The conversation had been a far from satisfactory one to Sebastian. He had had no idea, a month ago, that Myles Heywood’s image would take such an important place in his concerns. He turned the subject, and made arrangements with Adrienne about the school; but it seemed to him that since their passage of arms--for it had been a passage of arms--her eyes had brightened, and her voice had been more full and decided. He left her at last, firmly convinced that Myles was his formidable rival, and the conviction gave him a strange sensation, such as he had never known before. All his life he had been accustomed to quietly make up his mind, and then as quietly carry out his decision. Now, to his own astonishment, he found himself strangely wavering between certainty and uncertainty; and as he walked from Mr. Blisset’s house to his own, he pondered over the history of his own love for Adrienne, and, almost for the first time, began to wonder what would be the end of that history. It was three years now since he had first met her. There had been a chamber concert, in Coblenz, of classical music. Adrian Blisset had played violin and his daughter piano, and Sebastian had been one of the not very numerous audience; for the taste of the Coblenzers for music was not of the severe sort. Perhaps the small audience was the more appreciative--at least Sebastian Mallory sat a long two hours and a half, without a thought of being weary or any wish to go. When the music was over he had penetrated to the little room whither Adrian and his daughter had retired; and knocked, and been bidden _herein_. Apologising for the intrusion, he had introduced himself, and said he imagined that certain pieces that had been played that evening, and which stood on the programme without any composer’s name, were the production of the musician himself. He was right, and as these compositions had appeared to him to possess a certain wild, weird beauty of their own, there had ensued a long conversation upon the subject, during which Sebastian’s discrimination and real, earnest love for the art he professed had won over even Mr. Blisset’s reserved and moody disposition. Thus the acquaintance began. The musician had been kinder and more open than he usually was, not only to strangers, but to any one at all. Sebastian had been allowed to visit him and his daughter. Adrienne had played for him; she had talked with him, and he had found her charming.