He reached her both his hands across the table with such a true-hearted and, at the same time, comically-crushed manner, that she did not hesitate for a moment to close the bargain. In a second his mood seemed to have gone through a complete transformation. He sprang up, bent over her hand, which he eagerly kissed, and began to hum a tune and to light a cigar, talking all the while about the masked ball of the night before. His niece, when she entered again, laughingly asked what magic charm her beautiful friend had been using in her absence, to dispel so completely her dear uncle's melancholy mood.
Julie smiled and answered that people ought not to laugh at the secrets of magic, and the baron acted as though nothing at all had happened. Then the two friends took leave of one another. Julie was anxious to see Jansen again, whom she confidently hoped to find in his studio at this hour. But on the stairs, to which the baron escorted her, she whispered to him:
"Why don't you want to let Irene into the secret? Unless I am very much mistaken, she already knows the first half; you owe it to her to tell her the other half, which truly does you honor."
"Do you think so?" answered the baron. "Irene have a suspicion? Good God, these young girls nowadays! One takes great credit to one's self for the profound innocence and ignorance in which one has brought them up, and they are wiser than we ourselves! Well, then, in Heaven's name! one sour apple more; my teeth are yet on edge from the first one."
He kissed Julie's hand once more and returned, sighing, to his niece.
Julie went slowly and thoughtfully down the stairs. The moment she was alone, all in which she had just taken part sank into the background before the one thought how it fared with her friend, how he had passed the day, and what might have occurred between him and his wife, who held his fate in her hands. She reproached herself for having let her visit detain her so long. It is true he did not generally come until evening. But what if he had sought her out earlier to-day?--what if he had had some news to give her, or had needed her advice or consent? A cold shudder passed over her at the dreadful thought!
As if to make up for lost time, she hastened down the remaining steps. But, upon reaching the landing of the first floor, she involuntarily stopped. A very strange kind of music issued from one of the neighboring doors. This was Nelida's _salon_; the waiter who had taken her to Irene had told her so. The piano within, which only skillful hands were generally allowed to touch, seemed to have fallen into the hands of a maniac, who cared more for making noise than music, or who was trying to test the instrument's power of resistance.