Mr. Sabin, with his training and natural power of seeing through the words to the heart of the speaker, could not misunderstand her, and he spoke with a gentle earnestness very moving.
“Believe me, my dear lady, when I say that to every one once at least in his life there comes a chance of happiness, although every one is not wise enough to take it. I had my chance, and I threw it away: there has never been an hour in my life since then that I have not regretted it. Let me help you to be wiser than I was. I am an old man now; I have played for high stakes and have had my share of winning; I have been involved in great affairs, I have played my part in the making of history. And I speak from experience; security lies in middle ways, and happiness belongs to the simple life. To what has my interest in things of high import brought me? I am an exile from my country, doomed to pass the small remainder of my days among a people whom I know not and with whom I have nothing in common.
“I have a heart and now I am paying the penalty for having treated badly the one woman who had power to touch it; so bitter a penalty that I would I could save you from the experiencing the like. You come to me for advice; then be advised by me. Leave meddling with affairs that are too high for you. Walk in those middle ways where safety is, and lead the simple life where alone happiness is. And let me part from you knowing that to one human being at least I have helped to give what alone is worth the having. Need I say any more?”
She took his hands and pressed them.
“Goodbye,” she said. “I shall start for Germany to-morrow.”
So Mr. Sabin was left free to return to his former melancholy mood; but it was not long before fresh interruption came. A servant brought a cablegram.
“Be sure you deliver my letter to Lenox,” it ran, and the signature was “Felix.”
He rolled the paper into a little ball and threw it on one side, and presently went into his dressing-room to change for dinner. As he came into the hall another servant brought him another cablegram. He opened it and read—
“Deliver my letter at once.—Felix.”