"Judith, I see, is waiting for you, in the hall, my boy," he announced. "She will give you some music, I dare say. If you should happen to want me--I am upstairs." Then he disappeared. In spite of Uncle Bond's announcement that Judith was waiting for him, the King lingered at the dinner table. Somehow, he did not wish--to be alone with Judith again. Was he afraid of her? Or of himself? He hardly knew. But he shrank instinctively from the ordeal. It would be an ordeal. The consequences, the inevitable consequences, of his false position, of his reckless self-indulgence, were closing about him-- Suddenly, the soft notes of the piano, in the hall, reached his ears. Judith had begun her music, without waiting for him. The King had no cultivated taste in music. The rattling melodies of the wardroom piano, or gramophone, were his greatest pleasure. Like most people, where music was concerned, he was merely an animal, soothed or irritated, by noise. Judith's music was soft and low. It soothed him. Well, the ordeal had to be faced! Finishing his glass of port, he stood up. Then he passed, reluctantly, out of the dining room, into the hall. In the hall, the shadows of the twilight were gathering fast. Judith's silver dress shone, obscurely luminous, in the far corner, where she was seated at the piano. She turned, and welcomed him with her friendly little nod, and went on playing. The King sat down on the ottoman, at the foot of the staircase. It was the furthest distance that he could keep from Judith. Judith played on, passing from one melody to another, playing throughout from memory, odd movements, and the music of songs, all soft and low, and all, it seemed, now, to the King, plaintive, sad. The twilight deepened in the hall. Neither the twilight, nor the music, brought peace to the King. A sense of fatality, a feeling of impending crisis, was with him. And he was afraid, now--of himself. At last, the music ceased. Judith stood up. The King rose to his feet, in turn. And then, suddenly, blind instinct came to his aid, counselling flight. Without a word, with the briefest possible glance in Judith's direction, he turned sharply round on his heel, and passed quickly up the staircase, to Uncle Bond's quarters. He flung open the door of Uncle Bond's writing room, without knocking-- "I have come--to place myself under arrest, Uncle Bond," he exclaimed. "I have come--to put myself into safe custody. I can't--trust myself." Uncle Bond, busy at his writing table, laid down his pencil, and turned in his chair. "Shut the door, my boy," he said. "I accept the responsibility you have offered me. It is a responsibility which I would have accepted before--but I did not care to interfere, between you and Judith, until it was offered to me." The King shut the door. "Fortunately, 'Cynthia' and I have just finished our climax," Uncle Bond chuckled. "I can blow out the candles, and devote myself to you."