At any rate she dressed, as if she did. A heavy sea-green silk dress plastically encloses her divine form, leaving the bust and arms bare. In her hair, which is done into a single flaming knot, a white water-lily blossoms; from it the leaves of reeds interwoven with a few loose strands fall down toward her neck. There no longer is any trace of agitation or trembling feverishness in her being. She is calm, so calm, that I feel my blood congealing and my heart growing cold under her glance. Slowly, with a weary, indolent majesty, she ascends the marble staircase, lets her precious wrap slide off, and listlessly enters the hall, where the smoke of a hundred candles has formed a silvery mist.

For a few moments my eyes follow her in a daze, then I pick up her furs, which without my being aware, had slipped from my hands. They are still warm from her shoulders.

I kiss the spot, and my eyes fill with tears.

He has arrived.

In his black velvet coat extravagantly trimmed with sable, he is a beautiful, haughty despot who plays with the lives and souls of men.

He stands in the ante-room, looking around proudly, and his eyes rest on me for an uncomfortably long time.

Under his icy glance I am again seized by a mortal fear. I have a presentiment that this man can enchain her, captivate her, subjugate her, and I feel inferior in contrast with his savage masculinity; I am filled with envy, with jealousy.

I feel that I am a queer weakly creature of brains, merely! And what is most humiliating, I want to hate him, but I can't. Why is that among all the host of servants he has chosen me.

With an inimitably aristocratic nod of the head he calls me over to him, and I--I obey his call--against my own will.

"Take my furs," he quickly commands.

My entire body trembles with resentment, but I obey, abjectly like a slave.

All night long I waited in the ante-room, raving as in a fever.

Strange images hovered past my inner eye. I saw their meeting--their long exchange of looks. I saw her float through the hall in his arms, drunken, lying with half-closed lids against his breast. I saw him in the holy of holies of love, lying on the ottoman, not as slave, but as master, and she at his feet. On my knees I served them, the tea-tray faltering in my hands, and I saw him reach for the whip.

But now the servants are talking about him.

He is a man who is like a woman; he knows that he is beautiful, and he acts accordingly. He changes his clothes four or five times a day, like a vain courtesan.

In Paris he appeared first in woman's dress, and the men a.s.sailed him with love-letters. An Italian singer, famous equally for his art and his pa.s.sionate intensity, even invaded his home, and lying on his knees before him threatened to commit suicide if he wouldn't be his.

"I am sorry," he replied, smiling, "I should like to do you the favor, but you will have to carry out your threat, for I am a man."

The drawing-room has already thinned out to a marked degree, but she apparently has no thought of leaving.

Morning is already peering through the blinds.

At last I hear the rustling of her heavy gown which flows along behind her like green waves. She advances step by step, engaged in conversation with him.

I hardly exist for her any longer; she doesn't even trouble to give me an order.

"The cloak for madame," he commands. He, of course, doesn't think of looking after her himself.

While I put her furs about her, he stands to one side with his arms crossed. While I am on my knees putting on her fur over-shoes, she lightly supports herself with her hand on his shoulder. She asks:

"And what about the lioness?"

"When the lion whom she has chosen and with whom she lives is attacked by another," the Greek went on with his narrative, "the lioness quietly lies down and watches the battle. Even if her mate is worsted she does not go to his aid. She looks on indifferently as he bleeds to death under his opponent's claws, and follows the victor, the stronger--that is the female's nature."

At this moment my lioness looked quickly and curiously at me.

It made me shudder, though I didn't know why--and the red dawn immerses me and her and him in blood.

She did not go to bed, but merely threw off her ball-dress and undid her hair; then she ordered me to build a fire, and she sat by the fire-place, and stared into the flames.

"Do you need me any longer, mistress?" I asked, my voice failed me at the last word.

Wanda shook her head.

I left the room, pa.s.sed through the gallery, and sat down on one of the steps, leading from there down into the garden. A gentle north wind brought a fresh, damp coolness from the Arno, the green hills extended into the distance in a rosy mist, a golden haze hovered over the city, over the round cupola of the Duomo.

A few stars still tremble in the pale-blue sky.

I tore open my coat, and pressed my burning forehead against the marble. Everything that had happened so far seemed to me a mere child's play; but now things were beginning to be serious, terribly serious.

I antic.i.p.ated a catastrophe, I visualized it, I could lay hold of it with my hands, but I lacked the courage to meet it. My strength was broken. And if I am honest with myself, neither the pains and sufferings that threatened me, not the humiliations that impended, were the thing that frightened me.

I merely felt a fear, the fear of losing her whom I loved with a sort of fanatical devotion; but it was so overwhelming, so crushing that I suddenly began to sob like a child.

During the day she remained locked in her room, and had the negress attend her. When the evening star rose glowing in the blue sky, I saw her pa.s.s through the garden, and, carefully following her at a distance, watched her enter the shrine of Venus. I stealthily followed and peered through the c.h.i.n.k in the door.

She stood before the divine image of the G.o.ddess, her hands folded as in prayer, and the sacred light of the star of love casts its blue rays over her.

On my couch at night the fear of losing her and despair took such powerful hold of me that they made a hero and a libertine of me. I lighted the little red oil-lamp which hung in the corridor beneath a saint's image, and entered her bedroom, covering the light with one hand.

The lioness had been hunted and driven until she was exhausted. She had fallen asleep among her pillows, lying on her back, her hands clenched, breathing heavily. A dream seemed to oppress her. I slowly withdrew my hand, and let the red light fall full on her wonderful face.

But she did not awaken.

I gently set the lamp on the floor, sank down beside Wanda's bed, and rested my head on her soft, glowing arm.

She moved slightly, but even now did not awaken. I do not know how long I lay thus in the middle of the night, turned as into a stone by horrible torments.

Finally a severe trembling seized me, and I was able to cry. My tears flowed over her arm. She quivered several times and finally sat up; she brushed her hand across her eyes, and looked at me.

"Severin," she exclaimed, more frightened than angry.

I was unable to reply.