"Oh, please, dear colonel," she begged and prayed, "give them up. They are only two or three sheets of paper covered with music, the music of songs--nothing else, I swear. Please let me have them, dear colonel." Her innocent pleading touched him, and the comical unconscious humility of her "dear colonel" made him laugh again. Besides, as the daughter of a professional, she might cherish musical ambitions. "Do you compose yourself?" he asked. "No, no, no! It's not my composition, but don't look at it," she entreated, "or I'll jump out of the window. I swear I will by all the saints." He was so delighted with the picture she made, her eyes wide with alarm, her hair loosened and dishevelled, the tragic mute expression on her sweet childlike face with its clear-cut features, that he wanted to prolong the struggle for a few minutes. So he looked very black and pretended to be what he really had been a little while ago--full of jealous suspicion. Then she fell on her knees, and, clasping his legs, she whispered in a voice half suffocated by her emotions of shame and distress: "If only you give it back to me, I won't mind what you do. I won't attempt to defend myself." The bargain struck him as advantageous. "Your hand on it," he said. "Yes, here is my hand on it," she replied. "And you'll never ask any questions? Promise." "Not if you swear by your blessed St. Joseph that it's really nothing but music." "Yes, nothing but music and the libretto, I swear." He gave her the roll, and she yielded herself entirely to him ... sold herself at the price of "The Song of Songs" to the man to whom she already belonged. * * * * * The early morning sunlight, shining straight in her eyes through the yellow striped curtains, awoke her. She felt herself resting on a sort warm pillow, and was conscious of having slept splendidly. Slowly it dawned on her what had happened. She leaned over to him with the intention of giving him a kiss. He lay with his head thrown back and his mouth open, and the light from the window played on his shining bristled chin. Over his haggard cheeks little red and blue veins ran in all directions like rivers on a map. His ink-black moustache glistened with pomade, and his eyelids were so wrinkled into folds that they must, it seemed, have reached down to the top of his nose if they had been ironed out. "He's not so bad-looking," Lilly thought to herself; but she omitted the kiss. She got up noiselessly and dressed herself without his moving. The old cavalry officer was a sound and heavy sleeper. Lilly scribbled on a sheet of notepaper which she found in the hotel blotter: "I am gone to church," laid the note on his pillow, and slipped down the stairs, past the porter, who was so astonished he forgot to say "Good-morning."