"Is it possible that you live in this world and have never heard of the old colonel?" he asked. "The old colonel is the almighty; the old colonel decides what is good and what is evil on this earth; he ruins one man and pays another's debts with equal ease. He is the great receptacle for all our virtues and all our sins. Above all, the old colonel is eternally a boy. If he were to see you he would say, 'Come along, little girl. I am a hoary-headed old monster, but I want you'; and then your courage will only permit of your saying, 'When do you want me, your high and mightiness?' You see, my dear child, that is the old colonel. They have put him on your track long ago, and if he finds his way here, Lord have mercy on you! It will be all up then with my beautiful young queen." "But I still don't know who the old colonel is," interjected Lilly, feeling a little uncomfortable at his mysterious prognostications. "Then don't ask," he answered, and held out his freckled hand in farewell. "It's really a pity," he added, blinking at her through his half-closed light eyelashes with tender compassion. "We might have given history another famous pair of lovers." He leant over the counter. "As I am a man totally devoid of any moral sense, may I borrow a kiss before I go?" Lilly laughed and held up her mouth in reply. He kissed her, and then dragged himself stiffly to the door. "I can't run," he said. "Last night's banquet has made me a bit lazy," and he was gone. The same feeling of uneasiness, which Lilly had felt after her lively comrade's first visit, took possession of her again. She felt as if someone was playfully lashing her with switches. Her anxiety caused her torment mingled with pleasure. It was as if behind a closed golden door her unknown fate crouched ready to spring on her--its prey. CHAPTER XI The midday December sunlight made the hilt of a sword and the buttons of a uniform glitter in the street outside. "Some one fresh," Lilly thought, for the upright bull-necked figure of the man clanking up the terrace steps was unfamiliar to her. An imperious stamping before the door, and the bell sounded more sharply than usual. No, she had not seen this person before. Here was no frivolous young lieutenant, nor one of the maturer officers, who were on their dignity till the first shy smile told them how far they might go. Here was a piercing falcon eye, set in a circle of crow's-feet, an aquiline high-bred nose, prominent cheek-bones with a fixed red colour; a small hard firmly closed mouth, which smiled with cynical benevolence under a bristling moustache, a chin--highly polished from shaving--retreating in two baggy folds behind a high military collar. She saw these details with a heart throbbing so violently that she had to lean against a bookcase for support. "This must be what I have been feeling so frightened about," she said to herself. "This is the dreadful old colonel."