But one night, just before "tattoo," when the fruit trees were frothing with light blossoms and the scent of lilacs was heavy in the air, Sydney sent for me. He was officer-of-the-day, today, and could not leave the premises. He wanted me to go in his place, to meet the girl and to explain why he could not keep his appointment. I looked at him in amazement. "Do you mean to say, you've been meeting her every night. As late as this? Alone?" He was playing with the tassel at the end of the red sash which the officer-of-the-day wears about his waist. He let it drop and gave me a quick glance. "Yes," he said, "and mind you don't tell anybody, either. You'll have to sneak off bounds--but I'll see you don't run much of a risk. You can leave that part to me." Then, when he saw me hesitate, he began to plead. "Oh, say, you won't go back on me, will you? I've been a good friend to you and done you lots of favors--and now when I ask you to take a little risk for me...." I smiled. "You don't understand, Sydney," I said. "It isn't the risk." "Then what is it?" "It's--it's the girl." He stepped back from me, and his face took on a coldness I had never seen before. "Don't worry about that," he exclaimed. "That's my business." Then, as I hesitated, he burst out: "Hurry up, now, you little Jew!" I stood very still for a minute. Then I felt my face flush hot and I flung away from him. It had come at last. He, my best friend--my only friend--he had called me a Jew! I wanted to scream back at him, to beat him with my fist, to denounce him and curse him. I felt betrayed, degraded as I had never been before. Then I gulped hard and controlled myself. I said nothing. I merely saluted and set off upon his errand. But I did not find the girl at the street corner he had mentioned. I went on, only a few hundred yards, to the store. There was a dim blue light in one of its windows, and I crept up and pressed my face against the glass, knowing that she was probably sitting up and waiting. Yes, she was there--behind the counter with her shawl still over her head and her eyes fixed on the cheap wall clock. She could not see me in the darkness outside--not even when she turned her head and gave me a full view of her face, so that I could see how strangely pale and set it was, and how deeply lurking in her eyes was the fear of the moment. I did not go in and tell her anything. I could not. The sight of her and the appeal of her thin, tragic little body sent me hurrying back with my errand uncompleted--and glad, madly glad that it was so.