"Well, everything has to be taken into consideration."

"You talk just as if I were serious about it," he cried. "Altogether you act as if you didn't care, as if you would like to be rid of me in a twinkling."

With languid eagerness Lilly tried to a.s.sure him she did not wish to stand in his way, not in the least, least bit. She had only his happiness at heart, and if he cared to make her proud by showing confidence in her, he would not take this step, neither now nor later, without discussing it with her beforehand.

He was touched. He kissed her and said:

"Oh, it's nonsense."

But the conversation left Lilly as in a nightmare, and the one thought obsessed her:

"If he deserts me, I shall sink into the mire after all."

Grief over her mother's death was a vanishing cloud compared with this torturing anguish.

The vultures Mrs Jula had spoken of occurred to her, all those vultures with their white fronts and black dress suits, who were waiting to s.n.a.t.c.h her to themselves with their moneyed claws the instant her friend and protector abandoned her. From them her thoughts flitted to those other vultures in Kellermann's picture, who perched on the sunburnt rocks ready to pounce on the naked beauty when she should lose the strength to defend herself.

"Her chains are her weapons," thought Lilly. "And that's the way it is with me. If I am set free, I am lost."

The next day she and Richard carefully avoided the dangerous topic, though Richard remained distraught and uneasy.

Finally Lilly took courage, and though her feelings compressed her throat like a murderous clutch, she said:

"I see you haven't come to a decision yet, Richard. Wouldn't you like to bring me her picture, so that I can see what she is like? No one knows you so well as I do, and no one will know so well whether she suits you or not."

Richard violently denied that he was undecided. What did _he_ care for that doll of a girl?

But his resentment was disingenuous, and his eyes stared into vacancy.

She had five millions.

And the next day he actually brought the photograph.

Lilly laid it down without unwrapping it. Mere contact with the picture made her hands tremble. She feared the first sight of the girl's face would expose her own great distress.

"Why, you're not even looking at it," said Richard, with some disappointment in his tone.

"Time enough after you've gone," said Lilly, rejoiced that she could smile so indifferently.

She called to him when he was out in the hall:

"I'll tell you to-morrow--you'll know then."

The next instant she caught up the picture. Her heart knocked at her ribs. But first she had to wave "good-by" to Richard, as was her habit and duty.

And then--and then--

A girl's face, good, placid, somewhat peaked, with poor, though amiable eyes. Her blond hair was plaited country fashion, and the heavy braids, thick as a woman's wrist, drew her head back a bit. A timid smile played about her full lips.

Something just to be loved, something which would revive with happiness as a spray of lilacs in fresh water. Not turbulent, none too gifted--wifely and yielding.

Just what Richard needed.

Lilly placed the picture on a chair and threw herself on her knees in front of it. She prayed and wrestled with her soul.

She had to reiterate again and again:

"Just what he needs. He won't have another such chance."

And the five millions!

If she were not to set him free she would be one of those harpies which Mrs. Jula said the world of respectability considered her and her like to be.

"But I am in possession, therefore mine is the right. What good are her five millions to me, if I go to ruin on account of them? Why need I sacrifice myself for him, for him or for anybody in the wide world?"

"Harpy, harpy!" rang in between.

So thought the vampires described in children's mythologies as having beautiful hair and murderous claws.

"I will tear to shreds the flesh of him whom I possess."

Oh, what a night!

She crouched in bed with her knees drawn up and her face buried in her lap, sobbing, sobbing.

At last, toward morning, she found what she had been seeking. Out of tears, out of bitterness, out of shuddering and prayer arose the alleviating resolve: that very afternoon when he came she would tell him--but no!--why wait until the afternoon? Why wait until he entered the rooms where the force of familiarity, his loving resistance might shiver the great sacrificial work to bits?

It must be in some other place where she seemed more of a stranger to him, which she could leave the instant she felt his proximity caused her to waver.

She was not allowed to visit him in his office without special permission. But at the midday recess, when it was quieter than at other times, he retired to his back room for his actual work of the day, and she might be sure of entering unseen and speaking to him without fear of interruption.

So sacred a resolve sanctioned everything.

She used the morning for a.s.sorting his letters and tying them together.

She wanted to hand them to him along with his betrothed's picture when she bade him farewell. He need never fear she might cause him trouble in the future.

Then she dressed--more carefully than usual--washed herself with milk of lilacs to remove the traces of tears, waved her hair, and drew it into a knot at the nape of her neck, as she had seen on statues of Greek women.

She was their equal--like them, serenely raised above sorrow and joy.

She drove to the office.

The clock struck quarter past one when she stood in front of the columned gateway.

n.o.body was to be seen in the yard except the porter, who lifted his cap with a confidential smile.

She was still their employer's mistress.

If only she had taken the precaution to send in her card.