Anna the Adventuress

"Anna! Thank God I have found you at last. But you have not finished

surely. Your second turn is not over, is it?"

She laughed a little hardly. Even now she was dazed. The horror of

those few minutes was still with her.

"Have you not heard?" she said. "For me there is no second turn. I

have said good-bye to it all. They hissed me!"

"Beasts!" he muttered. "But was it wise to sing to-night?"

"Why not? The man was nothing to me."

"You have not seen the evening paper?"

"No. What about them?"

He called a hansom.

"They are full of the usual foolish stories. To-morrow they will all

be contradicted. To-night all London believes that he was your

husband."

"That is why they hissed me, then?"

"Of course. To-morrow they will know the truth."

She shivered.

"Is this hansom for me?" she said. "Thank you--and good-bye."

"I am coming with you," he said firmly.

She shook her head.

"Don't!" she begged.

"You are in trouble," he said. "No one has a better right than I to be

with you."

"You have no right at all," she answered coldly.

"I have the right of the man who loves you," he declared. "Some day

you will be my wife, and it would not be well for either of us to

remember that in these unhappy days you and I were separated."

Anna gave her address to the driver. She leaned back in the cab with

half-closed eyes.

"This is all madness," she declared wearily. "Do you think it is fair

of you to persecute me just now?"

"It is not persecution, Anna," he answered gently. "Only you are the

woman I love, and you are in trouble. And you are something of a

heroine, too. You see, my riddle is solved. I know all."

"You know all?"

"Your sister has told me."

"You have seen her--since last night?"

"Yes."

Anna shivered a little. She asked no further questions for the moment.

Ennison himself, with the recollection of Annabel's visit still fresh

in his mind, was for a moment constrained and ill at ease. When they

reached her rooms she stepped lightly out upon the pavement.

"Now you must go," she said firmly. "I have had a trying evening and I

need rest."

"You need help and sympathy more, Anna," he pleaded, "and I have the

right, yes I have the right to offer you both. I will not be sent

away."

"It is my wish to be alone," she said wearily. "I can say no more."

She turned and fitted the latchkey into the door. He hesitated for a

moment and then he followed her. She turned the gas up in her little

sitting-room, and sank wearily into an easy chair. On the mantelpiece

in front of her was a note addressed to her in Annabel's handwriting.

She looked at it with a little shudder, but she made no motion to take

it.