Hertha cast down her eyes and was smiling coy dreamy smiles. When she came into the light of the lanterns he saw that her whole face was radiant with great excitement. Her cheeks seemed rounder, her mouth like a flower. "What a charming metamorphosis," he thought. "A woman all in a minute, before she has become a woman." And when they had settled her comfortably in her corner, they began the homeward journey. He put a short pipe in his mouth, and rode in the wake of the carriage. A soft breeze had risen, and drove the mist in his face. The grasshoppers were silent, and a great stillness lay on the world. Slowly he recalled one sweet picture after the other, and as they passed before his mind's eye, one in particular arrested him. How expectantly her lips had been rounded to receive his threatened kiss, and to return it with emphasis. He felt the impression of it still, he felt, too, the thin outline of the slight young form as his arm had encircled it. "Aren't you ashamed of yourself?" something spoke within him. "Don't hurt the child. Don't carry on a 'bud' flirtation." XIV When Leo entered his bedroom towards two o'clock in the morning, in passing the little table by the bedside, a penetrating and peculiar perfume met him, a perfume that years before had often clung to his clothes and person. Astonished, he turned the marble salver upside down, and between newspapers and books found a small ivory-coloured note with the device in silver of a baron's coronet, and a carrier pigeon beneath it on the outside. The handwriting was disguised. Nevertheless he recognised it at a first glance, and turned pale. He tore open the envelope with trembling fingers. The contents were as follows:-- "Leo, "I trust you, and I trust myself, to make a meeting between us possible. It would be simply cowardice to avoid it any longer. It is time that we arrived at a clear understanding with regard to our position to each other and to the outside world. I will wait for you every morning when the fog lies on the stream, at the Isle of Friendship. For the sake of one who is dear to us both I conjure you to come. Our unhappiness makes it imperative that you should come." With a harsh laugh he cast the note from him. It flew between the bed-curtains and rested on the pillow. This was too good. He had struggled with himself honestly--weary days and nights, resisted and been proof against the excommunication of scripture, the appeals of honour and friendship, the exhorting of his own conscience, and now was all his defiance and hardihood to be swept away by this small clandestine billet? "But what can I do?" he murmured, seeing his position with sudden distinctness. "I am in for it." Still, there should be no question of repentance. Let all the priests and all the hysterical women of the earth enter into a conspiracy of vengeance against him, he would yet remain true to himself and his principle.