Lize paused; he saw her fully in the brave illumination—the large black hat, the close-clad figure, the pallid face—and as he looked, she smiled unexpectedly and, putting out her hand, patted him on the shoulder.
"Good-bye, mon enfant! Go home! Youth comes but once; and this Blake—he is a good boy!"
Before he could answer, before he could return smile or touch, she was gone—absorbed into the maze of lights, and he was alone, to turn which way he would.
CHAPTER XXXVIII
THE fifth floor was dim and silent, the door of M. Cartel's appartement was closed; but Max, mounting the stairs two steps at a time, was not daunted by silence or lack of light. Max was once again a prey to impulse, and under the familiar tyranny, his blood burned—raced in his veins, sang in his cars.
Without an instant's pause, he knocked on M. Cartel's door, and when his knock was answered by Jacqueline—fair and cool-looking, oven in the great heat—words rushed from him as they had been wont to rush when life was a gay affair.
"You are alone, Jacqueline?"
Jacqueline nodded quickly, comprehending a crisis.