling the girl with a surprising skill and
+deftness, in spite of his big clumsy-looking hands.
+
+When he touched her she opened her eyes.
+
+"_Mais, ou suis je_?" she murmured, painfully dragging out the words.
+Then followed Emile's name.
+
+The doctor laid her back gently, and stood holding one of her wrists.
+"She thinks it's you, Poleski!  'Tis diphtheria.  A bad case, too.
+Shall want some looking afther.  Who's seeing to her?"
+
+"I am," responded Emile, coolly.
+
+"The divil ye are!"  The Irishman's long upper lip twitched humorously.
+"Well, treat her gintly then, me bhoy!  You're wise to be smoking.
+Less chance of infection.  I'll keep you company."  He produced a
+couple of thin black cigars, and handed one to Emile.
+
+"See, now," Michael Furness added seriously, "I may as well be telling
+you the truth.  Your little friend there hasn't a very big chance.
+She's been going to bits for some time.  If it hadn't been this it
+would have been something else.  She's got a grand physique, so there's
+hope.  If she's worse by to-morrow she ought to have an operation.
+Only I can't undertake it, ye see.  There's the trouble.  My hand isn't
+as steady as it was, and I haven't the instruments."
+
+Emile nodded.  He knew nothing of the operation of tracheotomy, and
+though he spoke English well he found it difficult to follow Michael's
+soft, thick, County Cork speech.
+
+"She's a grand heap of a girl, isn't she?" continued that gentleman,
+regarding Arithelli with kindly eyes.  He had all the Celt's love of
+romance, and the ingrained reverence of the Irish Catholic for women.
+"This isn't the place for girls, at all, at all!  And they tell me
+she's from the old country.  Will I be sending up one of the good
+Sisthers to see after her, and put things to rights a bit?"
+
+For the second time that day Emile ungratefully rejected the
+ministrations of the Church.  He knew that no one else in Spain ever
+thought of employing anyone but the religious orders as nurses, but he
+preferred to arrange things in his own way and said so.
+
+"Ah, well then!" said Michael amiably, "give her something to drink if
+she wants it.  That's all.  I'll look in again this evening.  She'll
+have taken a turn then one way or the other.  It's a quick thing, this."
+
+Arithelli's ministering angels left in each other's company.  Michael
+drifted back to his favourite _cafe_, while Emile betook himself to the
+Hippodrome to wage war with that amiable functionary, the Manager.  The
+strife was both noisy and prolonged, and resulted in only a partial
+victory for Emile.  With many picturesque oaths the Manager accused
+himself of folly unspeakable in not dismissing Arithelli at once.
+
+She had a contract?  Yes!  But in it there was no allowance made for
+incompetence and non-appearance.  It only stipulated that she should be
+paid for doing her work.  She had not done it, and moreover she had
+refused to practise.  That he should be expected to continue to pay her
+a salary even of the smallest description while she lay in bed was a
+monstrous impertinence.
+
+Would he not have the trouble and expense of getting another artiste to
+fill her place?  There must be an _equestrienne_ in the programme.  If
+she found herself taken back again to finish her time after this
+illness or whatever it was, then she should be more than grateful, but
+as for paying salaries to _employes_ who did not work, why, did people
+consider him an imbecile?
+
+Emile shrugged and sneered at intervals throughout this tirade.  He had
+wisely begun by asking more than he knew he was at all likely to get,
+and was now obliged to be satisfied with the compromise.
+
+Disappointment followed his search for the whereabouts of Count
+Vladimir.  The owner of "_The Witch_" was expected back in Barcelona in
+a month or so, no one knew exactly when.  Letters might be addressed
+Poste Restante, Corfu, for he was cruising in his phantom craft through
+those sapphire seas that lie round about the Ionian Islands.
+
+There was nothing to do but to write and wait.  One piece of ill-luck
+was following close upon another, and Emile felt that he needed all the
+consolations that his cynical philosophy could afford.
+
+His anxiety on Arithelli's behalf was fast becoming an obsession.  When
+she had first come into his life he had wondered sometimes how she
+would stand the late hours and all the hardships of a circus training,
+but after her one outburst she had never complained again.
+
+He thought the sea-trip had done her good.  Of course she always looked
+pale, but then that was her type.
+
+He had also been impressed with the unwonted seriousness of Michael,
+knowing that in spite of his erratic ways the doctor understood his
+craft.
+
+Emile's instinct prompted him vigorously to go back now and see how she
+was getting on, but he dared not neglect the work of his Society.
+There were letters to be written, arrangements to be made, all the
+usual paraphernalia of intrigue to be kept going.
+
+He returned to his own rooms and began to write savagely, using all his
+will to expel from his brain the vision of the girl as he had seen her
+last, semi-conscious, and yet with his name on her lips.
+
+Michael had promised to see her again at six o'clock.  It would be time
+enough if he also went then.  Besides, the Cause came first always, and
+there were many women in the world.  His pen tore fiercely over the
+paper as something whispered: "Women?  Yes.  But another Arithelli--?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+"I have something more to think of than Love.  All the women in the
+world would not make me waste an hour."
+            SAYING OF NAPOLEON.
+
+
+The stolid niece blundered heavily about the room, doing things that
+were entirely unnecessary, and raising much dust.  She was a
+conscientious person in her own way, and felt that she must get through
+a certain amount of work in return for the anticipated reward.
+
+She banged chairs and table about, folded up scattered clothes,
+investigated them with much interest, and fingered and re-arranged the
+row of boots with muttered ejaculations and covetous eyes.  She had
+previously contrived to get Arithelli into a night dress, had brushed
+her hair back and plaited it, and pulled the green shutters together to
+keep out the midday glare.
+
+As she looked at the livid face patched with scarlet against the coarse
+linen, Maria began to feel a little perturbed.  Something in the
+atmosphere of the room had penetrated even the brick wall of her
+stolidity.  She hoped the two Senors would soon return and relieve her
+of the responsibility of her charge.
+
+The stillness oppressed her, for Arithelli had ceased her moaning and
+muttering for a merciful stupor.
+
+As the hours went on the fever increased, and the horrible fungus in
+her throat spread with an appalling rapidity.
+
+As Michael Furness had prophesied, the crisis would soon be reached,
+and she had everything save youth against her in the fight for life.
+
+Maria crossed herself perfunctorily and mumbled a few prayers.
+Doubtless the Senora was like all the English, a heretic, and
+therefore, according to the comfortable tenets of the Roman faith,
+eternally damned, but a little prayer would do no harm, and would be
+counted to herself as an act of charity.
+
+That ceremony over, more mundane considerations engrossed her mind.
+She could smell the pungent odour of the _olla podrida_, or national
+stew, insinuating itself through the half-open door, and she knew that
+if she were not present at the meal, there would be more than one
+hungry mouth ready to devour her share.
+
+She drew a breath of relief as she marched heavily downstairs to the
+more congenial surroundings of the kitchen.  She had done her duty.
+Senor Poleski had not told her to stay in the room all the time he was
+away, and she could easily be back again before he came in.
+
+Michael was the first to appear, almost aggressively sober, and
+carrying a small wooden box.  His interest in his case was as much
+human as professional, and instead of wasting the afternoon, after his
+usual custom, loafing and drinking, he had gone, after one modest glass
+of the rough _Val de Penas_, to search in out-of-the-way streets for a
+certain herbalist of repute.
+
+This was an aged Spanish Jew, unclean and cadaverous, with patriarchal
+grey beard and piercing eyes, a man renowned for his marvellous cures
+among the peasantry.
+
+He was regarded more or less as a wizard, though his wizardry consisted
+solely in a knowledge of natural remedies, and the exercise of a power
+which would have been described at the Paris Salpetriere as hypnotic
+suggestion.  By the aid of this he was able to inspire his patients
+with the faith so necessary to a successful treatment.
+
+Michael was not fettered in any way by the ordinary conventions of a
+practitioner.  He had neither drugs nor instruments of his own
+wherewith to effect a cure on ordinary lines, and what he had seen of
+herbalists in Spain had inspired him with a vast respect for the
+simplicity and success of their methods.  The wooden box contained a
+quantity of leaves which, steeped in scalding water, and applied to the
+patient's throat, possessed the power of reducing the inflammation and
+drawing out the poison through the pores of the skin.  Of their
+efficacy Michael entertained not the slightest doubt.
+
+He walked straight to the bed, and glanced at Arithelli's throat, now
+almost covered with white patches of membrane.  There was no time to
+waste if she was to be saved from the ghastliness of slow suffocation.
+
+He went to the head of the stairs and yelled lustily for Maria, whom he
+commanded to produce boiling water immediately, thus further adding to
+the reputation of the mad English for haste and unreasonableness.
+
+Then he took off his coat, rolled up his sleeves, and began busily to
+clear a space on the table, on which he emptied the contents of the box.
+
+All his movements had suddenly become alert and energetic.  The joy of
+the true physician, the healer, had awakened in him at the prospect of
+a duel with Death, and he was no longer merely the slouching,
+good-natured wastrel who doctored horses at the Hippodrome.
+
+He possessed for the moment the dignity of a leader, of the master of a
+situation.  He smiled to himself as he moved about humming a verse of
+"Let Ireland remember," and swept away a _debris_ of books, a rouge
+pot, some dead flowers, and a large over-trimmed hat.
+
+"Shure 'tis back in the surgery again I am," he told himself, while his
+lean, ugly face beamed with satisfaction.
+
+No one who knew Michael Furness had ever suspected the regret by which
+he was for ever haunted, regret at the loss of his profession.  His
+rollicking manner made it impossible to believe him capable of any
+depth of feeling, and he had a trick of talking least about the things
+for which he cared most.  The failing that banned him from his work was
+an inherited one.  He suffered for the sins of his fathers, for the
+indulgences of many generations of hard riding, hard living, reckless
+hot-blooded Celts.  He was too old to reform now, he would say.
+Perhaps later on he would be "making his soul"; in the meantime he
+drifted.
+
+Emile, Maria and the boiling water all made their entree together.  The
+eyes of the former travelled first of all to the bed and then to the
+heap of vegetation.
+
+"_Qu 'est-ce que c'est que ca_?" he demanded.  "She is better, eh?"
+
+"No, she's worse," answered Michael.  He seized upon the leaves and
+began to bundle them into the steaming basin.
+
+"We shouldn't have been gone so long.  What's this did ye say, Poleski?
+Well, 'tis the only thing I can do for her.  After I left you I went
+and got these.  They're great believers in herbs in this counthry, and
+by the light of what I have seen, so am I.  The poor people never use
+anything else, and I've seen some fine cures.  It's unprofessional, but
+it's giving her a chance and as I told you I can't operate."  He
+withdrew his fingers hurriedly.
+
+"Faith, that jade with the dark eyes knew what she was doing when she
+made this water hot!  They're ready now, and I'll want a piece of stuff
+to lay them on.  Find me a piece of the colleen's finery, something old
+that she won't be wanting to use any more."
+
+He pronounced the last two words as "ANNIE MOORE," and would have been
+furious if the fact had been pointed out to him, for like all Irishmen
+he would never admit the possession of a brogue.
+
+A pale blue silk scarf was found, and ruthlessly utilised as a bandage.
+Then Emile lifted the inert figure, while the doctor wound it round her
+throat and fastened it securely.
+
+"Lift her higher, man," he adjured Emile.
+
+"There's only one pillow?--Then use this."  He rolled up his coat, and
+put it behind her head.
+
+"We've done all we can now, and must just wait till this begins to
+draw.  It will make her uncomfortable, and we must watch that she
+doesn't pull it off.  Give me a cigarette if ye have one, Poleski.
+'Tis hot work this."
+
+He sat down on the bed and took up Arithelli's thin wrist.  In his
+shirt sleeves, with his hair well on end, and his robust voice very
+little subdued below its usual pitch, Michael did not convey the
+impression that he was capable of taking either Life or Death in a
+serious spirit.  He talked on gaily, in no way depressed by his
+unsympathetic audience, telling tales of his own escapades in the
+matter of fighting and love-making, of wild midnight steeplechases
+ridden across unknown country, and the delights of the fair town by the
+river Lee.
+
+Once he stopped talking for a few minutes to boil some more water on
+the stove that Arithelli sometimes used for making coffee, and to renew
+the application of leaves.  The fact that his patient was in exactly
+the same condition of stupor, and had not stirred, did not discourage
+Michael's optimistic views of her recovery.
+
+"Ye must give it time, me bhoy," he told Emile.  "There's no hurry in
+Spain, ye know, with anything.  Be careful that ye watch her and keep
+her hands off her throat.  She'll not be lying so quiet presently."
+
+Emile growled out an inaudible response.  He was in a smouldering
+condition of wrath and impatience.  Reserved and limited of words as he
+himself always was, and now rendered savage by anxiety, he found it
+impossible to understand the other man's mercurial temperament.  By
+this time he was without hope, and certainly without faith in either
+Michael or his remedies.
+
+The doctor having skilfully extracted his crumpled outer garment from
+under Arithelli's shoulders, regretfully prepared to depart.  He was
+obliged to be somewhere about the premises of the Hippodrome during
+every performance in case of accident to any of the animals, and
+careless as he was where his own benefit was concerned, he had
+sufficient wisdom to be always within call.
+
+When he had vanished Emile walked to the window, and threw open the now
+useless shutters.  He guessed instinctively that Arithelli needed more
+air, and he had himself begun to find the temperature almost
+unbearable, for the building was lofty, and the room they were in near
+the roof.  He rested his folded arms upon the sill and leaned his head
+and shoulders far out.
+
+The house stood at a corner, and while the side of it was in a small
+street, the front overlooked one of the many wide and beautiful
+_paseos_, with which the city abounded.
+
+A little breeze borne of the incoming tide in the harbour came sweeping
+along, and its coolness stirred him into fresh vitality.
+
+It was the hour of pleasure, when the inhabitants threw off their
+sun-begotten sloth and thronged the _cafes_ and public gardens and
+promenades.
+
+On the Rambla, once the bed of a river, the military bands played waltz
+music, and the favourite operas, and hot blood moved faster to the
+unfailing enchantment of the Habernera, and the newest works of
+Massenet and Charpentier.
+
+It was now dark, and the stars blazed down upon the never-resting city,
+with its sinister record of outrages and crimes, and its charm which
+was as the alluring of some wild gypsy queen.
+
+Men fleeing from the justice or vengeance of their own country could
+find here a City of Refuge.  Here the tide of life ran swiftly, and
+churches and cruelty walked hand in hand, and Hate trod close upon the
+heels of Love.
+
+Here no man's life was safe, for from time to time an epidemic of bomb
+throwing would break out.  Infernal machines would be hurled in an
+apparently purposeless fashion wherever there was a large gathering of
+people in street or square.  A few policemen, soldiers, or onlookers
+would be killed or mutilated, and a panic created, but few arrests were
+ever made.  The whole of the Press would unite to lift up its voice in
+an indignant appeal to the Government, and then everything would be
+forgotten till the next explosion.  People in Barcelona lived from day
+to day and accepted lawlessness as a matter of course.
+
+Emile's own particular circle had no hand in these promiscuous
+destructions of life.  Their own attempts were invariably well
+organised and directed towards some definite end.  They did not destroy
+life for mere wanton cruelty, and their victims were marked out and
+hunted down with an accurate aim.
+
+
+It suddenly occurred to Emile that during the last few months he had
+looked upon Barcelona with a changed vision.  He had always seen her
+beauties and hated them, as a man may hate the fair body of a despised
+mistress, while he yet sees it fair.  Now the thought that he might at
+any time, and at a few days' notice, be forced to leave the place,
+struck him with a feeling of blankness and desolation.
+
+The sense of exile was almost gone, the nostalgia for his own land no
+longer keen.  Had he turned traitor to his own country, the country for
+whose woes he was now suffering--?
+
+There he had neither home, parents, friends nor lover.  Here he
+possessed at least interests.
+
+
+A rustling sound behind him made him turn quickly.  In the gloom he
+could only see the outline of a white moving figure.  He groped for the
+matches, struck one and lit a candle.
+
+Arithelli sat upright in bed; she had pushed back the clothes, and her
+long fingers were dragging at the blue scarf.  It was knotted at the
+back under her plait of hair, and she had almost succeeded in loosening
+it.  The fatal inertia was passed, and she was beside herself with heat
+and pain and the fight for breath.
+
+A couple of strides brought Emile to the bedside.  He caught her hands
+between his own and drew them down.
+
+"Listen, Arithelli," he said quietly.  "You mustn't do that.  This is
+to cure your throat.  It may hurt you now, but to-morrow you will be
+better, _voyez-vous_?"
+
+The girl writhed in his grasp, turning her head from side to side.  The
+wild eyes, the tense, quivering body, made Emile think of some forest
+animal in a trap.
+
+The bandage had fallen from her throat and therefore was useless, and
+the aromatic scent of the crushed herbs was pungent in the air.  He
+remembered Michael's injunction, "See that she keeps it on.  It's her
+only chance."
+
+She was still struggling frantically, and he needed both hands.  For a
+moment he meditated tying her wrists together, but he decided to trust
+to his influence over her to make her do as he wished, she had always
+obeyed him hitherto, and he knew that she was perfectly conscious now,
+and capable of understanding what he wanted.
+
+He set his teeth and tightened his grip, and spoke again in the same
+quiet voice.
+
+"Look at me!  That's right.  Put your hands down, and keep them so.
+You must not touch your throat."
+
+He held her eyes with his own as he spoke, and after a momentary
+struggle and shrinking she grew quiet, and he felt her body relax.  Her
+eyes closed and she sank down against the pillow, turning her face
+towards him.
+
+"_Pauvre enfant_!" Emile muttered.
+
+He released her hands and they lay still, and she made no movement to
+hinder him as he re-adjusted the bandage.
+
+He stood looking down upon her.  A vast compassion shone in the grey
+eyes, that she had only seen hard and penetrating.  The gesture of mute
+abandonment, the ready compliance had appealed to his complex nature,
+which he kept hidden under an armour of coldness and cynicism.  For an
+instant his years of outlawry and poverty were blotted out and he had
+gone back to the days in Russia when he had first come into his
+kingdom, and had believed women faithful and their honour a thing on
+which to stake one's own.
+
+As sweet and yielding Marie Roumanoff had seemed when she had lain in
+his arms.  A few years hence if Arithelli did not succeed in breaking
+her neck in the ring, she would probably also make Paradise and Hell
+for some man.
+
+He could see that the dangerous crisis was over.  She would live and
+eventually go back to her work again.  The swift intelligence, the wit
+and charm of her--_A quoi bon_?  She had been saved, and to what end?
+For a dangerous and toilsome profession, and, in secret, another and
+still greater peril.
+
+Husband and children, and the average woman's uneventful, if happy,
+fate could never be hers.  Her very beauty was of the type almost
+repellent to the strictly normal and healthy man.
+
+She would no doubt have her hour of triumph, of passion.  Some
+_connoisseur_ of beauty would purchase her as a rare jewel is bought to
+catalogue among his treasures.
+
+In Paris she might achieve notoriety.  Not now, perhaps, but later when
+she had developed into a woman and knew her own power.  Paris loved all
+things strange, and gave homage to the woman who was among her fellows
+as the orchid among flowers.
+
+"_FATALITE_," he had named her in jest.  Truly a name to bring
+misfortune to any woman.  Her fate had been in his own hands a few
+minutes ago.  He could so easily have denied her her chance, her chance
+of life.  Perhaps the time might come when she would reproach him for
+having helped her to live.
+
+He thrust back the thought and stooped over her.
+
+"_Mon enfant_, do you want anything to drink?  You are thirsty, _n'est
+ce pas_?"
+
+"Yes.  And Emile--you won't--go away--yet?"
+
+"_Ma foi_, no!  Drink this and go to sleep."
+
+He was the Emile of every-day life once more, brusque, blunt and
+practical.  As he turned away to put the glass back on the table, he
+was debating whether it would not be wise to call up Maria.  A woman
+would understand better what to do for another woman.  He knew that
+Arithelli would never ask for anything under any circumstances.
+
+He had taught her too well his own depressing theory that life "mostly
+consisted of putting up with things," and in practice thereof the pupil
+had outshone her master.
+
+The rigid tension of her arms and hands as they lay on the coverlet
+told of her effort for composure, and he noticed for the first time
+that beautiful as the latter still were in shape and colour, one of the
+nails was broken, and the finger tips had spread and widened.  When
+there had been meetings up in the hills at night she had always been
+left to see to the unharnessing of the horses and mules, and these
+disfigurements were the result of her struggles with saddle-girths and
+straps.  Her work was usually well done, and if it did not happen to be
+satisfactory, she came in for the united grumbles of the whole party.
+
+Emile bit into his cigarette as his eyes caught the discoloured lines
+of Sobrenski's sign-manual on her wrist.
+
+It was entirely through him, Emile, that she had in the first place
+joined the league of conspirators, and this was one of the results.
+Sobrenski's judgment had been more far-seeing than his own.  One girl
+in a roomful of fanatics, (he was one himself, but that did not make
+any difference,) would naturally stand a very poor chance if she was
+foolish enough to oppose them.
+
+With masculine thoughtlessness Emile had set the candle close beside
+the bed, where it flared full into Arithelli's eyes.
+
+They were wide open now.  The look of desperation had faded, and there
+was in them only the appeal of one human being to another for help and
+sympathy.
+
+"_Eh, bien_, Fatalite?"
+
+She shifted her position wearily and stretched out her hands towards
+him, murmuring, "_Je veux dormir_."
+
+If Emile had possessed either chloroform or any other narcotic he would
+at once have given it to her without much thought of the possible
+consequences.  An inspiration seized him to use the power for soothing
+and alleviating provided by Nature.  He knew that Arithelli would be an
+easy subject for the exercise of animal magnetism, and her morbid
+condition would make it even easier for him to send her to sleep.
+
+He moved away the candle, so as to leave her face in shadow, and
+leaning forward he laid his hand across her forehead and eyes, and
+began a series of regular and monotonous passes, always in a downward
+direction.  Once he rested his thumbs lightly on her eyeballs,
+remaining so for a few seconds, while his will went out to her, bidding
+her sleep and find unconsciousness.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+  "There is a woman at the beginning of all great things."
+            LAMARTINE.
+
+
+The whizzing rush and discordant scream of the electric trams, the sun
+warm upon his face, aroused Emile from a restless, fitful sleep of a
+few hours.  The street cries had begun to swell into a volume of sound,
+and at the earliest dawn the whole place teemed with stir and life.
+There was no hour in all the night in which Barcelona really slept.
+Some of the shops did not close before midnight, and people were
+continually passing through the Rambla, and entering and leaving the
+_posadas_, which were open for the sale of wine and bread soon after
+three o'clock in the morning.
+
+Emile yawned and stretched, and pulled himself up slowly from the chair
+by the open window in which he had fallen asleep.  He was cramped and
+stiff from his uncomfortable position.  Anxiety and strain had deepened
+the lines on his face, and his eyes were dull and sunken.  He looked
+less hard, less alert, and altogether more human and approachable.
+
+A glance at the bed assured him that Arithelli was still asleep and in
+exactly the same attitude as he had left her.  Though her sleep was not
+a natural one, at least it was better than drugs, and he had given her
+a respite, a time of forgetfulness.  In a few minutes he would have to
+arouse her again to more pain and discomfort, and the inevitable
+weariness of convalescence.  He stood inhaling the wonderful soft air
+and gathering up his energies to face the work of another day.
+Arithelli's affairs had to be put straight, and Vardri provided for in
+some way.  He did not in the least know how this was all to be
+accomplished, and at present the problems of the immediate future
+seemed likely to prove a little difficult.
+
+He was not by nature optimistic, and the events of the last few days
+had made him even less so than ordinary.  He felt that he must go back
+to his rooms, and finish out his _siesta_ before he could work out any
+more plans.
+
+Arithelli awoke at once when he touched her and called her name, but
+before she had realised where she was Emile was half way downstairs in
+search of Maria.
+
+As it happened it was Sunday morning, and being at least outwardly
+devout, the damsel was just on the point of starting for an early Mass,
+and was arrayed in her church-going uniform of black gown and _velo_,
+and armed with missal and rosary.
+
+Her round eyes widened and her round mouth grew sulky when she heard
+that she was expected to go upstairs without further delay and attend
+to Arithelli.  Juan would be waiting for her outside the church door,
+Maria reflected, and perhaps if she did not come he would seek others.
+There was Dolores, of the cigarette factory, for example.  The English
+Senora could surely wait a few minutes.  Her expression, and her
+obvious unwillingness, supplied Emile with material for cynical
+reflections upon the working value of religion.  He did not trouble to
+communicate his views to Maria, but merely gave orders and
+instructions.  His tone and manner were convincing.  Like all the rest
+of her sex Maria respected a man who knew what he wanted, and showed
+that he intended to get it.
+
+Emile made his way into the cool, shady Rambla, where a double avenue
+of plane trees met overhead, and where a grateful darkness could always
+be found even at mid-day.  On either side of the promenade were the
+finest shops, the gaiest _cafes_.  A band of students passed him,
+waving a scarlet flag and shouting a revolutionary _chanson_ of the
+most fiery description.  Emile scowled angrily.  He had not the least
+sympathy with these childish exhibitions of defiance, which he
+considered utterly futile and a great waste of time.  They did harm to
+the serious aims and intentions of the Anarchist community, and were
+often the means of getting quite the wrong people arrested.
+
+At the Flower Market (La Rambla de las Flores) he paused to look at the
+heaped roses, gorgeous against the grey stones.  Daily they were
+brought there in thousands, dew-drenched and fresh from the gardens of
+Saria.  He took up a loose handful from the piled mass of sweetness and
+laid it down again.
+
+Red roses were not for Fatalite.  They would not suit her, and she had
+good reason to loathe the colour that was symbolical of blood and
+sacrifice.  He chose instead a sheaf of lilies, long-stalked and
+heavily scented, and despatched them in the care of a picturesque
+_gamin_.  Sobrenski and the others would certainly have considered him
+hopelessly mad if they had known.  It was many years since he had sent
+flowers to a woman.  His present life did not encourage little
+courtesies and graceful actions.  It was in the natural course of
+events that all the comrades should help one another in every possible
+way, but none of them made any virtue out of it.  It was all done in
+the most matter-of-fact way possible.  As he had told Arithelli when
+they had talked up at Montserrat, one only kissed the hands of a Marie
+Spiridonova.  And he was sending bouquets as to some _mondaine_ of the
+vanished world and of his youth.
+
+He shrugged and walked slowly on.  In passing the house where Michael
+Furness lodged, he stopped to leave a message as to Arithelli's
+condition, and the advisability of another visit.
+
+When "_The Witch_" touched at Corfu for letters Count Vladimir found
+among them one that twisted afresh the thread of two destinies--his own
+and that of a woman.  His companion had still the same features and
+colouring of the boy who had sung at night under the stars in the
+harbour of Barcelona.  Pauline Souvaroff still sang through the hours
+between dusk and dawn, but her disguise had been discarded, and now
+soft skirts trailed as she passed, and the cropped fair hair had grown
+and twisted into little rings.  Her secret had been no secret to Emile,
+though Arithelli with her trick of taking everything for granted had
+never guessed that Paul, the singer, was other than the boy he
+professed to be.  Besides the two women had never talked together
+alone, and seldom even seen each other by daylight, for Pauline had
+sought no one's company.
+
+There was for her but one being in the world, and when she could not be
+with the man she worshipped she was content to be with her thoughts and
+dreams.
+
+At first she had, like many another Russian woman, yearned to make an
+oblation of herself in the service of her horror-ridden country, but
+with the coming of love she had put aside all thoughts of vengeance.
+The Cause was identified for her with the person of her lover.  She
+toiled willingly at it still, but from entirely different motives.  His
+interests were hers, and while he worked for the revolutionary party,
+so also must she.
+
+Pauline Souvaroff had loved much and given freely.  All that she
+possessed of beauty and charm, her whole body and soul she had laid at
+the feet of the man at whose lightest word she flushed and paled, and
+on whom she looked with soft, adoring eyes.  She lived in dreams, a
+life of drugged content in which there was neither past nor future.
+
+In all the Brotherhood no one could be considered a free agent, and the
+ordering of no man's life was in his own hands.  The private actions of
+each member were almost as well known as his public ones, for each man
+spied systematically upon his companions.  If the devotion of two
+people to one another seemed likely to outrival their devotion to the
+Cause, then separation came swiftly.  Nothing would be said, no
+accusations made, but each would receive orders that sent them in
+opposite directions.  The supporters of the Red Flag movement were
+always particularly ingenious in arranging affairs to suit themselves.
+An Anarchist could form no lasting ties.  Some time in the future there
+was always separation to be faced.
+
+It was in Vladimir's power to settle matters in his own way by ignoring
+Emile's letter, and remaining where he was in enjoyment of the present
+idyll.  As long as they kept out to sea they were safe.  But he had
+pledged his word to answer any summons and to give his help, and with
+him, as with all men, love came only second to his work.  Emile had
+also explained Vardri's position, and it would be impossible to adjust
+anything without being on the spot.
+
+He read the letter over again, slowly and carefully.  It hinted and
+suggested more than it had said.  Emile had just come from an interview
+with Sobrenski, and there had been a talk of an entire re-organization
+of the band.  Some of the members would be required to carry on the
+propaganda in other countries, Russia, for example.  They all knew what
+that meant--!
+
+As he climbed the ladder by the yacht's side, and swung himself onto
+the deck, the girl ran up to him with outstretched hands, her white
+skirts fluttering behind her in the wind.  She was as incapable of
+disguising her feelings as a child, and she was a joyous pagan in her
+happiness.
+
+Vladimir slipped his hand under the warm round arm.  "Have I been long,
+_petite_?  Come and walk up and down.  I want to talk to you."
+
+"You have found letters, _mon ami_?" Pauline asked carelessly.
+
+"From Poleski.  Yes.  I'm afraid they are rather important ones.  We
+shall have to talk them over later on."
+
+"When you like.  Vladimir, do you remember the girl Monsieur Poleski
+brought on board once for a few days.  I never knew her real name.  She
+always looked so ill and miserable.  Do you remember?"
+
+"It is about this very girl that he has written."
+
+Pauline looked up quickly.  "She is dead?"
+
+"No!  No!  I suppose you think that because she always looked such a
+tragedy.  However, she is very ill, out of danger now, but of course
+not able to ride--she was in the Hippodrome, you know--and apparently
+she has no money, so one must do something for them.  Poleski has
+barely enough for two, especially under these circumstances."
+
+"I am sorry," Pauline said gently.  "I remember how she used to sit all
+day and look at the sea.  Monsieur Poleski left her too much alone, and
+always spoke so roughly, but I think he loved her."
+
+Vladimir gave a short laugh.
+
+"You're wrong there, child.  No, I'm sure that's not the case with
+Poleski."
+
+"But she loves him?"
+
+"Possibly!  She always seemed to me uncanny with those extraordinary
+eyes, and that voice.  Poleski has certainly failed to educate her as
+regards taste in clothes.  You saw how she was dressed when she came on
+board--!"
+
+Half an hour later the anchor was up, and they were cutting through the
+white-crested waves.  The girl pointed to a green headland on the left
+that rose suddenly and overhung the water like a sentinel on guard.
+
+"I have been watching that all the morning in the distance, and I could
+think of nothing but the Winged Victory in the Louvre.  You remember
+how she stands on a rough-hewn pedestal at the head of the marble
+staircase, and she is all alone against a dull red background.  And as
+one looks one goes back all those centuries, and sees her as she was on
+the day the Greeks set her up to celebrate their great sea-victory.  It
+must have all looked just as it does to-day, those centuries ago in the
+Island of Samothrace.  There was a strong wind blowing, and the waves
+met and raced and leapt together, and the sky was the same wonderful
+colour that it is now, and there were wild birds hovering and screaming
+round her."
+
+"What will you say to me, when I take you away from all this,--when we
+have to go back to Barcelona?"
+
+"But I shall go with you?"  The blue eyes were searching his face, and
+there was fear as well as a question in them.
+
+"Do you suppose I shall leave you here alone, child?"  He hated himself
+for the evasive answer.
+
+He turned her thoughts to other things, bidding her talk of those days
+they had spent together in Paris.  She had named it Paradise, and to
+her it had been indeed a place of enchantment, for she saw it for the
+first time, and Vladimir was always with her.
+
+She had seen its treasures of art, and abandoned herself to its glamour
+with the enthusiasm and the freshness of a child.
+
+She had looked out of place in the artificial atmosphere of the
+boulevards, among the gas-lit _cafes_, dazzling shop-windows,
+_flaneurs_ and gaily dressed women.  A man who wrote poetry, and
+starved on what he received for his verses in the Quartier Latin, had
+stood beside her for a few moments in the Rue de Rivoli, and had gone
+home to his garret inspired to produce some lines in which he compared
+her to the delicate narcissus blooms that died so quickly in the flower
+sellers' baskets.
+
+Together she and Vladimir had strolled among the wonders of the Louvre,
+he critical and unmoved, but indulgent and gratified at her pleasure as
+at the pleasure of a child.
+
+Pauline had never been able to express what she felt.  She could only
+worship dumbly before the changeless unfading beauty of these relics of
+the fairy-cities, of Athens, and Rome, and Alexandria.  She had loved
+the Greek marbles best.  The weird shapes in the Corridor of Pan, the
+glorious torso of the Venus Accroupie with the two deep lines in her
+side that make her more human and alive than any other Venus, more
+divine even than the Milo, faultless in her "serpentining beauty rounds
+on rounds," serene and gracious in the shadow of her crimson-hung
+alcove.
+
+And Vladimir was wise, for he allowed her to dream, and did not show
+her more than he could help of modern Paris.
+
+From there they had gone to Brussels, then to Vienna, and last, and
+most beautiful of all, Buda-Pesth, the city among the hills.  They had
+seen it first of all as Buda-Pesth should be seen, at night, hanging
+between earth and sky, and with her million lights sparkling against
+the soft darkness of the surrounding hills.  Pauline's eyes had never
+become satiated with the sight of beautiful things.
+
+Perhaps, as she had told Vladimir, it was her love for him that had
+given her this gift of clear-seeing.  Without love she might have
+allowed herself to be blindfolded as many other women are, by ambition,
+or money, or intellect.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+  "La vie est vaine,
+  Un peu d'amour,
+  Un peu de haine,
+  Et puis bon jour."
+
+
+In the process of Arithelli's convalescence, comedy fought for place with
+tragedy.
+
+For the first time in her life she felt irritable, and inclined to
+grumble, and her racked nerves made the lonely hours appear doubly long
+and lonely.
+
+Day after day, each one seemingly more unending than the last, the sun
+poured into her room, and the dust and litter accumulated in all four
+corners, and she lay and gazed at the hideous meandering pattern of the
+stained wall-paper, and the cracks and blistering paint on the door.  The
+nights were less terrible, for the darkness veiled all sordid details,
+and there was a star-lit patch of sky visible through the open window.
+
+The attendance she received could only be described as casual.  Neither
+Emile nor Maria possessed one idea on the subject of hygiene between
+them.  The methods of the former were, as might be expected, a little
+crude, and Maria combined a similar failing with a vast ignorance.
+Moreover, she was not original.  At the beginning of Arithelli's illness
+pineapple juice had seemed to Maria a happy inspiration, and she
+continued to provide it daily.  What was good to drink on Sunday, she
+argued, must also be good on Monday.
+
+Arithelli's throat had healed quickly, but the depression and weakness
+clung to her persistently.  She fought it and was ashamed of it, true to
+her Spartan traditions, but was forced to realise that it was not in her
+own power to hurry her return to the world and work.
+
+Michael Furness, who was much elated by the success of the Jewish
+herbalist's remedy, continued his treatment on the same lines, giving her
+various tisanes of leaves and flowers, which if they tasted unpleasant
+were at least harmless.  He had grown fond of his patient, and she always
+looked for his visits with pleasure.  He treated her with a genuine,
+almost fatherly kindness, and they were drawn together by the kin feeling
+of race, so strong among all Celts.  In many respects Michael was not
+ideal as a medical attendant.
+
+He smoked vile tobacco,--he dropped some things and knocked over others,
+he shaved apparently only on _festas_, and if he happened to arrive late
+in the day his speech was thick and his manner excitable.
+
+Upon one occasion Arithelli had complained that her mane of untended hair
+made her uncomfortably hot, and Michael brought out a pocket knife,
+clubbed it all together in his hand like a horse's tail, and obligingly
+offered to relieve her by cutting it off.  Emile had arrived only just in
+time to prevent the holocaust, and the two men exchanged fiery words for
+the next ten minutes.
+
+Another day, prompted by a desire to amuse her, Michael introduced into
+her room a fat mongrel puppy with disproportionate legs and an alarmed
+expression.  His wish to provide her with what he was pleased to call a
+"divarsion" was, like many of his other good intentions, not entirely
+successful.  He had deposited the excited animal on the bed, and in the
+course of its frantic gambols it overbalanced and fell sprawling to the
+floor on its back.  The ancient canopied bed was high, and the puppy was
+frightened as well as hurt, and lifted up its voice in anguished yells.
+When Michael had rescued it, and put it outside the door and finished
+laughing, he came back to find Arithelli weeping helplessly with her face
+buried in the pillow.  His alarmed suggestion that he should fetch Emile
+helped her to recover more quickly than any amount of sympathy could have
+done.
+
+Sometimes there were other visitors.  The grooms and strappers from the
+Hippodrome came often to enquire, and Estelle, forbidden by the Manager
+to come at all on account of infection, sat on the stairs and showered
+effusive speeches in a high-pitched voice through the open door.
+
+Arithelli had sent no word of her illness to her parents in London.  She
+knew their views on the subject of complaints.  They would consider the
+whole thing due to imagination, there would be unpleasant letters, and it
+was perfectly certain that they would send no assistance in the shape of
+money.  Emile had wished to write, but she had begged him not to do so,
+and for once he had yielded to what he called her "whims."
+
+From the scraps of information she had received from time to time it
+appeared that the uncomfortable _menage_ of her kindred had become even
+more disorganised.  Her father had turned for consolation to the whisky
+of his country, her mother spent whole days in bed reading, and weaving
+futile dreams of a recovered fortune, and Isobel and Valerie grew taller
+and hungrier, and fought and wrangled after the manner of Hooligans.
+Lazy and shiftless, they envied Arithelli the life she had chosen, but
+had neither the pluck nor the brains necessary to emulate her example.
+
+Emile's manner had troubled her of late, for he had been strangely
+bad-tempered and variable in his moods.  She had become more or less
+accustomed to his eccentricities of behaviour and speech, but this was
+something different, indefinable.  One day he would be extraordinarily
+kind and considerate, the next almost brutal, either hardly speaking at
+all, or else finding fault with everything she said and did.
+
+She often felt a presentiment that he had something important to tell
+her, but he would come and go without imparting any news, and, as always,
+she did not worry him with questions as many women would have done.
+
+She wondered if he were feeling harassed over "_les affaires
+politiques_," or whether he was afraid that the Manager's small stock of
+patience would be exhausted before she was able to appear in the ring
+again, and that he would cancel her contract.  If that happened she felt
+that the end of all things would have indeed arrived.  She could not
+struggle against the Fates any longer, obviously she could not return
+home, and it was not fair that Emile should continue to keep her.
+
+He came in one evening about eight o'clock to find her up for the first
+time since her illness, and sitting on the edge of the bed draped in the
+long blue cloak she used for covering her circus attire.
+
+Her hair was parted over her ears, and divided into two long sleek braids
+drawn forward and falling over her shoulders, the ends resting on her lap.
+
+She looked up, as he entered, with the haunting sea-green eyes that
+showed larger than ever in contrast to her hollowed cheeks.  Something in
+her pose, in the arrangement of her hair, reminded Emile vividly of her
+first morning in Barcelona, when he had come in early in the morning to
+find her dazed with sleep.  He remembered also how she had asked him to
+repeat his remarks, and how carelessly nonchalant had been her manner.
+
+"You look like a witch sitting crouched up there, Fatalite," he snapped.
+"What's the matter?  You don't seem very cheerful."
+
+"I don't feel very cheerful," the girl responded.  She spoke with grave
+deliberation, and without moving a muscle.  Emile grunted and sat down.
+
+"There has been another explosion of bombs on the Rambla," he said.  "A
+market woman killed and two work people injured--I believe one has since
+died.  Of course a got-up affair of the Government.  They hope by doing
+this sort of thing often enough to make the populace take vengeance on
+us."
+
+"Then the Anarchists didn't do it?"
+
+"My dear Fatalite, we don't blow up harmless people simply _pour passer
+le temps_.  I've told you that before, and being inside the movement
+yourself you ought to know.  It is a favourite trick of the officials to
+excite public feeling against us.  They have been doing it now for the
+last three years, letting off bombs in various parts of the city.  They
+take care always to choose the most frequented places and to kill someone
+who doesn't matter, and then all the Republican journals have four
+columns of indignation with large head-lines, 'LATEST ANARCHIST OUTRAGE.'
+They like to get their exploits well talked about.  Everything seems to
+be against us now.  Sobrenski will have it that there is treachery inside
+our circle as well as outside.  You know whom he suspects?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Vardri."
+
+"That is my fault," Arithelli said quietly.  "Sobrenski has felt like
+that since the night Vardri made a scene about my being lowered down from
+the window.  He just stood up for me because I'm a woman.  I'm only a
+machine to the rest of you."
+
+She spoke without a touch of resentment.  It was purely a statement of
+fact.
+
+"Ah, that's just the point.  The feminine side of you is exactly what we
+don't want.  One Felise Rivaz is enough, most of us think.  Try and keep
+the elfish boy you were when you arrived.  It will be less trouble,
+Fatalite, _ma chere_.  With the other thing there are always
+complications.  No, I'm not accusing you of falling in love with Vardri.
+I only say, be careful.  Even an elf-child can develop suddenly into a
+woman once she arrives at a knowledge of the fact that there is a man
+ready to make love to her.  Perhaps you do not know it yourself, but you
+have changed lately.  You are losing your fearlessness, your
+indifference.  I have watched you sometimes when you have not known, and
+have seen your eyes soften, your face change.  You started when I spoke
+just now."
+
+"How did you learn things about women?  From books?"
+
+"Books?  _Ma foi_, no!  I liked them well enough at one time, when I
+hadn't studied _la vie_.  Now they're _fade_."
+
+Arithelli was silent for a little while.  She knew only too well that
+Emile had spoken the truth, had put into blunt words what to herself was
+only a vague, half-formed idea.  Her illness had been Vardri's golden
+harvest time, for it had given him the chance of being often alone with
+her.  He had read to her, waited upon her, served her with the utmost
+chivalry and devotion.  He had made of her a Madonna, a goddess, she who
+was fair game for all other men in Barcelona.
+
+Emile's voice broke in upon her meditations.
+
+"You shouldn't worry, Fatalite.  It's not becoming.  Have a cigarette to
+make yourself a little distraction."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"No, thank you, Emile.  I never wanted to smoke, and any way it would not
+give me a distraction to-night."
+
+"Then what are you worrying about?"
+
+"I've only been wondering what will be the end of me."
+
+"What has made you suddenly become so anxious about your end?"  Emile
+looked at her keenly.
+
+The wide eyes raised to his were tragedy incarnate.  The long nervous
+fingers were tightly locked together.
+
+"I'm a coward to-night," the soft hoarse voice went on.  "I've never
+grumbled before, have I, Emile?  I seem to have suddenly realised how
+hopeless everything looks for me in the future.  I've had time enough to
+think it all out since I've been lying in bed.  When I first came here I
+thought I was going to do all sorts of wonderful things, but now I see
+that this life leads to nothing, and I may go on being just a circus
+rider for years.  When I get well and finish out this contract I shall
+have to try and get another engagement in Paris or Vienna.  The English
+Consul and all the other men wait to see me come out, and throw me
+flowers and rings, but when they see me driving with you in the Paseo de
+Gracia, they look the other way, especially if they are with their wives
+and families.  They like 'ARITHELLI OF THE HIPPODROME' in her proper
+place,--the ring.  Gas and glare, paint and glitter!  That is my life.
+And they always hope that I shall fall off.  I can feel it.  It's the
+Roman arena all over again.  For a long time before I had that accident I
+didn't know how to get through the rehearsals.  I nearly fell off two or
+three times, but there was no one there to see.  The more I practised the
+more cold I got, and I used to have horrible shivering fits.  It's so
+queer.  I don't believe I'm made like other people.  Estelle gets hot and
+scarlet when she practises."
+
+"Poor little child!"
+
+"Why are you so nice to me?  You've never said anything like that before."
+
+"Because if when you first came here I had begun to pity you it would
+have made you realise your position sooner than need be.  You were like
+one in a dream.  It was not my place to awaken you.  I left that for
+Life, '_la vie_' that you were so anxious to experience.  You made
+yourself '_Chateaux en Espagne_.'  We all do that at some time or other."
+
+"Nobody really cares what becomes of me except--" she broke off the
+sentence and continued steadily.  "My people don't mind whether I am here
+or not.  They won't like it if I come back a failure."
+
+In his heart Emile cursed the Fates.  Her awakening had been a complete
+one.  At first novelty and excitement had served as merciful
+anaesthetics, but they could not last for ever.
+
+He was not in love with her, he still told himself, but he would miss
+her.  Women like the Roumanoff were the women to whom men made passionate
+love, but Arithelli was unique.  She had become part of his life in
+Barcelona.  Their lives had touched and mingled till it was impossible to
+believe that he had only known her for a few short months.  A future
+without her would be one without interest.  For her he could see no
+future.  She would have to go to the devil some way or another
+eventually, and there would be plenty of people ready and willing to
+provide her with an escort.
+
+He threw away his cigarette, and came across the room to her, and his
+hands fell heavily upon her shoulders.
+
+"Look here, Fatalite," he said roughly; "we thought you were dying a
+little while ago, and I helped to fight for your life, and all the time,
+at the back of my brain I wished you were dead.  Yes, you needn't look so
+horrified."  He gave her a fierce shake.  "I hoped to see you in your
+coffin.  Can't you understand, Fatalite?  No, of course you can't, and
+you think me a brute.  One of these days perhaps you will think
+differently.  Probably you imagine I don't care for you, but if I didn't
+should I mind whether you were alive or dead?  You've always been saying
+that you feel something is going to happen.  It seems you are right.
+There have been several unexpected developments during the last few days.
+It is most likely that I may be chosen to go back to Russia with
+despatches to one of the secret societies there.  Here I cannot be
+arrested, there I can.  Of course it means Siberia--eventually.  That's
+only what we all expect."
+
+"Then I shall be here alone."
+
+"Yes, and there's no future for a woman in this vile place.  You know the
+proverb they have, 'Can any good thing come out of Barcelona?'  Your
+looks are against you too."
+
+"There's always the river."
+
+"Then when the time comes choose that--if you still have the courage.
+You've been _bonne camarade_ to me, Fatalite.  The men you will meet
+later on may not want that."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+  "I kiss you and the world begins to fade."
+            W. B. YEATS.
+
+
+Count Vladimir and Emile met and consulted together, the immediate
+result of the interview being that Vardri was offered the post of
+private secretary to the former.  Emile had gone out leaving them
+together, and Vladimir had hardly finished speaking when he found
+himself faced by an unexpected situation.
+
+"I accept with pleasure," Vardri said, "but on one condition--that it
+means my remaining in Barcelona."
+
+Vladimir hesitated.  "Well, I had not contemplated that.  Naturally one
+requires one's secretary to be--"
+
+"I understand, Monsieur.  I hope you will not consider me ungrateful,
+but there is a reason."
+
+"It's a woman?"
+
+Vardri bowed gravely.  "Exactly, Monsieur.  It's a woman."
+
+"You are risking a great deal for her.  Poleski has told me something
+of your circumstances, and it appears that if you do not get some
+appointment very soon, you will starve."
+
+Vardri straightened himself, throwing back his head with a
+characteristic gesture.  He looked the older man in the eyes, his own
+alight and eloquent under finely drawn brows.
+
+"That's as it may be!  I'll take my chance of work.  In any case I
+cannot leave Barcelona.  Of course, I regret greatly that it is
+impossible for me to fall in with your arrangements."
+
+Vladimir smiled and shrugged.  He knew the type with which he had to
+deal.  Quixotic and generous to the verge of folly, the type that will
+sacrifice itself without reserve for an illusion, an ideal; the type
+that filled monasteries, and Siberian prisons, and made a jest for half
+the world.  Such men were valuable to the Cause, because they gave
+ungrudgingly, and never counted cost.  The Russian was a man of
+affairs, cautious, cynical and given to analysis, and he was also a
+student of human nature.  He was moreover interested in the unknown
+woman.
+
+If he had been told that she was Arithelli the circus-rider, who had
+sat silently upon the deck of his yacht dressed in gaudy raiment, and
+indifferent almost to stupidity, then his smile would have been
+contemptuous instead of tolerant.  He was interested too in the unknown
+woman's champion.  Something in Vardri's attitude of courteous defiance
+appealed to him by the law that will attract strongly one man's mind to
+another, diverse in every way.  He could see that Vardri was plainly
+consumptive, and that the disease was in its advanced stages.  Even
+with the aid of good food and an easier life he could not last more
+than a year or two, so one might as well make things a little more
+smooth for him during the time.
+
+"I see you have the illusions of youth, my friend," he said carelessly.
+"I trust they may remain long unbroken.  Myself I am sorry to have
+lived beyond the age when they content one.  Sit down and talk to me."
+He motioned Vardri towards a chair.  "Well, since you have refused to
+entertain my plan, we must think of something else.  I'm at present
+writing a series of articles on '_Militarism in France_,' and should
+like to have them translated for publication in an English journal.
+You speak the language well, better even than Poleski, for you have a
+better accent.  I have been a good deal in London and I notice the
+difference.  I suppose you also write it easily?"
+
+"Yes, I had an English tutor."
+
+"Good!  Then you will undertake this work, and you shall fix the price
+of payment.  I'm not in the least afraid of your asking more than I
+care to give.  You are the type that gets rid of money, not the type
+that acquires it.  Also I will give you an introduction which will
+enable you to get on the staff of _Le Combat_.  They want another man
+there who is a good linguist, as there is a great deal of
+correspondence with other countries.  As I have an interest in the
+paper, you may consider it settled.  No, don't thank me.  Your thanks
+are due to--a woman.  She is unknown to me, but perhaps that is the
+reason I--I also owe you something, Monsieur Vardri.  Your example has
+made me feel young again."
+
+A week later Vardri went swinging quickly down the Calle San Antonio,
+on his way to Emile's rooms.  He was in exuberant spirits, and whistled
+as he walked keeping step to the dancing gaiety of '_La petite
+Tonquinoise_.'  His headgear, which vied in picturesque disorder with
+Emile's historical sombrero, was pushed to the back of his head,
+exposing his thick, unruly hair, and over one ear, Spanish fashion, he
+had stuck a carnation.
+
+There was more money in his pocket than he had possessed since his days
+of luxury in the Austrian chateau, and for him the sun was shining in a
+metaphorical as well as a literal sense.  During the last few days he
+had been happier than he could have believed possible.  He felt in
+better health, for he had been able to go to bed at a reasonable time,
+and though he missed the horses and the free life of the Hippodrome,
+and found the work of a newspaper office somewhat trying, there were
+shorter hours and other advantages.
+
+He had also the joy of knowing that Arithelli was almost well again.
+She had not been out yet, but Michael Furness had declared her to be
+practically recovered.
+
+One day Vardri hoped to take her along the sea-front towards the old
+quarter of the town, where the fishermen and sailors lived, and where
+she could sit on the stone parapet and look across the harbour, and let
+the sea-air blow strength and vitality into her.
+
+After all he told himself, life was good even if one were a vagabond.
+Life with adventure, a little money, and love.
+
+He burst open the door of Emile's sitting-room, and entered headlong.
+The sun-blinds were all drawn, making everything appear pitch dark
+after the blinding glare of the streets.
+
+"I want some matches, Poleski!  By luck, I've got some cigarettes.  One
+never has both matches and cigarettes at the same time."  He had come
+to a dead stop and stood staring.
+
+"Fatalite!  Fatalite!  The gods are kind for once!  If only I had known
+you were here sooner."
+
+The half-full box of cigarettes descended to the floor, and its
+contents went in all directions, and he was kneeling beside her chair
+and holding both her hands.  It was Arithelli not "Fatalite" who smiled
+back at him.  The little mask-like face changed and grew soft till she
+looked more a girl, less an embodied tragedy.  Vardri's wild spirits
+were infectious, and, as on the night of the Hippodrome fiasco, Youth
+called and Love made answer.
+
+"_Mon ami_, I am so glad you have come."
+
+"Is this the first time you have been out?  Who said you could get up?
+The doctor?"
+
+"No, it was Emile."
+
+Vardri nodded towards the communicating door of the bedroom.  "Poleski
+is here then?"
+
+"No, and he doesn't know I'm here.  He has gone to Saria and will not
+be back till late.  I was horribly irritable this morning, so he thinks
+I'm all right now."  A ripple of amusement broke her voice as their
+eyes met.
+
+"My sweet, you must ask me to believe some other little _histoire_."
+
+"Oh! but it's true.  You should have heard us!  I knew that it was
+funny afterwards, but there was no one to laugh with at the time.  It
+was about that dreadful old coat of Emile's.  He threw it on my bed,
+and--I can't help being a Jewess, can I?  and I so loathe dust and
+dirt, and I said so.  Emile was furious.  'Very well,' he said.  'If
+you are strong enough to grumble, you are strong enough to get up.'  So
+when he had gone I dressed and came here.  I was so glad to get away
+from that room."
+
+"Not as glad as I am to see you here.  And I've heard you laugh,
+Fatalite.  You're a little girl today."
+
+"I have moods, dear.  I shall depress you sometimes."
+
+Vardri smiled scornfully, and slid down to the floor, his head resting
+against her knee.  "_Je suis bien content_!  What cool hands you have,
+and how still you keep.  No other woman in the world was ever so
+restful.  You love to be quiet, don't you?  I know you better to-day
+than I ever did.  You were always in the wrong atmosphere at the
+Hippodrome."
+
+"And I have to go back to it," the girl said under her breath.  "And I
+may be hissed again.  You will not be there now, and we shall miss you.
+I and Don Juan and Cavaliero, and El Rey, and Don Quixote.  Some of the
+grooms are horrible, and the animals get so badly treated."
+
+"It seems to me that everything gets badly treated here," Vardri
+muttered.  "Women and horses, it's all the same.  Don't let us talk
+about it.  It drives me mad to think, I shan't be able to be near you.
+I was some use to you there."
+
+He jumped up and began to move about the room collecting the scattered
+cigarettes.
+
+"Shall I play to you, _mon ange_?  I suppose the piano hasn't been
+tuned yet."  He struck a few notes, and made a rueful grimace.  "It's
+worse than ever."
+
+"I'm afraid it never will be tuned now that I've been ill and caused so
+much expense.  Emile always says he will go without cigarettes to
+afford it, and I say I will go without powder, but neither of us keep
+our heroic resolutions, and the piano gets worse and worse."
+
+Vardri shut down the lid with a bang.
+
+"Well, anyway it doesn't matter," he said, "I don't want to play or do
+anything; I just want to be with you."
+
+"Bring up a chair, and sit and smoke, _mon camarade_."  She held out
+her hand with a gesture of invitation, and Vardri took it and kissed
+it, and went back to his former position at her feet.
+
+"Shall I read to you?" he asked.  "Ah!  I'd forgotten there was
+something I wanted to tell you.  I found a poem the other day, a
+love-song of De Musset.  Do you know that you lived in this very city
+years ago, Fatalite, and he saw you and loved you?  How else could he
+have written this?
+
+  "_Avez-vous vu en Barcelone,
+  Une Andalouse au sein bruni,
+  Pale comme un beau soir d'Automne,
+  C'est ma maitresse, ma lionne,
+  La Marchesa d'Amagui._"
+
+Arithelli listened, her eyes dilating, and a little flame of colour
+creeping up under the magnolia skin that made her likeness to the woman
+of the poem.  Her awakening senses thrilled to the eager voice, the
+riotous challenging words:
+
+  "_J'ai fait bien de chansons pour elle_."
+
+He broke off abruptly and continued: "I hate all the rest of it.  The
+woman isn't like you, further on, and the lover laughs at his own
+passion, and the whole thing jars.  That first verse haunted me for
+days after I'd read it."--The sentence was finished by a convulsive fit
+of coughing, which he vainly tried to stifle.
+
+"This is the first time to-day," he gasped, between the paroxysms.
+"I'm quite well really.  It's the cigarette.  They often have that
+effect.  Don't look so worried, or I shall think you hate me for being
+a nuisance."
+
+"If you talk so foolishly I shall go."
+
+She made an attempt to rise, but Vardri caught at her skirts.  "You
+won't go!  You don't want to make me worse, do you?  Think how sorry
+you'll be if I cough and worry you all the evening!"
+
+"Can't I get you anything?  If only I were not so stupid about illness.
+Don't try to talk if it makes you worse."
+
+"I won't--if you'll stay."
+
+To Arithelli caresses did not come easily, but during the last few
+weeks she had learnt many things.  She stroked the dark head that
+rested against her knee, wondering how it was that she had never before
+noticed till to-day how feverishly brilliant Vardri's eyes were, and
+how his skin burnt.  She had often heard him coughing before, but he
+had always gone away and left her when an attack came on, with some
+laughing excuse about the horrible noise he made.  After a while he
+shifted his position, and smiled up at her.
+
+"You're getting tired, Fatalite!"
+
+"No.  Tell me, have you anything important to do to-night?"
+
+"No, dear, and if I had I shouldn't do it.  Do you feel well enough to
+come out and have dinner with me somewhere?  I'll take you to some
+place where it's quiet."
+
+"Why not let us stay here all the evening, and have  supper together?"
+Arithelli  suggested.  "We'll take Emile's things.  He loves cooking
+_cochonneries_, and there is sure to be a _quelque chose_ somewhere in
+the cupboard."
+
+Vardri scrambled to his feet.  "_Bon_!  Sit still, and I'll go and
+_acheter les_--things!  We'll leave Emile's _cochonneries_ alone.  I'm
+rich now, so we will have luxuries."
+
+"Yes, and I'll hunt for plates and dishes, and wash them properly (not
+like the Gentiles do) while you go and _acheter les_--things!"
+Arithelli mocked.  "What a dreadful mixture of languages we all use!  I
+used to speak German quite well when I was at the convent, but now I
+have forgotten nearly all of it.  This place is bad for both one's
+French and English, and Emile says that when I try and speak Spanish it
+sounds like someone sawing wood."
+
+Vardri went out still coughing, and came back flushed and excitable,
+laden with various untidy parcels, from which some of the contents were
+protruding.  Long rolls, the materials for a salad, a _pate_, flowers,
+and an enormous cluster of grapes.  They pledged each other in the
+yellow wine of the country, and presently Vardri set about the
+manufacture of what he inaccurately described as Turkish coffee.  That
+the result of his efforts was half cold and evil-tasting mattered not
+to either of them.
+
+Arithelli's red hair was crowned with vine leaves that he had stripped
+from the grape-cluster and twisted into a Bacchante wreath.  She leant
+her elbow on the table, resting her chin upon her hand.  Her eyes
+glowed jewel-like, almost the same colour as her garland.  The flame of
+love had melted into warmth her statue-like coldness, and given her the
+one thing she had lacked--expression.  Yet the mystery, the charm that
+surrounded her clung to her even when she appeared most womanly.  To
+the boy lover gazing with devouring eyes she seemed that night more
+than a woman.  He thought of the tales he had heard as a child from the
+peasants on winter nights in his own country.  Tales of the forests and
+legends of the Hartz Mountains, of lonely places haunted by nixies and
+wood maidens, fairy shapes with streaming hair and vaporous robes,
+seeing which a man would become for ever after mad with longing, and
+desire no mortal woman.
+
+Arithelli's long limbs appeared nymphlike in her plain blue
+high-waisted gown of Emile's choosing, that had no superfluous bow or
+trimming, and left free her beauty of outline.  She possessed no
+jewellery now wherewith to deck herself, and there was no trace of
+artificial red on face and lips.
+
+The candles on the table flickered to and fro in the draught from the
+open window and she shivered in the midst of some laughing speech and
+glanced over her shoulder at the door behind her.
+
+Vardri, reading her thoughts, said, "You're afraid of something, dear,
+what is it?"
+
+"Nothing, at least I thought someone was listening, was coming in.  We
+are always talking of spies till one gets absurdly nervous and imagines
+all sorts of foolish things.  I have never said so to anyone else, but
+there is always the feeling of being watched.  It is so difficult to
+know who is for and who against us, and so easy to give evidence
+without meaning to be a traitor.  Just before I got ill, Sobrenski sent
+me to a little newspaper shop down in the Parelelo quarter.  I was to
+ask if they sold '_Le Flambeau_.'  The man looked at me hard and asked
+if there was any connection between that journal and the one published
+at number 27 Calle de Pescadores.  The sun must have made me feel
+stupid, and I answered _Yes_, without thinking.  I had taken it for
+granted that the man was one of us, and then I knew suddenly that he
+wasn't."
+
+Vardri bent forward across the table.  "Did you tell anyone what you
+had said?"
+
+"Not Sobrenski; I told Emile.  He looked me up and down, and said
+something that I couldn't hear, and then, 'I thought you could hold
+your tongue, Fatalite.  It seems, after all, you are a woman and
+can't!' and then he walked out of the room.  Vardri, did you ever feel
+as I do when you first began to work for the Cause?  Perhaps one gets
+used to it in the end and doesn't care."
+
+"Yes," the boy answered between his teeth, "Yes!  One gets used to it.
+Dear, your hands are trembling.  Do you think anyone can hurt you while
+I'm here?  You are nervous because you've been ill, that's all.  This
+is the first time you've been out and you are overtired.  I'll take you
+back soon.  You were all right a few minutes ago.  You thing of moods!"
+
+She tried to smile, "I warned you, _mon ami_."
+
+"I know.  It wasn't any use.  That wreath makes you look like the
+statue of Ariadne in Rome."
+
+"I wish you would talk to me about yourself."
+
+"Myself!" Vardri shrugged expressively, "_Ma foi_!"
+
+"Tell me what made you join the Cause."
+
+"Because of a man I believed in.  You have heard of Guerchouni who died
+early in the year?  There was a great funeral in Paris.  It was in all
+the papers."
+
+Arithelli nodded, "Yes, I heard the men talking about it at one of the
+meetings.  I wasn't interested enough to listen then.  Was he--?"
+
+"He was one of our greatest leaders.  His death meant something to me,
+because it was really through him that I joined the Red Flag.  He had a
+life sentence in Eastern Siberia and he escaped from there and got to
+America.  For some time none of us knew exactly where he was, and then
+we heard rumours that he was dangerously ill at Geneva.  Then came news
+of his death and his funeral in Paris.  His friends had decided to
+bring the body there, so that all the comrades might be present, for
+there are many anarchists in Paris.  They gave him a guard of honour of
+Russian students, men and women surrounding the coffin with linked
+hands, and there were hundreds of red roses and red carnations, though
+it was in the winter--there had been snow on the ground a few days
+before.  There was a crown of thorns from those who had been his
+companions in prison, and the canopy of the hearse was a red flag.  If
+only I could have been there to do him homage!
+
+"There are all sorts of wild stories about his escape from Siberia.  I
+suppose he bewitched the jailers as he bewitched other men.  He was the
+first man I ever heard speak about the Cause.  He came to Vienna and
+held meetings for the propaganda and collected enormous crowds.  I had
+just begun to take life seriously then, to think about things and to
+hate injustice.
+
+"My father drank and wasted money and treated his servants brutally.
+My mother was dead, and when she was alive she was an invalid, and
+could do nothing.  Most of the people I knew seemed to think the serfs
+no better than animals.  I remember how sometimes when we were starting
+off in the early morning for a boar hunt in the forest, they would come
+begging and whining round the horses' heels.
+
+"They seldom got anything except a kick or a curse.  They looked
+scarcely human, yet it was ourselves who were the brutes really.
+
+"Well, Guerchouni spoke and I went and listened to him.  A friend with
+whom I had gone to the meetings gave me an introduction to him.  I was
+mad on the Cause long before the interview was over.  He was a man
+that!  If he had looked at me twice, I would have walked through flames
+to please him.  Oh, I wasn't the only one!  We all felt like that more
+or less with Guerchouni.  I couldn't describe him.  He was not a tall
+man, but he carried himself well, and he was dark and pale with
+wonderful blazing eyes.  One knew him at once, and talked as if one had
+known him for years.
+
+"Of course I accepted all his theories and doctrines except two.  I
+don't believe in '_L'Union fibre_.'  (They all do, you know, or nearly
+all) and I never was an atheist.
+
+"A Catholic and an Anarchist!  It sounds impossible, doesn't it,
+but"--he flushed boyishly--"I believe in _Le bon Dieu_, and the _union
+libre_ is hard on women.  Yes, I adored Guerchouni.  He worked day and
+night, he feared nothing, he did impossibilities himself and he made us
+do impossibilities."
+
+"He was like Sobrenski."
+
+"Yes, he was like Sobrenski in some ways.  He will be a loss to the
+Cause."
+
+For a few moments there was silence, and then Arithelli spoke.  "Tell
+me one more thing.  Now we are alone, we can speak the truth to each
+other, you and I.  Vardri, do you still care for the Cause--in the same
+way you did before?"  She whispered the question fearfully, yet knowing
+well what the answer must be.
+
+"I don't feel the same about it since I have known you."
+
+"I have not tried to make you a traitor, have I?  Sobrenski always
+suspects me of that."
+
+"My sweet, you have done nothing.  I love you, therefore I must feel
+differently about the Cause.  Why?  Because I'm afraid of it for you.
+Because these men have no consideration for you as a woman, because
+they always make you take the greatest risks.  It is always so in this
+work.  Look what happens to the women in Russia.  When there is a
+political 'Execution' there, nine times out of ten it is a woman who
+throws the bomb.  Look at the things they have done lately.  At the
+printing office we see all the anarchist journals, and the comrades get
+news privately.  The men do little in risking their lives compared to
+the women, and some of them are so young.  An article in '_Les temps
+Nouveaux_' of last week said that, '_beside the men these young girls
+are as artistes beside artisans_.'  The last case was Sophia Pervesky.
+She was arrested for being in charge of a secret printing-press.
+Before the police seized her she nearly found time to put her lighted
+cigarette down on a pile of explosives.  They wounded her in two
+places, threw her down, and stamped on her injuries.  Then they took
+her to the hospital and kept her there till she had recovered.  She
+waited two months for death and then they brought her out one morning
+in the dawn and hanged her.
+
+"'You shall see how a Russian woman dies,' she told them as she ran up
+the ladder and flung herself into space.
+
+"You women shame us with your courage.  Now every time I hear of a
+thing like that, I think of you.  You may have to run some great risk
+here for a caprice of Sobrenski's."
+
+"Vardri, Vardri, I wonder what will be the end of it all?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+The walls of the Hippodrome were no longer adorned with gaudy posters
+whereon flared a travestied portrait of "_The beautiful English
+equestrienne_."  No longer for Arithelli were showered roses, the
+tribute of head-lines in the weekly journals, and the welcome of many
+voices.  She had been absent for nearly a month, therefore she might as
+well have been dead as far as the Spanish public was concerned.
+
+The Manager had known this and had been careful to provide his patrons
+with a new toy, who had come, even as Arithelli herself, from Paris.
+This was a female contortionist with a serpent's grace, and a serpent's
+flat head, and wicked slit eyes.  She had proved a success, so he could
+afford to exult, and Estelle dangled in triumph a new pair of diamond
+earrings.  He had lost nothing and the once famous Arithelli, the
+"_She-wolf_" who had been mad enough to defy him, was now simply one of
+the crowd.  Her name did not appear on the programme.  She was not even
+Madame Mignonne now, but merely a unit among the many other women who
+were grouped in the grand spectacle, or a rider in a procession with
+twenty others.  He had reduced her salary to a third of what it had
+been formerly, and every Saturday she was required to assist with the
+correspondence and weekly accounts.  If she did not like this
+arrangement, he explained, she could fight out the terms of her
+contract in the courts.  Doubtless she had a great opinion of her own
+capabilities, but as she could see for herself her place had been
+easily filled.  The world was large, and there were plenty of
+women--_sacre_, too many!
+
+As usual he was disappointed in the effect of his remarks.  Whether her
+silence meant indifference or sheer stupidity he was never quite sure.
+As Arithelli had no vanity the loss of her position meant little to her.
+
+The loss of a private dressing-room meant a great deal.  It was a
+refined torture to her to be herded among the other women, with their
+noise and quarrelling and coarse jokes.  She found changes too.  Her
+friend the toothless lion had succumbed to old age, several of the
+helpers had been changed, and Vardri was no longer near at hand to lift
+her on to her horse and wait to help her dismount.  Whenever he could
+get away from Vladimir and the newspaper office, he was among the
+spectators, and their thoughts and glances met across the wide arena's
+space.  Emile did not come regularly now though he took care there was
+always someone sent to bring her home.
+
+Since the night of the alarms in the Calle de Pescadores, the
+Brotherhood had decided in council that they must change their place of
+meeting, at any rate for a time, and that no part of the city itself
+could be considered safe for the purposes of a meeting place.
+
+They must keep to the hut up in the mountains.  This had been seldom
+used on account of the difficulty in getting there, and the waste of
+time involved by the distance.  In all respects it was safer.  If they
+were surprised it was not likely they would all be caught, for in the
+open there was always a chance of escape.  The distance and lonely
+situation were all in their favour.  In a small house in a narrow
+street they were like trapped animals.
+
+The custom was to start at midnight on the outskirts of the town,
+collecting by degrees, and when they were well on their way the
+cavalcade joined together and formed into Indian file.
+
+Some were on horseback and some on the more sure-footed mules.
+
+Not one among the conspirators could ride with the exception of Vardri
+and Emile, and the knowledge of the art possessed by the latter was
+poor enough.
+
+The steeds of the general company went at whatever pace they chose and
+in what direction they saw fit, and occasionally two or three got
+wedged together in some narrow place and there was an interlude of
+kicking and squealing.
+
+Then "Fatalite" was called to the rescue as being the only one among
+them capable of managing horseflesh.
+
+When not required in her office of peacemaker she was sent on in front
+as guide to the procession, dressed in her boy's disguise and astride
+the most vicious of the mules.  These excursions meant less rest for
+her than ever for the party seldom returned till five o'clock in the
+morning.
+
+Emile had told her that she must get her sleep up in the hut.
+
+"You have two hours to yourself," he said.  "You can't sleep up there?
+Nonsense!  Make up your mind to do it and then you will."
+
+The building in question, which was more like an outhouse than anything
+else, she had christened, "The Black Hole of Calcutta."  The upper
+part, which was approached by a ladder as a loft would be, was used as
+a meeting-room, while the ground floor became a temporary stable for
+the horses and mules, of which she was left in charge.  Since the scene
+in that upper room in the Calle de Pescadores she had put herself
+outside all consideration; and Sobrenski now excluded her from all work
+other than the merest drudgery.  Vardri was also kept under
+surveillance.  It was felt by all that in some quarter treachery lurked
+as yet undiscovered, and every man suspected his comrades.  There were
+indications that someone, hitherto a sworn ally of the Cause, had
+turned spy and sold certain information to the authorities.
+
+Even Sobrenski's iron nerves were stretched to breaking point.
+
+The rest tried to drown anxiety in _absinthe_, and all grew daily more
+morose and uncertain of temper.
+
+The first sensation came in the shape of a rumour that Count Vladimir's
+companion, Pauline Souvaroff, had disappeared.
+
+Only three people knew that she had vanished utterly and completely on
+the same day that she had received a communication from the leader.
+The note had been brought to her by Vladimir himself.  He could guess
+at its contents, but Pauline had revealed nothing.
+
+Two hours afterwards when he went on shore she was shut up in her
+cabin, and he had not interrupted her, thinking she was asleep.  When
+he returned, and found her door unlocked, and her cabin empty, a
+suspicion of the truth occurred to him.
+
+Everything was left in perfect order, but there was no letter, no word
+of explanation.  He questioned the crew, and heard that she had been
+rowed to shore by two of them soon after he left.  She had given the
+men orders not to wait, but to return at once to the yacht.  For a week
+Vladimir hunted through street and slum.  At the end of that time he
+knew that alive or dead he would never see Pauline Souvaroff again.
+The missive he had brought her from Sobrenski had probably meant a
+journey for her to one of the great centres of the movement--Amsterdam,
+Geneva, or perhaps even London.
+
+Alphonse of Spain was now in England, having escaped two attempts upon
+his life in Paris, and in his own capital.  His every moment would be
+watched and noted by the destroyers of monarchy.  Probably she had been
+chosen to obtain information, because women made better spies than men,
+and their movements were not so likely to be noticed by the police.
+Many a high official whose name was on the list of those condemned to
+death by a revolutionary tribunal had been tracked from city to city by
+female agents.
+
+Yet, if she had been sent on such an errand, what reason could she have
+had for going in secret, alone and without a word of farewell?  He had
+supposed it impossible that she could have kept anything from him; of
+course there must eventually be separation.  He had warned her of that.
+And when it came he had expected scenes, tears and a frantic appeal.
+
+That she should vanish in silence was inconceivable.  Perhaps she had
+not cared for him so much after all.  In any case the episode had been
+a charming one, and to him no woman could ever have been more than an
+episode.  He had shown her some of the many beautiful things and places
+of the world, and by her own words he had made her happy.  Now their
+play time was over.  He had his work and she hers.  She had come into
+his life as a piece of driftwood floats to shore on the edge of a wave,
+and gone out of it as noiselessly.
+
+Vladimir did not discuss his private affairs, so that among all the
+conspirators Emile alone knew, and it was Emile alone who guessed the
+truth.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+  "Tout passe, tout casse, tout lasse."
+
+
+For some days Arithelli had not seen Emile, and she had wondered.
+Since the night she had sat with Vardri in his room, he had scarcely
+spoken to her except for a few moments on business matters.
+
+She thought he looked haggard and worried, and there was a change that
+she could not define in his manner towards her.  She wondered if he
+knew about Vardri, if he thought she was deceiving him.
+
+She wanted to tell of this new, wonderful thing that had befallen her,
+but he had given her no chance, and she had begun to think that he did
+not even take sufficient interest in her to care what she thought or
+felt as long as she performed her allotted tasks and did not worry him
+with complaints or questions.
+
+The feeling of a barrier between them troubled her vaguely, and she was
+glad when she found him one night waiting for her outside the stage
+door.
+
+Half an hour later he was smoking a cigarette in her room while she
+brushed her hair.
+
+They had been silent for some time, and both started when the door was
+assaulted by a sudden thump, and the scarecrow-like visage of the
+depressed landlady appeared in the opening.
+
+Having delivered herself of a small cardboard box, and a few grumbling
+comments upon the indecent hours and ways of circus performers, she
+withdrew, and Arithelli proceeded to cut the string and remove the lid.
+
+"I can't see what it is in this light," she said; "Emile, may I have
+the candle a little nearer?  Flowers?  No one sends me flowers now.
+But these are--"
+
+Her voice broke and stopped.  Emile, who had been on the alert from the
+moment of the landlady's entrance, sprang up and pulled the girl to one
+side.  A mysterious parcel at that hour of the night, too late for any
+post.  One might have guessed what it meant.
+
+"What is it?" he asked sharply.  The answer was an incoherent one, and
+he could see that she was paralysed with terror.
+
+The opening of the box had revealed a sinister-looking bouquet of
+artificial black roses tied with blood-red ribbons.
+
+In Barcelona there are many strange and ingenious ways of conveying
+death by explosives.  A clock, a painted casket which might contain
+bon-bons; a coffee-pot, a _casserole_--any apparently harmless and
+common utensil.
+
+A bunch of flowers was one of the most common mediums for a bomb.
+
+The Anarchist colours showed clearly that it must either have been sent
+by an enemy who had been formerly one of the band, and who was now
+revenging himself by an attempt to see his former associates "hoist
+with their own petard," or else it was an affair of the police.  In any
+case, supposing the thing to be harmless, it was a warning of danger.
+
+Emile's wits worked swiftly, and he was used to emergencies.  He looked
+round, and found a jug of water, and the floral tribute floated
+harmlessly therein.  As it did not sink at once he concluded that there
+was no concealed bomb.  Then he turned his attention to Arithelli, and
+gave her a vigorous shaking, which was probably, under the
+circumstances, the best possible restorative.
+
+"You'll die more than once in imagination before your time comes,
+Fatalite.  Probably the next parcel you receive will not need as much
+investigation."
+
+She tried to smile.  "I'm sorry!  They looked so uncanny, and when I
+saw red I thought--Emile, what does it all mean?"
+
+"It means danger, my dear.  It means that you are suspected.  You
+yourself best know whether the suspicion is deserved or not.  Of course
+it may be only one of the police tricks, but I don't think so.  Anyway
+whether it was charged or not it's safe enough now.  Look in the box
+and on the floor to see if there's any note or message.  There isn't?
+_Eh bien_!  I suppose they thought this would speak with sufficient
+eloquence."
+
+He fished the bedraggled bouquet out of the water and hung it like a
+trophy across Arithelli's mirror, which was a fetish of its owner and
+the one valuable thing she now possessed.  It had been the gift of
+Michael Furness, who had bought it from the Jewish herbalist.  It was
+of antique silver gilt in oval shape, and rimmed with rough topaz set
+in silver, and was alleged by its former owner to have been the
+property of Agnes Sorel.  Arithelli had often declared that in it she
+could see visions as in a crystal.
+
+Over it Emile carefully arranged the flowers so that the stained red
+ribbons hung limply across the polished surface.  Then he sat down
+again and lighted another cigarette.
+
+"You ought not to be afraid of this sort of thing, you know," he said.
+"Sudden death is part of our business.  In the oath we take we swear to
+'Slay or be slain,' if by so doing we can advance the Cause one small
+step forward."
+
+She caught at her breast with a sudden gesture of passion.
+Death--could they talk and think of nothing else?  And she was a woman
+now, not a weapon, and she wanted life.
+
+"You don't seem very enthusiastic," the cold voice continued.  "A few
+months ago the dangerous side of the game was rather an attraction to
+you than otherwise.  Now you shrink and shiver at everything.  You do
+your work, yes, because, you can't help doing that, but is there any
+heart in what you do?"
+
+"None!  Every day I live, I loathe it more!"
+
+"Take care!"
+
+"I'm past caring.  When I came out here first I was a child playing at
+a new game."
+
+Emile's back was turned to her, and if his answering speech was brutal,
+it was because his conscience was awake and crying fiercely.  He would
+not be likely to make the mistake of interfering with people's lives a
+second time.  He had seen in her an instrument to be handled at will,
+and had charged himself with the burden of her destiny, and now he
+supposed she was about to reproach him.
+
+"You are hysterical.  That's the worst of women.  They always are--more
+or less.  You had better go to bed, and not talk nonsense.  If you were
+a child only a few months ago you are not too old to be treated as one
+now."
+
+It hurt him more than it hurt her, but she would never know that.  His
+pulses hammered furiously as she dropped at his side with a soft rustle
+of garments.  Her clasped hands rested on his knee; the strong, slender
+hands that had grown rough with work.
+
+"Emile," she whispered, "can't you see that I've altered?  I'm a woman
+now.  You said I should be one soon.  I've wanted to tell you all
+along, but I always hoped you had guessed."
+
+"Perhaps I did, but I preferred that you should tell me yourself.  And
+since when have you become what you call 'a woman'?  No, you needn't
+answer.  When I knew that you and Vardri had been together in my rooms,
+I was certain I had not warned you without reason."
+
+"You knew before I did myself."
+
+"_Mon enfant_, I'm neither blind nor a fool.  As they say in this
+country, 'love and a cough cannot be hidden.'  I was sure about Vardri,
+but about you;--no, one couldn't say.  When you came out here you were
+a sexless creature with a brain.  It did not seem likely that you would
+develop into the ordinary girl with a lover."
+
+It was the only way he could keep a hold upon himself, by keeping up a
+pose of cynicism.  The fragrance of her hair, the curved mouth so close
+to his own, maddened him.  He who could have been her lover had been
+only her guardian, her taskmaster.  And now she was ready to give
+herself to a boy, who thought life was a romance, and who would
+probably sit at her feet reading poetry while they both starved.
+
+"You have been together often?"
+
+Her head drooped.  "Yes.  I should have told you before."
+
+"What plans have you made?  I suppose it will be the usual mad scheme
+of running away.  I ought to betray you, of course, but--"
+
+"We haven't arranged anything yet; there is plenty of time."
+
+"Plenty of time--Mon Dieu!" the man rasped out.  "How like you,
+Fatalite!  What a pair!  Vardri always living _au clair de la lune_,
+and you half asleep, and full of illusions.  _Les illusions sont les
+hirondelles_.  How often have I told you that?"
+
+"They make life possible," Arithelli answered softly.
+
+Again the man stared and marvelled.  Verily, here was another being who
+was neither "Becky Sharp" nor "Fatalite."  The exultation, the triumph
+of one loved and desired, was hers for the moment.  Who, seeing her
+now, could have the heart to warn her of inevitable disillusion, the
+doubts and fears, the clinging and the torments that are the heritage
+of all womenkind.
+
+He, too, had once dreamed foolish dreams.
+
+He gripped her by the shoulder and forced her to look at him.
+
+"Vardri is your lover?  You shall answer me before I leave this room."
+
+She did not flinch, or blush, or look away.
+
+"I love him."
+
+Joy shone in her widely open eyes.  Love hovered about her mouth, and
+the passion that had stirred in him momentarily shrank back ashamed.
+He pushed back her hair with a rough caress.
+
+"It's all right, _ma chere_.  You needn't be afraid.  I shall not be
+here to advise you soon, and all I have to say now is, never imagine
+yourself secure for an instant.  Sobrenski is bound to discover this in
+the course of time, and he has seen this sort of thing before, which
+will not make him any more merciful.  He has watched human nature long
+enough to know that where there is what you would call love, people
+want to create, they no longer want to destroy.  If, as you say, you
+have made no plans, then make them.  And now you'd better go to bed,
+unless you want to look more like a ghost than usual to-morrow."
+
+As he went out into the moonlit street Emile knew that he had taken the
+first step on his _Via Crucis_.  He did not call it that, for of
+religion in the orthodox sense he possessed nothing, but he knew that
+his feet were set upon the path where snow and blood would mingle in
+his footprints.  He was going back to Russia, where death would be a
+thing to be welcomed and desired.  He had listened to the tales of
+escaped prisoners, and he knew that no words could exaggerate this
+frozen Hell in which flourished vices unnamable, where men rotted
+alive, and women strangled themselves with their own hair, or cut their
+throats with a scrap of glass to escape the brutalities of a gaoler or
+Cossack guard.
+
+He wondered whether it would be Akatui, or the mines, for him.  It was
+no use to try and delude himself that he could escape the police.
+
+He had got out of Russia by the skin of his teeth last time, and, even
+if he managed to get his despatches safely delivered, there would be a
+raid on the newspaper office, an arrest in the street.  Of course there
+was always the hope that he might come in for a chance shot in a
+scrimmage, but that was too much luck to expect.
+
+He had nothing to wait for now after what he had heard to-night, and
+the sooner he put himself out of the way, the better.  He would
+volunteer at once for the St. Petersburg mission.  The usual custom was
+to cast lots, unless some enthusiast begged for the privilege of a
+speedy doom.  By virtue of his long service he had a right to claim
+that privilege.
+
+If he could go to-morrow so much the better.  After what Arithelli had
+confessed it would be dangerous for them both if he stayed.  For a
+moment the primaeval man in him leapt up, telling him that he had only
+to pit himself against Vardri, and the victory would be assuredly his
+own.  His rival was only a boy, and Emile knew that if there came the
+struggle between male and male, the odds were all in his own favour.
+Arithelli had grown into the habit of obedience to him, and if he
+wished it he could make it practically impossible for her to see Vardri
+without his knowledge and consent.  She would sorrow for her lover at
+first, but he was a man, and he could make her forget.
+
+A thousand little devils crowded close, whispering how easy it would be
+to get Vardri sent out of the way.  A few words to Sobrenski, and the
+whole thing would be done.
+
+His sense of justice reminded him that he least of all people had a
+right to grudge her a few hours of happiness.  If he obliterated
+himself he was only making her a deserved reparation for some of the
+things she had suffered.  Through him she had joined the Anarchist
+ranks, and through him she had taken vows that despoiled her of the
+hopes and joys of womanhood, and transformed her into an instrument of
+vengeance.  She had apparently never realised that she had been in any
+way injured, for she had never blamed him, and been invariably grateful
+for anything he had done for her physical comfort.
+
+She loved Vardri, or imagined that she did.  Emile told himself
+savagely that he was a fool who deserved no pity, for he had had his
+own chance and missed it.  He had been with her by night and day, and
+her life had been in his own hands all these months, but he had never
+made love to her.  He had only bullied her, taught her, made her work,
+looked after her clothes and food, and, he knew it now too late, loved
+her.
+
+She had never suspected it, and the secret should remain his own.  Love
+and love-making were two very different things.  She did not know that
+now, but later on she would, when she was ten years older, perhaps, and
+then it would not matter to him, for he would be under two or three
+feet of snow in a Siberian convict settlement.
+
+He had gone about persuading himself that she was still a child, and
+this Austrian boy, this wastrel and dreamer, had awakened her.
+
+It was no use wasting time in sentiment and regrets.  _A la Guerre,
+comme a la Guerre_.  The episode was finished.
+
+He would have work enough to divert his mind soon.  There was nothing
+left to him now but the Cause.
+
+He would see Sobrenski to-morrow, and hurry on all arrangements for
+departure.
+
+After all, as he had once told Arithelli, in any venture it is only the
+first step that counts.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+  "Would I lose you now?  Would I take you then?
+    If I lose you now that my heart has need,
+  And come what may after death to men,
+    What thing worth this will the dead years breed?"
+            THE TRIUMPH OF TIME.
+
+
+Three days later the early morning post brought Arithelli a letter.
+
+She sat up in bed eagerly to receive it, and with the heaviness of
+sleep still upon her eyes.  As she read, the lace at her throat
+trembled with her quickened breathing, and her heart called back an
+answer to the tender, reckless phrases.
+
+Vardri was idealist as well as lover, and graceful turns of expression
+came to his pen readily and without effort.  In many pages of
+characteristic, hurried, irregular writing he set forth wild and
+unpractical schemes for their future.
+
+He urged her to take the dangerous step of leaving Barcelona and
+cutting herself free of the bonds of her allegiance to the Cause.
+
+If there was risk in going, he wrote, there was infinitely more risk in
+remaining.
+
+If he abandoned his political views it was more than likely that his
+father would receive him.  Their quarrel and parting four years ago had
+been solely on those grounds, and he was the only son, and there were
+large estates to be inherited.
+
+If it were the price of gaining her he was prepared to renounce all his
+theories, socialist and revolutionist.
+
+He had been able to save a little money lately, enough for their
+journey to Austria.  He was sure of a welcome among the officials and
+work-people of his former home.  The wife of the steward had been his
+mother's maid, and she and her husband would give him shelter till he
+could see his father and make terms.
+
+If things turned out well then his life and Arithelli's would be one
+long fairy-tale, which should begin where all other fairy-tales ended.
+If his father refused to see him then surely they could both find some
+engagement in another circus or Hippodrome.
+
+She had the advantage of the reputation she had gained here, and he
+could work in the stables again, and they would be free and together.
+
+Arithelli kissed the letter, before she put it down, and lay back with
+her hands over her eyes, trying to think.  She had begun her adventures
+by running away from home, and now for the second time her only course
+was flight.  Even Emile had told her not to waste time in going.  For
+her it seemed there was never to be any peace or rest.
+
+If they could only find some haven away from all the world, she
+thought.  A forest or desert, some unknown spot where there was air and
+space and natural savage beauty, a tent to dwell in, a horse to ride,
+complete freedom, the life of her remote ancestors, simple, dignified.
+
+Once she had craved for change.  Now she feared it.  She knew what
+Vardri had ignored, that the moment they both left Barcelona they would
+become fugitives.  If they were discovered they would be treated simply
+as deserters from the ranks of an army.
+
+Instinctively her thoughts turned to Emile.  It was he who must help
+her to decide.  She slid out of bed, and commenced her toilet, while
+she recalled to mind the things that must be got through during the
+day.  There was a manuscript to be delivered to Sobrenski, an article
+of Jean Grave's from _Les Temps Nouveaux_ which she had copied for
+reproduction.
+
+She finished dressing her hair, and pushed the window more widely open,
+for the sound of music in the distance had caught her ear.
+
+Though it was now autumn, and in England there would have been mist and
+gloom and fogs, here the sun shone, and the air was sweet and mild.
+
+The parching, exhausting heat of the summer was gone, and everything
+smelt fresh and clean, without any touch of winter cold.
+
+Down below in the Calle Catriona the music swelled louder and higher
+till her attic room was filled with the dancing notes.
+
+Along the pavement two men walked slowly with guitar and flageolet.
+
+They walked turning in opposite directions, their heads thrown back,
+their feet keeping step, two black-haired, supple vagabonds of gypsy
+breed, who had come down to the city from their mountain home on the
+heights of Montserrat.
+
+The guitar twanged merrily, the reed-like notes of the flute were true
+and clear as the song of a thrush.  The melody turned and climbed and
+twisted, rose to a climax, and re-commenced again the same phrase.
+Arithelli listened, hypnotised and bewitched, as she always was by
+music.
+
+Something wild and primitive in her responded to the shrill, sweet,
+insistent call.  She had felt like that before, listening to the
+Tziganes on the Rambla, and it was as if the heart were being dragged
+out of her body.  She thought of the childish story of the Piper of
+Hamelin.  She could understand now what had made the children follow
+him with dancing footsteps, through street to street, on, on from dawn
+till dusk.
+
+The guitar-player glanced up in passing and mocked her with laughing
+eyes.  An orange-coloured scarf left his brown throat exposed, and
+there were gold rings in his ears.  She kissed her hand and called down
+greetings in Spanish, and stood at the window, watching and listening
+and longing to run out into the street and follow as the children
+followed through the town of Hamelin.
+
+All the joy of life was in those oft-repeated and alluring phrases, the
+fall of water, the hum of bees, the shiver of aspen leaves, the slow
+music of a breaking wave.
+
+She strained to hear the last faint echoes till all sound was hidden by
+a turn of the road, and the brief enchantment was at an end, leaving
+her to the realities of life.
+
+She dressed slowly, singing under her breath as she plaited her hair
+before Agnes Sorel's mirror.  Before she left the room she thrust the
+loose sheets of Vardri's letter between the folds of her blouse,
+leaving the envelope lying among the bed clothes.
+
+Late in the afternoon one of the "comrades" brought her a cipher
+message, warning her of a meeting arranged to take place in the "Black
+Hole" up in the hills.
+
+Half an hour after she left the Hippodrome she was in boy's clothes and
+riding out to the _rendezvous_ to wait till the others appeared.  She
+had hoped for the chance of a talk with Emile, but to her surprise he
+was not among those who mustered outside the town.  She had never known
+him to be absent from a meeting before, but it was not her business to
+ask questions.
+
+While the rest of the company occupied themselves with long and
+bloodthirsty orations, and hatched fresh schemes for the destruction of
+their fellow-creatures, and the regeneration of the whole earth, she
+went quietly about her duties as stable boy.
+
+When she had finished she set the lantern at the furthest end of the
+stable, and pulling off her hat and black curly wig stretched herself
+wearily at full length on a truss of hay in a dark corner among the
+tethered horses.  The ways of men she had begun to fear and hate, but
+of the beasts she had no fear, for they were always grateful to those
+who cared for them, and they also had suffered at the hands of their
+masters.
+
+A lethargy had taken possession of her whole body, and her limbs felt
+heavily weighted.  She closed her eyes and sank inertly into the bed of
+soft and fragrant hay.
+
+Her loose shirt of faded dusky red had fallen open at the throat, and
+showed the dead-white skin.  Her feet, in riding boots of brown
+leather, were crossed beneath the dark drapery of her cloak.  A leather
+strap served as a belt for the slender hips that were more like those
+of a boy than a woman.  The horses fidgeted and stamped, and a mule
+dragged at its halter with laid-back ears and vicious sidelong glances.
+Sometimes a stirrup or a bit clashed against another with a musical
+ring and jingle.
+
+Arithelli heard nothing till she awoke to find herself in Vardri's
+arms, and being lifted into a sitting position with her back against
+the wall.
+
+In answer to her sleepy murmur of surprise, a hand was laid over her
+mouth with a whispered--"_Gare a toi petite! ne fais pas de bruit_."
+
+She sat up fully awake, and swept the veil of hair out of her eyes.
+
+"Oh!  it's you, _mon ami_!  Is it time to go?  I must get up and see to
+the horses."
+
+But he held her kneeling by her side.
+
+"No, no!  Lie still, dear.  There's time enough.  Yes, Sobrenski is
+still talking.  Can't you hear him?  You had my letter safely?"
+
+She laid her hand on her breast.
+
+"It's here."
+
+"Thank you!  How long is it since I've seen you?  It seems like a
+century.  Those brutes up there were driving me mad with their
+cold-blooded arrangements for wholesale murder.  The latest idea is to
+explode a bomb outside one of the big _cafes_ when Alfonso comes here
+next week to inspect the troops.  They might as well leave him alone.
+What harm has he done them?  As long as they can see people flying into
+atoms with the help of a little nitroglycerine they are quite happy.
+Vengeance, vengeance!  That is their eternal cry.  Of course in Russia
+it's a different thing.  One must either be an autocrat and
+slave-driver or a Nihilist out there, but here--they are mad, all of
+them!  They have just settled to draw lots to-morrow night.  I wonder
+who will have the 'honour' of becoming executioner?  I suppose they
+can't do it to-night because Poleski isn't here."
+
+Arithelli shook her head.
+
+"That is not the reason.  They have given Emile other work to do in
+Russia.  He is leaving here very soon.  I thought you knew."
+
+"Who told you that Poleski is going away?  It may not be true."
+
+"Emile himself.  Oh! it's true enough.  I don't know when he will go.
+He doesn't know himself, but soon."
+
+"Will you trust me to take care of you when Poleski is gone?"
+
+"I'll trust you always."
+
+"Promise me you'll come away with me.  If you care you'll come.  I'll
+give up the Cause for your sake.  I've told you so in my letter and now
+I say it again."
+
+"So I've made you a traitor.  Sobrenski was right."
+
+"My sweet, how can I live with violence and death and misery since I
+have known you?  I want to get away from men and back to Nature to be
+healed.  It doesn't follow that because I have grown to hate some of
+the revolutionist methods that I am against all their theories.  I
+believe they are right in sharing things, in fighting for those who are
+trodden down by the rich, but you and I can still believe all that
+without becoming inhuman.  Think of Sobrenski.  He's a werewolf, not a
+man!  Promise me that you'll come soon.  Let me take you away before
+they make you one of their 'angels of vengeance,' as they call these
+women of the revolution."
+
+Excitement and the feverish devil of consumption had turned his blood
+to fire.  He would take no denial, pay no heed to Arithelli's
+entreaties for time to think, and to consult Emile.
+
+For once he forgot to be gentle, and dragged her head back roughly,
+whispering passionate words, his face pressed against her own.  For a
+moment he saw no longer the goddess on her ivory throne, but a woman of
+flesh and blood, warm, living, and fragrant and to be desired after a
+man's fashion.
+
+Arithelli closed her eyes and leant back, yielding herself to his
+caresses.  The pressure of his hand across her throat hurt her, but in
+some strange way it also gave her pleasure.  Love, the schoolmaster,
+again stood by her side teaching her the lesson learnt sooner or later
+by all women, that pain at the hands of one beloved is a thing close
+akin to joy.  She felt incapable of any struggle or resistance, bodily
+or mental.  She had given her heart therefore her body was also his to
+use as he willed, and feeling her thus abandoned to him all the boy's
+chivalry was stirred anew, and the hunger for possession was lost in
+the desire to serve and protect.
+
+Possibly if he had been forty instead of twenty-eight, he would perhaps
+have demanded a man's rights.  Being, however, according to the world's
+standard, a fool and a dreamer, he chose to let the moment pass, to
+refuse what the gods offered, to think of Arithelli rather than of
+himself.
+
+"I'm hurting you, dear."  His voice shook a little, in spite of his
+efforts to control it.
+
+"No.  Nothing hurts now.  And I'm glad you love me."
+
+"I hurt you a minute ago.  I was mad and a beast.  Will you forgive me?
+You are not frightened?"
+
+"No.  I was only thinking of the future of tomorrow."
+
+"Let us forget to-morrow," the boy pleaded.  "Can you not forget for
+once?"
+
+"We have to-day, and each other.  '_Aujourd'hui le Printemps, Ninon_.'
+It's summer for us now, Fatalite!  When one loves there is always
+summer."
+
+He drew her out into the starlight as he heard the noise of the men
+pushing back their seats and moving about overhead.
+
+Several voices were raised in angry altercation.
+
+He raged inwardly as he thought how in a few minutes he would have to
+see her at the orders of them all, sent here and there, at everyone's
+call, and forced to work without either thanks or reward.
+
+"Let me go in, dear," Arithelli said.  "They will expect to find things
+ready."
+
+But Vardri held her back.
+
+"Let them expect!  Give them the trouble of looking for you.  They keep
+you up all night, so they can afford to waste a few minutes extra."
+
+It was both a foolish and useless protest and Arithelli knew that she
+would pay afterwards for these snatched moments, but she did not grudge
+the price, for to her they seemed worth the payment required.
+
+She was glad of the air too.
+
+She turned a little in Vardri's arms, lifting her face to the soft
+night wind.  The coolness and the dark were like the touch of a
+soothing hand.
+
+The branches of the tree under which they stood rustled softly, and the
+undergrowth stirred with the startled movements of some awakened bird
+or small animal.
+
+A bat flew past, almost brushing them with its velvet wings.  From the
+marsh lands below the dangerous white mist hovered like a fairy veil.
+
+"I love the night," Arithelli whispered.  "It makes me want to do all
+sorts of things.  Do you remember the story of Marguerite of France,
+who heard the gypsies singing under her window and leant out and called
+to them to take her away.  I feel like that.  Do you understand?"
+
+Vardri drew her closer.  "I know, my heart.  Tell me more."
+
+"There were some gypsies singing under my window this morning,"
+Arithelli went on.  "I wished I could have gone out and followed them
+'over the hills and far away' like the children in the old rhymes.  The
+Irish and Jewish people have always been wanderers.  Perhaps that is
+why I am fated never to stay long in one place."
+
+He answered her in the same mood.
+
+"We'll start at once, shall we, Fatalite?  We'll saddle two of the
+horses and ride, ride day and night till we come to Montserrat, and
+there we shall find your gypsies and their tribe.  When you come to my
+country there'll be gypsies too, and they shall play and sing for you,
+and you'll know what music is for the first time."
+
+"How foolish we are!"  Her eyes were wet, but she was smiling.  "If
+Emile heard me talking like this he would be so angry."
+
+"He talked like this once," Vardri replied.  "Poleski was young too not
+so very long ago, and he loved someone."
+
+"Yes, I know."  She found it almost impossible to think of Emile as a
+lover in spite of the photograph she had found, and the words in his
+own writing upon his songs.  She knew them by heart.  "_Emile a Marie.
+Sans toi la mort_."  And on another, "_Etoile de mon ame!  Je vous
+adore de tout mon coeur, ton Emile_."
+
+Perhaps it was the memory of this passion of his youth that had made
+him kind to her.
+
+While they talked and lingered, Sobrenski was descending the rickety
+ladder that served as a staircase.
+
+He had noticed Vardri's exit from the room, as he noticed everything
+else.  All the other men had been too excited to care whether one more
+or less was there or not.  In the hot argument that raged in the upper
+room, the absence of one of the members of the Brotherhood was
+apparently forgotten.
+
+Their leader, however, did not lose his head or his powers of
+observation even when matters of life or death were in the balance.
+Whatever he did was always done deliberately and in cold blood.
+
+All the time he had been apparently presiding over the discussion he
+had also been thinking rapidly.
+
+It would be to his ultimate advantage not to interfere with Arithelli
+and Vardri just now, but to let them be together, to see as much of
+each other as possible.  It was as well that Vardri should become
+thoroughly infatuated, as then he would be certain to take some step
+that would bring things to a crisis.  They would be sure to try to
+escape out of the country and hide themselves somewhere.  They would
+not be the first people who had tried that sort of thing before.
+
+In the course of his life he had known others who had flung the Cause
+and their vows to the winds from fear or passion and tried to hide
+themselves under some disguise.
+
+If they happened to be clever and have plenty of money their escape had
+been fairly easy, and they had even been safe for perhaps a year or so.
+Then just as they had begun to feel secure and had grown careless, the
+vengeance of their own particular circle had overtaken them.  There had
+been accounts in the newspapers of a mysterious tragedy to which no
+motive could be assigned, and for which no one could be brought to
+justice, and that was all.
+
+They were all monotonously alike, these affairs!
+
+Sobrenski had said little to anyone else of his suspicions.
+
+No need to declare anyone a traitor till it was proven.  Such things
+had a demoralising effect, and treachery was an infectious disease.
+
+He descended the uneven rungs of the ladder, treading soft-footed as a
+cat.
+
+There was no noise of talking, so of course she was asleep.  _Sacre_,
+these lazy women!  So she could not keep awake even for a lover!
+
+The place was dark except for the glimmering light at the far end, and
+he was obliged to feel his way to avoid the mules, who had an evil
+trick of lashing out with their heels at anything in the vicinity.
+
+At the foot of the steps he trod on a riding whip, which he recognised
+as one belonging to Vardri.
+
+In the dim circle of light cast by the smoky lamp there was only a
+truss of hay disordered as if someone had lain upon it, and the
+_manta_, and other things belonging to Arithelli.
+
+There was one thing more, a sheet of paper covered closely with an
+untidy scrawl.
+
+The lynx eyes flashed, and Sobrenski bent eagerly forward.
+
+Bad as the light was it had not taken him long to recognise the writing.
+
+He held it close to the lamp, and smiled with satisfaction.
+
+Nothing could be better from his point of view.  In the first sentence
+there was all, even more, than he wanted.
+
+He smoothed it out between his pointed fingers, folded it, and bestowed
+it carefully in an inside pocket.
+
+It was just the kind of thing he would have expected from a girl of
+Arithelli's type,--to go about dropping letters.  She had not method
+enough even to put on her clothes decently; they always looked as if
+they were falling off, and her hair as if it was coming down.
+
+_Sapristi_!  A fine agent for the Cause! and one fit to be trusted with
+important documents.
+
+Poleski must have been quite mad when he suggested introducing her to
+the Brotherhood, and he himself deserved even more blame for having as
+much as listened to the suggestion.
+
+A girl of that age, picked up from nowhere, and like the rest of her
+sex a mass of lies and vanity.
+
+He held the lantern above his head, and peered round.  Surely they had
+not been so utterly insane as to have attempted to escape to-night?
+All the horses and mules were there safe enough, and obviously they
+would not attempt to walk.
+
+He strode towards the door, meeting them on the threshold, and in spite
+of himself could not help being impressed by the uncanny likeness
+between the two, in form and outline.
+
+They had even the same trick of movement.
+
+The thought of what he had found made him feel almost good-humoured,
+although he took good care that no one else should benefit by this
+unusual mood.
+
+"You have found yourself a little distraction, _hein_?" he said,
+ignoring Arithelli's presence.  "We are not up here for amusement all
+the same.  There's nothing done.  I supposed you had come down to see
+to the horses."
+
+Vardri strolled across to a rack, and took down an armful of saddles
+and stirrups.
+
+"I have," he answered laconically.  "They'll be ready in five minutes."
+
+Sobrenski turned to the girl, and spoke to her in an undertone.  "What
+are you wasting time for?  See to your work."  Vardri raised his head
+from the adjustment of a girth.
+
+"I'm doing Mademoiselle Arithelli's work.  There is no need for her to
+trouble."  His accents possessed both dignity and command.  For an
+instant their positions were reversed.  The leader smothered an oath;
+but said no more.  He reflected that he could well afford to wait for
+his revenge.  The game was absolutely in his own hands if only they had
+known it.
+
+He could see that they were both perfectly unconscious of the fact that
+they had lost anything.  When they discovered they would most likely
+conclude it had happened during the ride up.
+
+When Arithelli had dragged herself up into her bedroom the sky was
+lighting with the dawn.  They had mistaken the road and gone a mile or
+two out of the way, and one of the men had been thrown off and twisted
+his ankle, and made another halt and delay.  She drew the curtains
+closely and lay down without undressing.
+
+Before she slept she put her hand into her breast, and felt the rustle
+of the thin paper on which Vardri's letter had been written.
+
+It was not until the landlady had nearly battered down her door that
+she stirred four hours later, and then she unfastened her blouse and
+drew out instead of the original two sheets, only one.
+
+She did not feel particularly alarmed; supposing it had been put with
+the envelope that she had left about in the morning.  Her things so
+often got lost, and it was Emile who generally found them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+  "Must a man have hope to fight?
+  Can a man not fight in despair?"
+            "A Polish Insurgent," JAMES THOMPSON.
+
+
+How he lived through his last day in Barcelona Emile never quite knew.
+A strong will, strong tobacco, and plenty of work were all aids in
+helping him to preserve his sanity.
+
+He soon arranged things with Sobrenski, and found no difficulty in
+obtaining the post of messenger in the St. Petersburg affair.
+
+He walked to the Hippodrome while the _matinee_ performance was in
+progress, and left a message for Arithelli at the stage door.
+
+Then he went back to his rooms in the Calle San Antonio, and began to
+make the few necessary preparations for departure.  He was not
+encumbered with worldly goods, and his wardrobe was not extensive, so
+there remained only to look through and destroy all documents, books,
+or letters that could not be carried about or that might involve the
+safety of others.
+
+Certain songs and pieces of music he put together in a pile, the rest
+he tore across and threw into a corner.  He would have no need of these
+amusements now.  Cultivation of the fine arts is not encouraged in the
+political prisons.
+
+At five o'clock Arithelli entered the room, her clothes put on
+carelessly, the grey pallor of intense weariness upon her face.  She
+had been working early and late during the past two days, and the
+thought of the missing letter worried her from time to time.  Sometimes
+she felt almost certain that she had dropped it in changing from her
+circus clothes, and that it had been appropriated out of curiosity by
+one of the women who shared the dressing-room.  As it was written in
+English, they would probably throw it away at once in disgust, annoyed
+at being deprived of the excitement of a romance or scandal.
+
+She knew it would be useless to make enquiries.  If it had been left
+there it had been done late at night, and the dressing-rooms were
+always cleaned early next morning, and it would have been swept away
+with the other rubbish.
+
+She had not said anything about her loss to Vardri.  It would make him
+even more anxious than herself, and she must bear the penalty of her
+own carelessness.
+
+She hoped that after all it would come to light in some box or drawer
+among her clothes.
+
+She came forward noiselessly across the polished, carpetless floor.
+
+"_Bon jour_, Emile!  You wanted me?"
+
+He pointed to a chair.
+
+"Sit down!  Your hat is on crooked--as usual!  Are you so little of a
+woman that you never use a mirror?"
+
+A gleam of fun lit up her eyes.
+
+"You covered mine up the other night with that horrible wreath and
+streamers.  I can only see myself in little bits now."
+
+"Well, sit down and I'll talk to you presently."
+
+Emile returned to the sorting and destruction of his correspondence,
+and Arithelli lay back in her chair with a sigh of content, and closed
+her eyes.  When she opened them again he was standing beside her with a
+glass of red wine in his hand.
+
+"Drink this," he said, giving it to her.
+
+"It isn't _absinthe_, is it?" she asked.  "I can't see in this light,
+and I don't want--"
+
+"It doesn't matter what it is or what you want.  Don't argue, but
+finish it.  How fond you women are of talking!"  He waited till she had
+obeyed him.
+
+"You see that music?  Well, you can take it back with you.  I shall not
+have any more use for music when I leave here.  And listen to me now,
+and don't go to sleep for the next five minutes if you can help it."
+
+He kept full control of himself and his feelings.  If anything his
+voice was a little more rasping than usual, and his dry words of
+counsel and advice were spoken in his ordinary hard, practical manner.
+An outsider would have found it difficult to say which was the more
+indifferent in appearance of these two who had been so strangely
+intimate for half a year, and who were now about to part.
+
+The girl was apathetic from physical fatigue and past emotions.
+
+She thought as she looked round the familiar room how impossible it was
+to believe that she would never be there again after to-day, and that
+Emile would never again come to her.
+
+The wine cleared her brain and made her blood run more quickly.  She
+roused herself to listen to what Emile was saying, and to answer the
+questions he was asking her about her own arrangements.  She thought he
+seemed relieved when she told him of Vardri's scheme, and she
+restrained a strong desire to tell him also about the missing letter.
+
+He gave her an address in the Russian capital to which she could write
+during the next month, warning her at the same time to be careful in
+what she said, to mention no names, and to avoid all references to
+politics, as his correspondence would run the risk of being edited by
+the police.  Inside the envelope on which the address was written he
+had enclosed forty francs.
+
+"You'll probably find a little money useful one of these days," he
+said.  "Keep it till you really want it.  You can't wear more than one
+pair of boots at once, and there are other things more important.  I
+don't want you to thank me.  You can go and sing something instead, and
+do your best as it's for the last time."
+
+Arithelli rose at once and went to the piano, eager to do something
+that might give him pleasure.
+
+She could play for herself now.  Emile had succeeded in teaching her a
+few easy accompaniments, so that he could listen without distraction.
+
+She hesitated for a minute, turning over his big music book, and then
+chose the popular song of the _cafe-chantants_ and streets, the famous
+"_La Colombe_" with its lilting time, and mingled gaiety and sorrow.
+One heard it everywhere, sung in Spanish, in the local patois, and in
+French, by _artistes_ in the theatres, by factory girls, and sailors,
+and market people.  The _gamins_ and beggars whistled and hummed it in
+the streets and squares.
+
+Emile walked up and down the room as he listened.  He had made her sing
+in the hope of lessening in a small degree the strain he was enduring,
+but what had possessed her to choose this song of all others?  The
+words told of one who was about to set sail, and lingered bidding adieu
+to his Nina, the woman he loved.
+
+  "_Le jour ou quittant la terre pour l'ocean,
+  Je dis, priez Dieu, priez Dieu pour votre enfant.
+  Avant que nous mettre en route je crus revoir,
+  Nina! qui pleurait sans doute de desespoir._"
+
+
+One could hear the rocking of the boat at anchor, the rippling of the
+out-going tide.
+
+In the second verse the time was changed, the words were hurried and
+insistent.
+
+  "_Nina! si je succombe, el qu'un beau soir,
+  Une blanche colombe vient te voir,
+  Ouvre-lui ta fenetre car ce sera,
+  Mon ame qui peut-etre te reviendra._"
+
+
+Her voice had grown weaker since her illness, and she sang with visible
+exertion and faulty breathing, but it was still the golden voice of the
+Israelitish woman, and there was the same _timbre_ that had attracted
+him, and made him speak to her that afternoon in May at the station.
+
+And all that had only happened six months ago!  When she had finished
+he said nothing in approval, but he asked her to sing again, and she
+understood, and was pleased.
+
+"You may thank the Fates for having given you a voice," he told her.
+"It's better than a face.  It lasts longer.  No man having once heard
+you would listen to another woman."
+
+It was the first compliment he had ever made her, but Arithelli did not
+answer.  Her back was turned towards him as she gathered together the
+music.
+
+He could see that her whole body was trembling with repressed sobs.  If
+he could only have been sure they were for him, he would have taken her
+in his arms.  She was sorry he was going, perhaps, in a way, but not in
+the way he wanted.  She had become dependent upon him, and he had
+filled a certain place in her life.  If she made a scene it was
+entirely his own fault.  Farewells were always a mistake, and he had
+been foolish enough to allow her to sing sentimental verses about doves
+and people's wandering souls.  She was over-tired and over-wrought, and
+a woman's tears were more often due to physical than to mental reasons.
+So he argued, trying to convince himself, yet knowing all the time that
+Arithelli was not one of the women whose emotions are on the surface.
+
+Once before he had seen her cry, and now as then he stood apart.  It
+was for Vardri to dry her tears.
+
+He glanced at the clock.  Of course it was wrong, but he knew by the
+shadows that filled the room that it must be time for her to leave if
+she was to appear in public again to-night.
+
+He must hurry the interview to a close, for he could not play his part
+much longer.
+
+"You ought to be glad to get rid of me, Arithelli.  _Vous avez la
+chance_!  What have I given you but work and grumbles, eh?"
+
+The soft, broken voice answered him:
+
+"I shall feel afraid without you."
+
+"You will have Vardri,--your lover."  His tone was brutal as the blow
+of a knife.  The natural animal jealousy of a man had risen in him
+again.  When he was between stone walls, she would have the warmth of a
+lover's arms; every nerve in his own body would know it, and long for
+that which he had himself resigned.
+
+He would have long hours to sit and think the thoughts that drive men
+to insanity or self-destruction.
+
+"Yes, but one can care in different ways, and you have done so many
+things for me."
+
+The man drew in his breath sharply.  The knife was in her hand now, but
+she had stabbed unconsciously.  He knew that she spoke quite simply,
+thinking only of his care for her physical well-being.
+
+Truly he had done things, things that he would have given several years
+of life to undo.
+
+Now he had that for which he craved,--the assurance that she cared,
+that she would miss him.  Still he did not delude himself.  He knew
+that what she felt towards him was not the love between a woman and her
+mate, but the affection of dependence, of habit.  Yet for such as it
+was his soul uttered thanksgiving.  Any other woman gifted with a less
+sweet nature would have felt for him nothing but hatred, but in
+Fatalite's mind neither spite nor malice ever found a place.  The petty
+vices of womankind had never been hers.  He knew now that he had been
+something to her, and that knowledge would make sunshine for him even
+in the shadow of a prison.  It gave him courage also to play out the
+tragi-comedy to the end, to make a brave jest, to lie convincingly.
+
+"We needn't make each other eternal adieux, _mon enfant_.  You must not
+take all I said about Siberian dungeons _au serieux_.  Russia isn't
+quite as dangerous as it's made out to be.  Of course the police keep a
+watch more or less on the 'suspects,' but we know all their tricks, and
+how to avoid them.  Plenty of us go to St. Petersburg and even to Kara
+and come back again.  The Schlusselburg fortress is about the only
+place we haven't succeeded in getting out of yet.  It's fairly easy to
+manage a false passport.  You can write to me at the address I've given
+you."
+
+      *      *      *      *      *      *
+
+It was all over now, and he was alone.  He had taken both her hands for
+an instant, and felt the convulsive clinging of the thin fingers.  He
+had longed to kiss them, but dared not trust himself.  His words were
+only such as might have been used by anyone of the Brotherhood.
+
+"_Au revoir, camarade_!"
+
+"_Au revoir_!"
+
+Her tears were falling still, though she answered him steadily enough.
+
+Then she turned away, pulling down her veil, and he saw her grope
+blindly for the fastening of the door.  It shut gently behind her, and
+he was alone.  He sat down by the table with its litter of books and
+newspapers, and stared dully round the room which her passing had left
+more hopeless and ugly than ever.
+
+Life itself would be more _fade_ and ugly now.  As well for him that
+after to-day he would have no time to sit and brood.  It would be all
+stern reality soon, enough to cure him of lovesickness.
+
+First the work and risks of a secret printing press in some cellar or
+sordid room behind a shop, and later on the inevitable police-raid, a
+trial that would be no trial with the condemnation signed before-hand,
+and afterwards the _travaux forces_, the long marches, the agonies of
+farewell at the Siberian boundary-post--not for him, for his were said,
+but for his companions in misery--the miseries of the sick and dying,
+the partial starvation, and the horrors of dirt and vermin.  There were
+sure to be some women too among the "politicals," and he would be
+obliged to watch their sufferings.
+
+There would be no imaginary grievances in that life at all events.
+
+On the floor, as it had dropped from among the music there lay a
+photograph, face downwards.
+
+He picked it up and looked back at the childish, smiling face, the
+tiny, rounded figure of Marie Roumanoff.
+
+"_Tout passe, tout casse, tout lasse_."
+
+His mouth twisted into a cynical smile.  She had been a true prophetess
+when she had written that.
+
+He tore the picture across, and threw it upon the rest of the _debris_.
+
+The Roumanoff would never haunt his dreams again.
+
+Her portrait was easily destroyed.  A flimsy thing of print and paper,
+as slight and fragile as herself.
+
+Of Arithelli he possessed no tangible likeness, but he would have her
+always with him, for her image was seared deep upon both heart and
+brain.
+
+_The Witch_ sailed out of Barcelona harbour with the early morning
+tide.  Besides Emile and Vladimir, and a small picked crew, she carried
+an assortment of strangely-shaped machines, things that looked like the
+inside of a clock, and were full of wheels and cogs, firearms, and
+ammunition, some copies of a revolutionist manual on street fighting
+tactics, and other inflammatory literature.
+
+Their plan was to enter Russia by way of Finland, leaving all the
+things there to be smuggled through by degrees.
+
+When they came to the frontier they would part company.  Emile would
+make his way towards the city that holds its trembling autocrat as
+closely guarded in his palace as any convict in the mines, while
+Vladimir was to go back to Spain overland to report success or failure
+in the landing and disposal of their dangerous cargo.
+
+All day the two men sat together, talking, plotting, preparing for all
+contingencies.
+
+There were no feminine voices to be heard on board the yacht now, no
+singing on deck in the evenings, no hint of the presence of a woman,
+either as wife, mistress, or companion.
+
+They neither discussed nor recalled these vanished days, though one had
+hours of memory and regret, and the other was consumed with a savage
+hunger for that which he had lost.
+
+Both had taken upon themselves vows that put them outside the pale of
+human ties and affections.
+
+The Goddess whom they both served had risen, claiming their allegiance,
+their service, and with the lives and ways of mortal women they had no
+concern.  The Cause had triumphed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+  "Do you not know I am a woman?"
+            AS YOU LIKE IT.
+
+
+Sobrenski was a man who wasted no time in making up his mind.  His
+success as a leader had depended upon his swiftness of action and
+unscrupulousness, and his latest manoeuvres had turned out an admirable
+success, upon which he might safely congratulate himself.
+
+The day following the resolution of the Committee, he had written to
+Arithelli, telling her to come to his flat to receive instructions.
+She would arrive in due time, and then he would explain things.
+
+He wondered whether she would faint or scream or perhaps refuse, but
+probably she would be easier to manage now that Poleski was safely out
+of the way.  He had schemed that business well too, and could now spare
+all his attention for Vardri and the girl.
+
+As to the amount of work they both did, they would be no great loss,
+for he could easily supply their places by other human machines who
+would carry out his desires without question.  The majority of the men
+who composed the circle were completely dominated by him, and incapable
+of opposing his will or argument, and by some he was worshipped as a
+hero.  Callous of suffering in others, he was equally indifferent to it
+for himself, and if he did not spare his tools he also slaved
+incessantly day and night.
+
+The large bare room in which he sat possessed very little furniture and
+no signs of comfort.  There were a quantity of books piled on the floor
+and mantelpiece, and the centre space was filled by an enormous bureau
+heaped with a mass of printed and written papers, for besides his
+extensive correspondence he was part-editor of one of the Anarchist
+journals, which he enlivened by daring and sarcastic contributions.
+The fragment of the letter that Arithelli had dropped, lay open in
+front of him.  He read it through again and smiled to himself.
+
+"I'll give up even the Cause for your sake," Vardri had written.
+"Seeing how these men have made you suffer has changed my views.  There
+must be something wrong about our ideas if they produce this cruelty to
+women.  Sobrenski and the others are killing you slowly.  I wanted
+struggle and excitement at one time, and whether it meant Life or Death
+it was all the same.  There was no one to care.  Now I want Life and
+Love and You!"
+
+Another madman like Gaston de Barres!  How alike all these effusions
+were, all in the same strain.  They had found a pile of ravings when
+they had searched among the property of the heroine of that affair.
+These were the people who did an incredible amount of harm, who were
+even more dangerous than the ordinary traitor.
+
+He pushed the letter underneath some others, and Arithelli had knocked
+more than once, before he called "_Entrez_!"
+
+He saluted her with a cold scrutiny, telling her to wait till he had
+finished.  He invariably made a point of using no title in addressing
+her, and never even gave her the customary Anarchist greeting of
+_camarade_.  He did not invite her to sit down, and she would have been
+surprised if he had done so.  There was another chair at the far end of
+the room, and she did not trouble to fetch it.  Her heart was still
+further weakened by her illness, and she was breathless after climbing
+two long flights of stairs.  She leant up against the wall, breathing
+quickly, and thankful for a few moments' respite.
+
+She supposed she was required to play "errand-boy" as usual, and to go
+through the well-known routine: A crumpled-up slip of paper, which she
+must hide in her hair or dress, a long walk, or a ride in the electric
+tram if she happened to have any money, and then perhaps at the end of
+it she would find the man for whom she was seeking absent, and then she
+would have to wait till he returned.  It was never safe to leave a
+message.  Everything had to be given directly into the hands of those
+for whom it was intended, and she had spent many weary hours in the
+rooms of Sobrenski's followers.
+
+She studied his face as he rapidly stamped his letters, flinging them
+on to a pile of others that lay ready.  It crossed her mind how Emile
+had once likened a certain group of the conspirators to a pack of court
+cards, saying that they were alternately red and black.
+
+Sobrenski's hair and small peaked beard were of a curiously unpleasant
+colour, and his thin lips, pointed teeth and long sloping jaw gave him
+a wolfish appearance.  His eyes, deep-set and narrow, were too close
+together to satisfy a student of Lavater as to his capacity for
+truthfulness.  The forehead alone was good, and showed reasoning and
+intellect.  He was about fifty, and like all fair men looked less than
+his age.  He was better dressed, and altogether more careful of his
+appearance than most of the other men, though he spent nothing on
+luxuries and never touched the _absinthe_, to which most of them were
+addicted.  The sole luxuries in which he indulged were Work and Power.
+
+"Probably you have heard a great deal of talk about spies lately," he
+began, addressing Arithelli in French.  "For some time I have suspected
+one of our own number of treachery.  However, one cannot condemn
+without proofs.  For these I have been waiting and they have now come
+into my hands.  I'm perfectly satisfied that the man I have all along
+suspected is a traitor, and there is no need to delay action any
+longer.  I suppose Poleski has informed you of how we treat those who
+are unwise enough to betray us?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+She was on her guard now, and stood upright, all her languor gone.  Why
+could he not say what he meant at once?  She wondered why he had taken
+the trouble to seek for proofs of anyone's guilt.  Enough for a man of
+his type to find an obstruction in his path.  He would need no
+authority but his own for removing it.  She hated him all the more for
+his parade of justice.  It had not occurred to her that his speech was
+a prelude to anything that concerned Vardri.  If anyone was implied she
+imagined it was herself.  These men were never happy unless they were
+suspecting evil of someone.  The Anarchist leader found in her
+incomprehension merely another sign of feminine stupidity.  Her outward
+air of indifference was as irritating to him as it had been to the
+Hippodrome Manager.  Sobrenski's blood had never stirred for any woman,
+however charming, and Arithelli's type of looks was repulsive to him.
+He loathed her thinness and pallor, her silence and immobility of
+expression.  He vowed inwardly that she should look less indifferent
+before he had finished with her.
+
+"You do not appear to have the least idea of the identity of the man to
+whom I am referring," he continued.  "Your friend Vardri is not a very
+careful person.  He is young, and shall we say, a little foolish.  It
+is always risky to say or write anything against the Cause one is
+supposed to be serving."
+
+"To say _or write_."  It dawned upon her all at once.  The piece of the
+letter she had missed, had been dropped in the stable up in the hills
+and found by Sobrenski.  It was all her own fault, sheer rank
+carelessness.  Emile had so often warned her against her fatal habit of
+leaving everything about.  She never locked up anything, jewellery,
+clothes, money or papers.
+
+Perhaps in the hurry of dressing that night, she had only taken with
+her the first page, and when she was out her rooms had been searched,
+and the rest stolen.  Sobrenski would stop at nothing to get the
+evidence he wanted.  If she accused him of having taken it he would
+simply deny the charge, and to seem anxious would be further evidence
+that the letter contained something that would compromise either Vardri
+or herself.  In any case it appeared that the mischief was done.  To
+expect either justice or mercy from her enemy was out of the question.
+She would try and fight him with his own weapon, feign ignorance, tell
+lies if necessary.
+
+"Vardri?  What has he done?"
+
+The note of surprise in her voice was well assumed and she could
+control her face, but her hands betrayed her.  Sobrenski had seen the
+blue veins stand out and the knuckles whiten unnaturally with the
+pressure on the black fan she carried to shield her eyes in the street.
+
+"Done?" he echoed contemptuously.  "Nothing so far.  He has only talked
+and written.  It is to provide against his doing anything important
+that the Committee have decided upon his removal.  There was a meeting
+held last night and the voting was unanimous.  Vardri has been
+condemned as a traitor to his vows, and a danger to everyone connected
+with our work."
+
+"Condemned without a hearing!" the girl flamed out.  "_Mon Dieu_!  Your
+justice!  What has he done?"
+
+"Have you a right to question the judgment of the Committee?"  The
+voice was like a scourge falling on bare flesh.  Arithelli drew her
+shoulders together involuntarily.
+
+"No!" she answered.
+
+"Yet you do it!  These womanly inconsistencies are a little fatiguing."
+
+Sobrenski caressed his beard with a narrow, bloodless hand, on the
+middle finger of which was a curious ring of twisted gold wire.
+
+He waited to see if she would make any further protest, but she set her
+lips firmly and refused to speak.  There was nothing more to be said on
+her side.  Evidently Sobrenski had found the letter, and when or where
+it had been found mattered not at all.  He continued:
+
+"The sentence has been passed and it falls upon you to execute it."
+
+The answer came back swiftly:
+
+"And if I refuse?"
+
+For once in his life Sobrenski was taken aback, and experienced a new
+sensation, that of surprise.  He looked at her with almost approval.
+If he was cruel he was also courageous, and able to appreciate the
+virtue in others.
+
+"You know what your refusal implies?" he questioned, more gently than
+he had yet spoken.  "You refused some time ago to carry a message.  You
+will perhaps remember that I gave you the choice between doing as you
+were told, or--" he gesticulated expressively.  "You were wise then.  I
+hope you will be wise now."
+
+Arithelli's thoughts were going at racing speed.  No one could be long
+in a room alone with Sobrenski without being impressed by his
+overpowering personality.  He affected her in a way that no one else
+ever did, in provoking her to futile outbursts of defiance and anger.
+She had never lost her head with anyone else, but he always made her
+incapable of reasoning, raging one minute, and cowed the next.
+Hitherto Emile had always been there to screen and protect her, to
+stand between her and her enemy.  She knew now why he had so often
+hoped to see her in her coffin.
+
+"I can't murder!  I undertook to work for the Cause, but not that--_Mon
+Dieu_! not that!"
+
+"We don't talk about murder," Sobrenski sneered.  "We merely 'remove'
+those who have proved themselves untrustworthy.  You undertook to obey
+orders, I believe.  You may contradict me if I am incorrect."
+
+He leant forward with the glittering eyes of the fanatic.  "You talk of
+murder and forget that to us human life is nothing.  Do you think you
+will save Vardri by refusing?  Am I to suppose that he has infected you
+also with the taint of disloyalty?  It is your business to loathe a
+traitor as we do.  You wear your badge, but do you never read the words
+on it?  Poleski used to tell me great things of your enthusiasm, your
+devotion.  Now I am putting you to the test.  You like to act a
+picturesque part, it seems, to wear boy's clothes, to sing, to be the
+only woman among us, to act the heroine.  We do not want acting here.
+This is Life, not the stage.  Now you are asked to give a practical
+proof of your loyalty!"
+
+The pitiless tongue lashed, and Arithelli shrank against the wall, her
+hands over her eyes.  There had been stories current among the younger
+members of the Barcelona Anarchists that Sobrenski possessed the power
+of hypnotism and did not scruple to use it.  Some of the most daring
+and successful outrages of the past years had been carried out under
+his direction, and executed by these youths.  He always made a point of
+choosing men who were highly strung and impressionable.  He was known
+to boast that after three interviews with him he could make anyone,
+either man or woman, into a will-less automaton.
+
+He exhorted, jeered, encouraged and derided, finally giving Arithelli
+five minutes in which to make her decision.  She did not keep him
+waiting, though he could scarcely hear the murmured words of assent.
+Her nerve was broken at last.  She would promise anything, do anything
+if only he would let her go.  Dazed with fear and misery, she watched
+him get up, unlock a drawer of the bureau and come across to her
+holding out something.
+
+"I shall arrange for you to be together one night up in the hut.  I
+don't know whether you have any idea of shooting, but you can hardly
+miss at such close range."
+
+The brutal words steadied her, and drove back the feeling of mental
+paralysis.  She realised suddenly all that her promise meant.  Vardri
+had given her love, and in return she was to give him Death!  Her own
+dawning love had enabled her to see more clearly what his devotion
+meant.  With the growth of a woman's soul she had also begun to
+experience womanly emotions, fear, anxiety, the need of sympathy and
+affection.
+
+She snatched the pistol from Sobrenski's hand, and he stepped back a
+pace, throwing up his arm instinctively as she raised, levelled and
+fired.
+
+The weapon clicked harmlessly, her hand dropped to her side, and she
+stood shivering, and wondering at her own madness.  The whole thing had
+been done without thinking, as an animal driven into a corner turns,
+snarling and showing its teeth.
+
+Sobrenski recovered himself first and laughed.
+
+"So you thought it was loaded?" he said.  "Do you take me for a fool?
+Allow me to congratulate you on your--failure!"
+
+Then changing his tone of sarcasm to command: "You must hide that
+pistol carefully.  Put it inside your dress or somewhere safe.  I
+suppose you would like to march down the Paseo de Gracia, carrying it
+in your hand, and wearing a tragic expression,--and get locked up by
+the first agent de police you meet!  You have pluck enough, but you
+should avoid these exhibitions of hysteria."
+
+He gripped her by the shoulder, swung her round, and pointed to the
+door, "_Allez_!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+  "My crown is without leaves,
+  For she sits in the dust and grieves,
+    Now we are come to our kingdom."
+            "Anthony and Cleopatra," KIPLING.
+
+
+Once more the procession of conspirators toiled on its way up the
+irregular mountain path.  The horses slipped and stumbled under their
+unskilful riders, the mules climbed steadily upwards.  No one spoke.
+
+As usual Arithelli led the way.
+
+Vardri, who had arrived last of all, rode forward to join her, but was
+curtly ordered to the rear by Sobrenski.
+
+They should see enough of each other later on,--when it was time.
+
+Before they started on their ride he spoke to Arithelli alone, and gave
+her his final instructions, and saw for himself that the pistol she
+wore at her belt was properly charged.  He never left anything to
+chance, especially in important undertakings such as the present one.
+
+"There will not be a long meeting to-night," he said.  "You will have
+an hour free to do your work.  You hear?"
+
+His eyes were fixed on hers, compelling an answer.  None came, though
+she bowed her head in token of acquiescence, and though he could hear
+no word Sobrenski was satisfied.  He had seen that shrinking attitude,
+that mechanical gesture before.  In the plot to assassinate General
+Morales there had been a young Spanish student who had given some
+trouble.  He had developed a conscience at the last minute, and vowed
+that he could not kill an old and defenceless man, that he would rather
+die himself.
+
+He had died, and so had Morales, and both by the explosion of the bomb
+that had been launched by the hand of the former.
+
+Sobrenski held rightly that those who meddled with politics on either
+side must dispense with such useless things as scruples.
+
+The night was still and sultry, with a full moon hanging low in the
+sky.  The weather had been unnaturally warm for the time of year, all
+day, down in the city.
+
+They were all glad when they had mounted above the sea-level.
+
+There was a little breeze met them, and the tired and patiently
+plodding horses raised their heads.
+
+Arithelli drew a long breath of relief as she shifted in her saddle,
+and glanced back to see if they were all in sight.
+
+The _manta_ in which she was wrapped stifled her, and the weight of her
+own hair under the wig and sombrero made her head ache and throb
+violently.
+
+As they rode she rehearsed her plans in her own mind, telling herself
+over and over again the things that she must say and do when she was
+alone with Vardri.
+
+To-night would see Sobrenski's triumph, his grand coup, and when it was
+all over perhaps she would have peace.
+
+How slowly they all seemed to ride, she thought.  She wondered how many
+of the other men knew that she was chosen to act the part of murderess.
+Some of them had been kind to her in a rough way, especially the older
+ones.
+
+But even if they did pity her a little, not one among them but would
+expect her to do the thing that they would consider obviously her duty.
+
+No one would raise a voice on her behalf, whatever their private
+sentiments.
+
+The majority of them would probably look upon her as a heroine, for she
+would have rid them of a spy, a traitor.
+
+She could only hope that she might keep her brain clear, her courage
+firm till the supreme moment.
+
+Once in the course of that awful day her nerves had given out in
+physical collapse, and her shaking hands had let fall the mirror of
+Agnes Sorel.
+
+It lay on the floor in her bedroom, broken in three places.
+
+Her early days in Ireland had given her a belief in the omens of good
+and evil, for in the "emerald gem of the Western world" superstition
+runs riot.
+
+The faith in it was in her blood, though it needed no broken mirror to
+tell her what dread thing awaited her, towards which she must advance,
+urged by fate.
+
+She had only written one letter, and that one was to Emile.  Now that
+he was gone there was no one else who cared.
+
+Something told her now that his last words had only been an attempt to
+comfort her, to ease her mind, and that she would wait in vain for his
+return.
+
+Estelle would weep for a little while, and drink a great deal to drown
+her tears, and then forget.  They were nearly at the hut now.  She
+could see it, a grotesque shadow thrown across the silvered earth.
+
+She slipped off and walked, leading her mule by the bridle.
+
+Behind her were subdued curses, the rattle of slipping hoofs and
+falling stones, as the animals climbed the last and steepest piece of
+road, which ended in the plateau on which the building stood.
+
+In front of it was a single large tree, but most of the ground close by
+bore nothing higher than dwarf shrubs and long grass.
+
+When the cavalcade drew up and dismounted, Vardri was discovered to be
+missing.
+
+He had been late in starting, lagged behind the others and dropped out
+of sight before they were scarcely clear of the town.  Being the last
+of the file his disappearance had not at first been remarked.
+
+Sobrenski refused to allow of time being wasted in a search.
+
+He ordered the rest of the men up into the loft, and Arithelli to her
+work of unharnessing.
+
+He himself remained standing in the shadow of the doorway, his eyes
+narrowed with anger, his thin lips compressed till they were merely a
+line.
+
+Here was a complication that he had not foreseen.  For the first time
+in his life his wit and cunning had been at fault.
+
+He must have been mad not to have kept a sharper lookout on Vardri, but
+he had reckoned he was secure with Arithelli as decoy.
+
+Could it be possible that she had been mad enough to warn Vardri?  If
+so, then why was she here herself?
+
+Either she had more courage or else she was more foolish even than he
+could have believed it possible for a female creature to be.  Women
+took good care of their own skins in general!
+
+If Vardri meant to try and escape, surely they would have gone together.
+
+Perhaps his, Sobrenski's, detailed descriptions of the fate of others
+who had attempted flight had made her decide that it would be safer to
+remain and throw herself on the mercy of himself and his companions.
+
+He might have miscalculated the force of her attraction for Vardri, but
+he felt perfectly certain that she was reduced to a state of mechanical
+imbecility.  She could not escape now at all events, even if she
+suddenly changed her mind.
+
+He would give them both five minutes, and then if Vardri did not
+appear--!
+
+He began to walk up and down outside, like some prowling animal
+awaiting its prey.
+
+At regular intervals his shadow crossed and recrossed the patch of
+light from the open door.
+
+Meanwhile Vardri was riding leisurely up the slope, reining back his
+horse, and stopping at intervals to put a fair distance between himself
+and the others.  He intended to make a chance of seeing Arithelli alone
+again, so he meant to wait till the whole crew, and especially
+Sobrenski, were safely embarked on their eternal discussions.  Then he
+would slip in and help her with the animals, and live in Paradise again
+for a little space of time.
+
+He had been to her rooms earlier in the day but she had sent down a
+message to beg him to excuse her.  She had a headache, and was lying
+down, so he had been obliged to go away unsolaced, and longing for the
+evening.
+
+Now that she had given him her promise to go with him to Austria, there
+was only to arrange the day and the hour of their departure.  For once
+he was alive to the necessity for prompt action.  There was her safety
+to be considered now.  When he had been alone it had not mattered how
+anything was done or not done, but now everything was different.  The
+world itself was another place.  He had already actually written and
+posted a tentative letter to his father, such a letter as he could
+never have written if only his interests had been concerned, but he
+found any sacrifice an easy one now, even the sacrifice of pride.
+
+There was no reason why they should not start to-morrow.  It would be
+safer to get out of the place by going round by the Mediterranean and
+thence across by way of Italy.
+
+Water-travelling was cheaper, too.  He laughed to himself to think how
+practical he was becoming.  How strange it would seem to live in a
+civilised fashion again, to not be obliged to look at every sou before
+it was spent, to have servants to wait upon one; enough to eat and
+drink, and the luxury of cleanliness.
+
+Yet the vagabond life had had its charm, too.  He had encountered
+kindness often, generally from those in more evil plight than his own,
+and there had been flowers and music and sunshine.  True, he had felt
+horribly ill and dejected on some days, and his wretched cough was an
+annoyance to himself and to other people, but at times he felt ready
+for anything, and more energetic than any three of those lazy Spaniards.
+
+Love and Arithelli would be a sure antidote for any misery or disease.
+For her he had created a House of Dreams, and now the dreams were on
+the verge of becoming realities.  Instead of the sand and stones of
+that desert that men call Life, a rainbow-coloured future lay stretched
+out before him.  Sunshine and the summertime of love, all that he had
+ever hoped for, were coming nearer.  And joy was hovering near at hand,
+till he could almost touch her flying robe.  Soon he would hold her in
+his arms, would possess her entirely.
+
+How different Arithelli was from all other women!  With her there was
+never caprice or fickleness.  Whatever she said was his law, whatever
+she wished to do was the right thing.
+
+Now he had abjured the Revolution, his father would be only too glad to
+have him back, to see him married to a woman of Arithelli's charm and
+breeding.  There had never been any quarrel with his family, except
+when he had joined the Red Flag party, and it was only natural that
+they should quarrel over that.  Love or the Revolution?  There would
+never be any more doubt now as to which he would choose.
+
+In the old days he had preferred starvation, and the freedom to act,
+and think as he liked.  He had gloried in being an outcast, in
+suffering for the Cause.  Life had been hard at times, but he had known
+men of ideals and enthusiasms and there had been a certain fascination
+in the excitement of being hunted.  But now that was all over and a new
+day was dawning for them both, for himself and for Arithelli.
+
+He spoke to his horse and stirred it into a quicker pace.
+
+They must be well out of the way and she would think he was never
+coming.
+
+Inside the stable Arithelli, tall and straight in her scarlet shirt,
+moved to and fro at her work, hanging up saddles and bridles, carrying
+pails of water, ranging on either side of the hut the horses and the
+mules.  Tortured as she was with anxiety, she did not forget the wants
+of her friends the animals.  It came across her mind how once when she
+had said to Vardri, "Let us see to the horses first," he had said half
+in jest, "If I were a Spaniard I should be jealous.  You always think
+of the animals before everything else."
+
+One by one the rest of the conspirators tramped heavily up the ladder,
+leaving her alone with Sobrenski, who stood with his back to the
+doorway, following her with his eyes as she moved to and fro in the
+shadows cast by the solitary lamps.
+
+Before he mounted the ladder in his turn, he came across the hut, took
+her by the shoulder and spoke to her.  "Be careful how you do your
+work, for if it is not well done others will do it for you."
+
+She could not answer; she shuddered at his touch; her hands went up and
+covered her face.
+
+Sobrenski turned and mounted the worn rungs of the narrow ladder with a
+lithe, active step.  He was quite sure of her now.  She would not fail
+to carry out his will.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+  "Il n'y a que l'amour et la mort."
+
+
+For a few minutes after he had gone, Arithelli stood motionless, still
+with her hands pressed tightly over her eyes, trying to command her
+brain to work clearly.  Her will and her limbs seemed paralysed.  She
+could only wait for Vardri's approach.  Once she prayed an inarticulate
+wordless prayer, that inspiration might be sent her to find a way out
+of this _impasse_ in which there seemed neither light nor opening.
+
+Time was passing, and every moment was bringing her nearer the most
+appalling destiny that could ever be meted out to any woman.  If she
+did Sobrenski's bidding she would be not only a murderess, but the
+murderess of the being she loved most in the world.  Vardri, who was so
+different from all the other men; Vardri, who could never bear anything
+to be hurt, or even to be made uncomfortable.  She knew that it was
+perfectly useless for both of them to attempt to escape.  Someone was
+most likely posted at the window of the loft, they would get no
+distance on foot without being overtaken, and if she attempted to lead
+out any of the horses or mules, the noise would probably attract
+attention.
+
+Her hands fell to her side, and her head went up as she listened
+intently.  So he was coming, after all.  In that undisturbed space and
+clear dry air, sound travelled quickly, and she could hear the
+approaching hoof-beats while he was still some way off.  With the
+knowledge of his approach the blood flowed again warmly in her veins
+and courage and decision came back to her.  Her senses, unnaturally
+acute, told her that Vardri had now dismounted and was leading his
+horse.  She could distinguish his footsteps, and then the monotonous
+regular footfalls of his mount.  She ran out into the patch of
+moonlight, casting a hurried backward glance at the side of the hut.
+Thank God! the window was on the other side!
+
+Vardri was coming slowly towards her, his horse's bridle over his arm.
+Before she covered the distance between them she made a gesture that
+enjoined silence and stopped his greeting.  "Don't bring your horse
+in," she whispered.  "Tie him up out of the way over there, a good way
+off the hut.  I'll explain presently."
+
+In another moment Vardri was beside her in the hut and had her in his
+arms.
+
+"What is it, _mon petit_?  There must be something wrong.  Has
+Sobrenski--?"
+
+"No, no, he has done nothing.  It's just that I don't want you to be up
+here too long to-night.  I want you to do something for me.  Will you,
+Vardri?"
+
+"Do you think you'll need to ask me twice to do anything for you, dear?"
+
+He stood with his hands on her shoulders, his dark eyes gazing down at
+her hungrily.  "Did you think I was never coming?  I stayed behind on
+purpose.  I felt that Sobrenski intended to prevent our talking
+together."  Arithelli snatched eagerly at his words.  They had given
+her the clue she wanted.
+
+"Yes, that's it.  It's dangerous for me if we are seen often together.
+I've done something so mad and foolish, Vardri, you must help me to put
+it right,--you _can_.  Those letters you have written me saying all
+sorts of things against the Cause,--I left a piece of one about
+somewhere,--I don't know where,--and Sobrenski found it.  He has just
+told me that in about half an hour's time before all the rest of them
+leave, he is going to send on one of the men in advance.  He will get
+down to the town before us, go to my rooms and yours and collect all
+the letters that have passed between us; and use them, as then he will
+have what he has always wanted,--the proofs that we are what he would
+call traitors.  And when he has these proofs, neither of us will be
+safe for an instant.  It will mean death to both of us sooner or later.
+But even Sobrenski can't murder us without sufficient evidence.  He
+will be obliged to make some formal parade of justice to put it all
+before the rest of the society.  If he doesn't get our letters he will
+not have sufficient evidence."
+
+"But if we go away together to-night, as we intended?  We've got a
+start.  We can take the best horses.  That is the best plan."
+
+Arithelli shook her head.  "Listen to me, dear, and believe in a
+woman's wisdom for once.  If we go to-night and together, we are bound
+to be recaptured before we are out of Barcelona.  By doing what I
+suggest we avoid suspicion, we give ourselves breathing-space, time to
+arrange a disguise, to think of all sorts of things that we have
+overlooked.  We have everything in our favour to-night, Sobrenski does
+not know you are here yet.  If you go soon you will get away without
+his having seen you at all.  Here is the key of my room.  Go there
+first, and you will find all your own letters in a wooden box in my big
+trunk.  That isn't locked.  Open it and burn them all.  Then go on to
+your own room, do the same with yours and stay there.  If they raid my
+room, they will find nothing suspicious.  You could pretend you were
+ill, and that's the only reason you haven't come tonight, and I am here
+doing my work as usual.  Nothing could be less suspicious.  Then when
+they are off their guard we can escape."
+
+The minutes were flying.  Death thrusting his lean face before the rosy
+face of Love.  Sobrenski's phrase sounded in her ears like the tolling
+of a bell.  "You have an hour free to do your work."  An hour, only an
+hour!  How long had they been there already?  Time and all else alike
+seemed blurred.  All her will must be concentrated upon one thing--to
+make Vardri leave her as quickly as possible.  Yet she dare not show a
+sign of haste or emotion lest he should suspect something amiss and
+refuse to go.
+
+"Dear, it is a wonderful plan this, of yours," Vardri was saying.  "But
+how can I leave you here alone with these devils?  It makes me cold to
+think of it."
+
+"You'll leave me because I shall be safer alone.  You _must_ see that,
+_mon ami_."  She clung to him, putting up her face towards his.  Every
+art of womanhood must be used to weave a spell to send him from her and
+to save him.  "Will you not do as I ask you?"
+
+"I'll do anything in the world for you," the boy broke out eagerly;
+"I'd have my hand cut off to save you a minute's pain."
+
+"I know, _mon ami_.  And this is such a little thing, and so much
+depends upon its being done quickly."
+
+What was that?  A step on the ladder?  She could not control a violent
+start.  No, it was only a creaking rung, a stamp from one of the mules.
+
+"But you haven't broken your promise to me.  You swear to come away
+with me soon?"
+
+"To-morrow if you will.  Once the letters are burnt we are almost safe.
+Only one day more.  It doesn't make any difference."
+
+"It does to me, _mon petit_.  Every moment, every hour without you is
+time wasted."
+
+"But you'll go, dear, before Sobrenski sees us together?"
+
+"My sweet, if it is for your good, of course I will go.  You're right
+about the letters; I ought to have known it wasn't safe to keep them.
+As you say, they've got no circumstantial evidence if those are
+destroyed, and it only means a few more hours' delay in our getting
+off.  I'll go, darling.  I'll get down the hills in no time.  It's the
+best horse of the lot, that one outside.  But before I go give me
+yourself for a few minutes."
+
+Arithelli let him lead her unresisting towards the corner of the hut,
+and lay her gently back upon a truss of hay that he had covered with a
+cloak.  She had not the strength to deny him their last few minutes
+together.  Every fibre in her own nature, the lover, the mother, the
+child, were all crying out for him.  How gentle he had been, how he had
+always cared for her.  No one had ever touched her like this before,
+spoken to her in this caressing voice.  Emile had been kind in his way,
+but he had been always rough.  Her own emotions had always lain buried
+deeply, and now they had been called to life she longed for the natural
+expression of her love through the medium of physical things, by word
+and touch.
+
+"Now for my reward," Vardri said.  "I want to take your hair down."
+
+Arithelli bent her head towards him without speaking and he drew the
+pins, and undid the braid with deft fingers, spreading it out till it
+covered her as with a veil.
+
+"If only I could paint you!  How beautiful you are to-night, but how
+still and cold!  Fatalite, tell me you love me a little, _mon coeur_!"
+
+She put her arms round his neck, laying her cheek against his.  "_Mon
+ami_, I love you!"
+
+He held her in his arms as one holds a child, rocking her to and fro.
+"_Voila cherie_!" he whispered.  "After to-morrow I shall have you
+always, I shall never let you go again.  My dream is coming true."
+
+Arithelli listened with dry eyes and an aching heart.  She was past
+crying, and her brain felt curiously reasonable and alert.  She could
+not send him from her at once, yet with every passing second Death drew
+stealthily nearer and nearer.  Time swept on relentless and inflexible.
+
+"Perhaps you will be disappointed in me one of these days, find me
+depressing and full of moods.  I've always been so lonely, you know,
+till I met you.  _Je suis une ame detachee_."
+
+"Never again while I'm alive!  I think of you and with you.  When you
+are happy I know it, and when you are miserable I know it too.
+Fatalite!  Fatalite! believe that I don't want anything in return.
+I'll wait on you, work for you, lie, starve, steal, do anything.  I
+only want to know you're there, to have the right to serve you, to feel
+you don't hate me.  I couldn't go on living it I lost you.  Since the
+first day I saw you at the Hippodrome you've haunted me.  I led Don
+Juan down to the entrance to the ring.  You don't remember?  How should
+you?  I've never forgotten!  You smiled and thanked me.  You looked so
+strange beside Estelle and those other women."
+
+He was kneeling beside her, his lips pressed against the hollow of her
+arm, from which the loose red sleeve had slipped back to above the
+elbow.  Under his passionate words Arithelli sat like a being
+entranced, unseeing, unhearing.  The inscrutable eyes set in the rigid
+face gave her the likeness to some carven thing.
+
+"Fatalite!  Fatalite!"
+
+The sound of his voice came to her as from a distance.  She roused
+herself, and tried to smile.  "_Mon ami_, I'm a little tired to-night,
+a little nervous; I was thinking about the letters!  I shall feel so
+much safer when they're burnt."
+
+"I'll go at once--just one moment.  Arithelli, you do believe that I
+love you, and that I want nothing?  See, I'll not even touch your hand
+if it doesn't please you."
+
+The soft hand was laid gently on his.  "But if it _does_ please me,
+_mon camarade_--"
+
+"_Dieu_!  How sweet you are!  But don't call me '_Camarade_,' _mon
+petit_.  Those wolves above call each other that!"
+
+"I won't, if you hate it.  Yes, that's really love to give all and take
+nothing."  Arithelli spoke dreamily.  "Emile made me sing to him before
+he went away; you remember 'L'Adieu' of Schubert?  He loved it.
+
+  "La mort est une amie,
+  Qui rend la liberte."
+
+
+"C'est bien vrai ca!  I used to sing it without thinking at one time.
+How alike all those songs are.  Always Death;--Death and Liberty!"
+
+"Don't talk of those things, dear.  It's going to be Life for both of
+us--after to-morrow."
+
+"I was thinking of poor Emile."
+
+"He was always fond of you.  He'll be glad when he hears you're married
+and safe."
+
+"Yes, he'll be glad.  Don't talk any more for a minute, dear, then just
+say _au revoir_ to me and go as quickly as you can.  I want to be
+quiet.  It's good to be loved.  How gentle you are!  Emile was always
+so rough when he touched me."
+
+Vardri hung over her, caressing her with infinite tenderness.  Of all
+men in the world he was surely the happiest to have known this sweet
+and womanly Arithelli, the Arithelli that no one else had ever seen.
+He kissed the heavy, closed lids and stroked back the hair from her
+forehead.
+
+A faint intoxicating odour of jasmine hovered about her, for she was
+Eastern in her love of perfumes.  The stifling, dirty hut became a
+Paradise while she lay thus in his arms.
+
+Once again they kissed and clung together.  Though Arithelli's lips
+burnt, they scorched with the fires of despair rather than with those
+of passion.
+
+In silence Vardri helped her to her feet, and they walked together to
+the door.
+
+"You'll come to me to-morrow," Arithelli said.
+
+"To-morrow we shall be safe.  We'll be out of this hell altogether in
+another day or two, _a la bonne heure_!  You're not afraid, Fatalite?"
+
+"I shan't be--when the letters are safe.  Take care of yourself, _mon
+ami, et a bientot_!"
+
+"_Mon Dieu_! what pluck you have!  How I love you for it!  Go back and
+rest, dear, till those brutes come down.  Give me your hand again,
+Fatalite, _bien aimee! gardez-vous, mais gardez-vous_!"
+
+She answered him steadily.  "_A demain_.  _Adieu, mon ami_.  Ride as
+quickly as you can, but lead your horse for the first few minutes."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+  "Le jeu est fait, rien ne vas plus!"
+
+
+He was gone, and Arithelli was back in the hut again, and now the worst
+of it all was still to come.  If Vardri was to have a fair start she
+must wait out the hour alone, realising every moment of the time what
+awaited her at the end of it.
+
+A mad impulse seized her to rush up the steps to the loft, interrupt
+the meeting, defy them all and boast how she had schemed her lover's
+escape, and laugh at them and their plots, goad them into shooting her
+at once and finishing it all quickly.  She felt that she could not
+endure any more suspense and strain.  Anything would be better than
+this interminable, awful waiting in the semi-darkness and loneliness,
+with neither friend nor lover at hand, no single human to take her part
+or defend her.  Emile had gone and now Vardri, and she must face
+everything alone.  If she waited Vardri would have perhaps half an
+hour's grace and while they were dealing with her it would give him
+still another few minutes, and every minute counted.
+
+She fought down the temptation, and began to move about, speaking to
+the mules and, horses, taking down saddles and bridles.  She must not
+be too quiet, or they might suspect something, and come down sooner to
+see if she were still there.  She must pretend to be busy, play out the
+play to the end.
+
+She unhooked the lantern from its nail and placed it on the ground, and
+then stood still again to listen.
+
+The smothered hum of voices grew louder overhead.  It stopped suddenly,
+and she could only hear Sobrenski's slow, incisive tones.  No doubt
+they were listening to him as to one inspired while he preached his
+gospel of destruction.  Arithelli shivered, pressing her hands over her
+ears that she might shut out the sound of that hated voice that had
+bidden her outrage her sex.
+
+She stumbled towards the bed of hay, still warm with the impress of her
+own figure, and flung herself upon it face downwards and lay there
+whispering to herself over and over again Vardri's name as one whispers
+a charm.
+
+Would he forget her one of these days and marry someone else?  Had it
+been real, anything of this that she had lived through during these
+months in Spain?  Was she still that same "Arithelli of the Hippodrome"
+who had come gaily into Barcelona with her ridiculous dresses and her
+belief in herself and her career?  She had known an hour of love and
+passion, and that had been worth all the rest Emile had always told her
+that people were not meant to be happy long _ici-bas_.  She must pay
+now for her hour.  The gods were angry and must have a sacrifice.
+
+After she had been out in Barcelona only a week, Emile had taken her to
+one of the gambling-hells of the place, where the lights and mirrors
+and gilding hurt her tired eyes, and the croupiers called incessantly
+through the strained silence, "_Le jeu est fait_.  _Rien ne vas plus_!"
+
+It was like that with her now, "_Le jeu est fait_."  How that sentence
+heat in her brain!  She wondered if she were becoming delirious.  Then
+she was on her feet, and her hand went to the Browning pistol at her
+belt.  Sobrenski's figure had appeared at the top of the ladder.  He
+was shading his eyes with his hand, and peering forward into the gloom.
+Only one of them there!  The girl or Vardri, which was it?
+
+Then the whole place was in darkness, for Arithelli had overturned and
+extinguished the solitary lamp.  The excited whinny of a horse mingled
+with the sound of two shots fired in rapid succession, a rustling noise
+among the hay, a groan, and silence.  Before he set foot on the ladder
+Sobrenski shouted to the rest of the conspirators to bring a light.  He
+did not wait to look at the prone figure, but made straight for the
+door.  His business it was first to see whether his quarry were still
+in sight.
+
+All the other men were hustling each other in a hasty descent.  "_Que
+diable_!" one of them said.  "What is it now?  A spy?"
+
+The man who had lowered Arithelli from the window of the house in the
+Calle de Pescadores, made his way first to where Arithelli lay and
+stood beside her.  He could only see dimly the outline of a figure
+which might have been either that of a man or woman.  "Bring a light
+here," Valdez called impatiently.  "Which of them is it?"  Though he
+was a revolutionist he was still a human being, and he had always been
+as sorry for her as he had dared allow himself to be, and he hoped it
+was not the girl.  Another man came up carrying a lantern, and flashed
+the light on what rested motionless at their feet.  Arithelli lay on
+her face as she had fallen.  Her hair streamed over her shoulders and
+mingled with the dark folds of the cloak.  The hand that still held the
+pistol was flung wide.
+
+"It's not Vardri," the other man said.  "Is it--?"  Sobrenski cut
+across the question.  "A traitor," he said.  "What does it matter about
+the name?  Get back all of you and see to the horses.  There should be
+two of them and there's only one here.  We've got to find the other
+one."
+
+With a sudden brusque movement Valdez knelt down, turned the limp body
+over, and rested the head upon his knee.  "_Pardieu_!" he ejaculated as
+he let it fall gently back.  "It's Fatalite!"
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HIPPODROME***
+
+
+******* This file should be named 19943.txt or 19943.zip *******
+
+
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/9/9/4/19943
+
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+http://www.gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3.  YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
+page at http://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations.
+To donate, please visit:
+http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     http://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
+
diff --git a/19943.zip b/19943.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0dc441c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/19943.zip
diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6312041
--- /dev/null
+++ b/LICENSE.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,11 @@
+This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements,
+metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be
+in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES.
+
+Procedures for determining public domain status are described in
+the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org.
+
+No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in
+jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize
+this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright
+status under the laws that apply to them.
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d4d5b77
--- /dev/null
+++ b/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #19943 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19943)