The curtain had scarcely rung up upon the second act of the ballet when a young lady who met from all the loungers, and even from the doorkeeper himself, the most respectful attention, issued from the stage-door at the Empire and stepped into the large motor car which was waiting, drawn up against the curb. The door was opened from inside and closed at once. She held out her hands, as yet ungloved, to the man who sat back in the corner.
“At last!” she murmured. “And I thought, indeed, that you had forsaken me.”
He took her hands and held them tightly, but he answered only in a whisper. He wore a sombre black cloak and a broad-brimmed black hat. A muffler concealed the lower part of his face. She put her finger upon the electric light, but he stopped her.
“I must not be recognized,” he said thickly. “Forgive me, Louise, if I seem strange at first, but there is more in it than I can tell you. No one must know that I am in London to-night. When we reach this place to which you are taking me, and we are really alone, then we can talk. I have so much to say.”
She looked at him doubtfully. It was indeed a moment of indecision with her. Then she began to laugh softly.
“Dear one, but you have changed!” she exclaimed, compassionately. “After all, why not? I must not forget that things have gone so hardly with you. It seems odd, indeed, to see you sitting there, muffled up like an old man, afraid to show yourself. You know how foolish you are? With your black cape and that queer hat, you are so different from all the others. If you seek to remain unrecognized, why do you not dress as all the men do? Any one who was suspicious would recognize you from your clothes.”
“It is true,” he muttered. “I did not think of it.”
She leaned towards him.
“You will not even kiss me?” she murmured.
“Not yet,” he answered.