In the long intermission Paul found Helena and took her to the crowded café across the road to get something to eat and drink. It was a quarter after seven, and Wagner wears on the stomach. Even a poetical Roumanian girl has earthly appetites. So they drank champagne and ate pasties of goose liver, and confessions were many. Nothing establishes a strong bond of sympathy like the hunger and thirst of two healthy young humans. Paul seemed to have forgotten Rue and the splendour of her hair and complexion. He was rapidly losing his head in the subtle blandishments of the Eastern woman. He saw that she was a coquette, but her seriousness, her fierceness, that broke through the shell of silky manners, gave him a glimpse of a woman worth winning, and he was just gambler enough, American enough to dare. When he left her he carried away a look that was an unequivocal challenge. Paul’s brain was on fire during the Ride of the Valkyries, and hardly realized that it was Hans Richter’s masterly reading. The stage failed to interest him until he discovered Rue in Valkyrean garb, and then he watched with his soul in his eyes. Her profile, so charming in its irregularity; her freedom of pose, her heroic action filled him with admiration. By the light from the stage he read her name, Fräulein Rue Towne, and she was the last in the list of the Valkyries. He watched with indifferent gaze the close of the act, and mentally voted the Paris version of the Magic-Fire scene far superior to Baireuth’s. He went toward the Hotel Sonne, as he had promised to sup with Helena, and wondered how he could see Rue that night. The American girl seemed something infinitely sweet, healthy, sun-swept in nature compared with her Slavic rival. “By Jove,” said Paul aloud, “it’s a case of rouge et noir, and I’m in for it and no mistake.” Paul was fond of polyphony. IV After supper he suggested to Helena the Sammet Garden. The artists always flocked there and it might prove interesting. Although a chaperon was a necessity, Helena persuaded the princess that she could go out just once in the American fashion. It would be so novel. Paul pleaded and, of course, won. The young people hardly spoke as they went down the dark street to the garden. The air was full of electricity. A touch, a glance, and a storm would be precipitated. So they reached the garden and found a seat near enough the house to be tortured by Herr Sammet’s crazy trombone. At the same table was a black-bearded little man dressed in white flannels. “It is the Sâr Peladan; I know him by his musk,” said Helena discontentedly, and they changed their seats. “What a decadent you are!” said Godard laughingly.