I listened, breathlessly; and the arcade around me faded. Greedo's figure in the shadow was forgotten. There was only the white figure of Leela; her face, the purity of girlhood, her eyes half closed, her lips parted with the song. Nothing else--save myself. I stood in a void, stretching out my arms to Romance. All that I had ever dreamed, and vaguely longed for without understanding what it meant, was upon me. All that woman could mean to man--the spirit of the ideal never to be attained in mortal flesh--seemed suddenly attained. Romance--that thing elusive--intangible as a thought in the vaguest of dreams. It was mine! The song ended. Applause rang out. Leela was gone. Martt breathed beside me, "Frank! Wasn't that--wonderful! It was like----Look, here comes Zee!" Zee was on the platform--a whirlwind of veils, stained by the red light, white limbs flashing as she whirled. Greedo's music was faster now. Snapping staccato, with a thrum of melody. The lights changed to a mingled riot of color within which Zee was dancing. An elf. A sprite of the woodland, with tossing hair and fluttering arms; and a laughing face. . . . A figure in the fairy-tale of a child. . . . But only for a moment. Then the dance slowed. Maturity came suddenly. Zee mounted the dais, and the light there was abruptly green. She stood in an attitude of terror, her eyes wide, hands before her, posturing with horror. It made my heart leap. For an instant I fancied it had been real. But the light turned silver. The horror faded into a passion of love, her white arms extended, her breasts rising and falling beneath the veils, her red lips parted with passionate longing. The abandonment of youth--so young, with newly awakened passion as yet but half understood. Then again she was whirling around the platform, leaping on her bare toes, light as a faun. . . . Behind me, suddenly a woman screamed! The reality of a long scream of terror! Greedo's music ceased. The lights wavered. Zee was gone. A scream from the audience; then another. A chaos of mingled cries. Clattering of feet. Stools overturned. . . . Someone fell against me. I went down, recovered and climbed upright. The audience was in a panic. I heard Martt shout, "Look, Frank! Look there over the water!" People were pushing me--surging to escape from the arcade. Shouting. Calling to one another. And the woman behind me was still screaming. I saw it then. Through the open side of the arcade, out a mile or more over the water, the great giant figure of a man was standing, waist-deep in the lake, his naked torso towering a hundred feet above it. A giant, wading in the lake, his face grotesque, malevolently grinning in the starlight! [Illustration: "The giant grinned malevolently in the starlight."] VI