"Indeed!" retorted Béla airily. "How did you manage to do that?"
"I rendered her a service this afternoon—she was in serious trouble and asked me to help her."
"Oh?—and may I ask the nature of the trouble—and of the service?" sneered the other.
"Never mind about the nature of the service. I did help Klara in her trouble, and in return she has given me a solemn promise to have nothing whatever more to do with you."
"Oh! did she?" cried Béla, whose savage temper, held in check for awhile, had at last risen to its habitual stage of unbridled fury. All the hot blood had rushed to his head, making his face crimson and his eye glowing and unsteady, and his hand shook visibly as he leaned against the table so that the mugs and bottles rattled, as did the key upon the metal tray. He, too, felt that hideous red mist enveloping him and blurring his sight. He hated Andor with all his might, and would have strangled him if he had felt that he had the physical power to do it as well as the moral strength. His voice came hoarse and hissing through his throat as he murmured through tightly clenched teeth:
"She did, did she? And you made her give you that promise which is not going to bind her, let me tell you that. But let me also tell you in the meanwhile, my fine gentleman from America, that your d——d interference will do no good to your former sweetheart, who is already as good as my wife—and will be my wife to-morrow. Klara Goldstein is my friend, let me tell you that, and . . ."
He paused a moment . . . something had arrested the words in his throat. As so often occurs in the mysterious workings of Fate, a small, apparently wholly insignificant event suddenly caused the full tide of his destiny to turn—and not only of his own destiny but that of many others!
An event—a tiny fact—trivial enough for the moment: the touch of his hand against the key upon the brass tray.
Mechanically he picked up the key: his mind was not yet working quite clearly, but the shifty glance of his one eye rested upon the key, and contemplated it for awhile.
"Well!" he murmured vaguely at last, "how strange!"