At the end of the performance, Tavernake made his way to the stage-door and waited. The neighborhood was an unsavory one, and the building itself seemed crowded in among a row of shops of the worst order, fish stalls, and a glaring gin palace. Long before Beatrice came out, Tavernake could hear the professor's voice down the covered passage, the professor's voice apparently raised in anger.
“Undutiful behavior, that's what I call it—undutiful!”
They emerged into the street, the professor very much the same as usual; Beatrice paler, with a pathetic droop about her mouth. Tavernake came eagerly forward.
“Beatrice!” he cried, holding out his hand.
The professor drew back. Beatrice stood still,—for a moment it seemed as though she were about to faint. Tavernake grasped her hands.
“I am so sorry!” he exclaimed, clumsily. “I ought not to have come up like that.”
She smiled a little wan smile.
“I am quite all right,” she replied, “only the heat inside was rather trying, and even out here the atmosphere isn't too good, is it? How did you find us out?”
“By chance again,” Tavernake answered. “I have news. May I walk with you a few steps?”
She glanced timidly toward her father. The professor was holding aloof in dignified silence.