"I didn't see her, Harry. She sent word that she was not at home."
"You don't mean—not after you started upstairs."
"Yes—and she hasn't spoken to me all evening."
"And she left me waiting at home for half an hour. It's outrageous."
Harry strode across the floor just as the music ceased, and Baskinelli arose, bowing to the applause of his feminine admirers.
"May I ask the honor to show to you Madame Courtelyou's portrait of myself? It is called 'The Glorification of Imbecility,'" he said as he proffered his arm to Pauline.
He was a small man, with sharp features shadowed by a mass of flowing, curling hair—the kind of hair that has come to be called "musical" by the irreverent. The sweep of an abnormal brow gave emphasis to the sudden jut of deep eye sockets, and a dull, sallow skin gave emphasis to the subtle sinister light, of the eyes themselves.
Pauline accepted the proffered arm of the artist, but daintily, laughingly, she turned him back to the piano.
"You haven't yet escaped, Signor Baskinelli," she said. "We have not yet heard 'Tivoli,' you know."
"Tivoli," he cried, with hands upraised in mock disdain. "Why, I wrote the thing myself. Am I to violate even my own masterpieces?"