and just at the time of life when, for various causes, the art which conceals art has become indispensable.  He did not flatter himself that Alma was ready to fall in love with him; and here his calm maturity served him ill.  To his own defect of ardour he was blinded by habit.  After all, the affair had little consequence.  It had only suggested itself after the meeting in Munich, and perhaps —­ he said to himself —­ all things considered, the event was just as well.

But Alma felt the double insult, to her worldly honour, to her womanhood.  The man had not even made pretence of loving her; and this, whilst it embittered her disappointment, strengthened her to cast from her mind the baser temptation.  Marriage she would have accepted, though doubtless with becoming hesitancy; the offer could not have been made without one word of tenderness (for Cyrus Redgrave was another than Felix Dymes), and she had not felt it impossible to wed this polished capitalist.  Out of the tumult of her feelings, as another day went by, issued at length that one simple and avowable sense of disappointment.  She had grasped the prize, and heated her imagination in regarding it; had overcome natural reluctances, objections personal and moral; was ready to sit down and write to Mrs. Frothingham the splendid, startling announcement.  And here she idled in her bedroom, desolate, hopeless, wishing she had courage to steal down at night to the waters of the Bodensee, and end it all.

On the third day she returned to Munich, having said farewell to her friend, who was quite prepared for the parting.  From Munich she proceeded to Leipzig, and there entered again the family circle of the Gassners.  She had no intention of staying for very long; the pretence of musical study could not be kept up; but her next step was quite uncertain.

A fortnight later, Mrs. Frothingham wrote thus:  ——­

’I am sending you on a letter which, if I am not mistaken, comes from Mr Rolfe.  Do tell me if I am right.  Odd that he should write to you, if it is he.  You have not told me yet whether you saw Mr. Redgrave again.  But I see that you don’t care much, and perhaps it is as well.’

The forwarded letter had been originally addressed to the care of Mrs Frothingham, and Alma, at a glance, recognised Harvey Rolfe’s writing.  He dated from London.  Was he mistaken, he began, in thinking that certain photographs from Bregenz had come to him by Miss Frothingham’s kindness?  For his part, he had spent June in a ramble in South-west France, chiefly by the Dordogne, and through a strange, interesting bit of marsh-country, called La Double.  ’I hardly know how I got there, and I shall not worry you by writing any account of the expedition.  But at a miserable village called La Roche Chalais, where I had a most indigestible supper and a bed unworthy of the name, I managed to fall ill, and quite seriously thought, “Ah, here is the end!” It has to come somewhere, and why not on a grabat at La Roche Chalais?  A mistake; I am here again, wasting life as strenuously as ever.  Would you let me hear from you?  I should think it a great addition to your kindness in sending the views.  And so, with every good wish, he remained, &c.