All the same, her brief Saturday afternoon to Monday morning sojourn in a huge barracks of a house was to prove a particularly trying ordeal. Not that there was any lack of creature comforts. But the ordeal might be said to begin shortly after seven o’clock, just as she was about to ascend the famous white marble staircase to dress for the evening meal. For it came to Helen like a veritable blow to behold Saul Hartz, newly arrived, stride with an air of calm proprietorship into the entrance hall. At the sight of him, her heart gave a leap. This indeed, was a bird of ill omen. She had not in the least expected him to be there. Not that there was any reason why he shouldn’t be. He had the _entrée_ to nearly every house in England; and in most the art of the _charmeur_, great when he chose to use it, and his range of information made him a more than welcome guest. To Helen, however, it simply had not occurred that she was likely to meet him. As disconsolately she made a slow ascent of those imposing stairs, she could have wished that the new Home Secretary had followed the practice of Royalty by demanding a list of the people who had been invited to meet him! To add to Helen’s embarrassment, it fell out that the Colossus took her in to dinner. She would have given much merely to avoid talk with him or even the lightest contact with his arm. Yet surely this was Fate. And from Fate there can be no appeal. At the moment he crossed the room to claim her with a bow and a smile, she felt in her bones that this meeting had to be. Since John had told her of the diabolical aspersions this man had cast upon her good name, they had not met. In spite of all that she owed Saul Hartz, and she still felt it was much, her resentment was deep, just, implacable. Pride forbade the showing that her wound was still raw, but she could not help letting him see, even had she had the wish to prevent it, that she was now in the thrall of an icy antagonism. And yet with what mastery, what subtle art was this man able to toy with her fine feelings! At the dinner table he was irresistible. She sought escape at first by turning quickly to a pompous and monosyllabic politician seated at the other side of her. But that didn’t answer. Even more than usual Saul Hartz was dominant. When he liked to exert his great powers, he was the most compelling man she had ever known. The fact that he saw beyond his kind gave barbs to his wit, a depth to his insight, spice to his knowledge, a form to his philosophy. When this man unbent, there was none like him. Helen once again had to render him that justice. With that strange, remote whisper he could dominate half the large room if he chose; or if, as he now preferred, he chose to confine himself to the young and singularly attractive woman at his side, she, too, must yield to its mystic spells.