But as he said this, he felt that he blushed. Why should he have added “with Miss Gabel.” It was surely a matter of indifference with whom he had danced. Because he believed he had said something stupid, he was annoyed with the man to whom he had said it, and set to staring at his decoration without saying anything. Since this was a bogus foreign decoration of the worst sort, the man grew embarrassed, coughed drily, and passed on. Fant remained seated and stared into a mirror which faced him on an oblique wall. But it was not himself that he saw in the mirror, it was the flooding light of the dancing hall and the sinuous lines of the women. They seemed to move silently in time with the music. Look at their red lips, look at the white curves of their arms!-- There she was again! For the third time she glided past across the mirror. It was her cousin she was dancing with, a boy, lately a student--ah, well! No, he could not sit still, he could not look on any more. It surely signified nothing that the boy danced with his own cousin, but he could not look on. He rose and went out of the room. Someone asked, “Who is this Mr. Fant?” “He has invented something--a gas-burner, I believe. He is already on the way to make a fortune.” “But did you see,” said the man with the foreign order, “did you see that he has a blue anchor tattooed on one hand?” They suddenly burst into guffaws. II He sauntered back and forth through the rooms. He went out into the corridor. A couple of Knights of Vasa were sitting on the wood-box talking about business while they gesticulated with two big cigars, on which they had left the labels. They grew silent as he passed. He came into a greenish room that was half dark. From the roof on a narrow cord hung a single electric light, its glow shaded by blue and green fringes. On a dressing-table with a marble top an old Chinese mandarin of porcelain sat sleeping on his crossed legs. How strangely far off the music sounded, as if from underneath! He set the mandarin’s head in motion with a little punch of his little finger. Two mirrors repeated in unending succession the pale and lethargic nods of the yellow head. Now it was quiet, the music. All at once she stood there, in the middle of the room. He had not heard her enter. She held out both hands to him. He took them and drew her to him for a kiss, but she freed herself almost immediately. “Somebody’s coming,” she said. They listened. Voices approached and moved away again. When all was quiet around them, he pressed her to him in a long kiss. And he thought while she kissed him: This is life! This is eternity! Far away in the green darkness nodded the pale head of the mandarin. “No one kisses like you,” he muttered. “Many kiss like you,” she responded, smiling. He thought to himself: she’s smiling so that I shall know she’s jesting and that she has never kissed anyone else.