Dr. Chantel struck a few jangling chords, and skipping adroitly over sick notes, ran a flourish.  The billiard-players joined the circle, with absent, serious faces.  The singer cleared his throat, took on a preternatural solemnity, and began.  In a dismal, gruff voice, he proclaimed himself a miner, deep, deep down:—­

“And few, I trow, of my being know,
And few that an atom care!”

His hearers applauded this gloomy sentiment, till his cheeks flushed again with honest satisfaction.  But in the full sweep of a brilliant interlude, Chantel suddenly broke down.

“I cannot,” he declared sharply.  As he turned on the squealing stool, they saw his face white and strangely wrought.  “I had meant,” he said, with painful precision, “to say nothing to-night, and act as—­I cannot.  Judge you, what I feel.”

He got uncertainly to his feet, hesitating.

“Ladies, you will not be alarmed.”  The four players caught his eye, and nodded.  “It is well that you know.  There is no danger here, more than—­I am since disinfected.  Monsieur Jolivet, my compatriot—­You see, you understand.  Yes, the plague.”

For a space, the distant hum of the streets invaded the room.  Then Heywood’s book of music slapped the floor like a pistol-shot.

“You left him!” He bounced from his chair, raging.  “You—­Peng!  Where’s my cap?”

Quick as he was, the dark-eyed girl stood blocking his way.

“Not you, Mr. Heywood,” she said quietly.  “I must go stay with him.”

They confronted each other, man and woman, as if for a combat of will.  The outbreak of voices was cut short; the whole company stood, like Homeric armies, watching two champions.  Chantel, however, broke the silence.

“Nobody must go.”  He eyed them all, gravely.  “I left him, yes.  He does not need any one.  Personne.  Very sudden.  He went to the school sick this morning.  Swollen axillae—­the poor fool, not to know!—­et puis—­enfin—­He is dead.”

Heywood pitched his cap on the green field of the billiard-cloth.

“The poor pedagogue!” he said bitterly. “He was going Home.”

Sudden, hot and cold, like the thrust of a knife, it struck Rudolph that he had heard the voice of this first victim,—­the peevish voice which cried so weakly for a little silence, at early daylight, that very morning.  A little silence:  and he had received the great.

A gecko fell from the ceiling, with a tiny thump that made all start.  He had struck the piano, and the strings answered with a faint, aeolian confusion.  Then, as they regarded one another silently, a rustle, a flurry, sounded on the stairs.  A woman stumbled into the loft, sobbing, crying something inarticulate, as she ran blindly toward them, with white face and wild eyes.  She halted abruptly, swayed as though to fall, and turned, rather by instinct than by vision, to the other women.

“Bertha!” protested Gilly, with a helpless stare.  “My dear!”