‘Why does Cordova hate him?’ asked Bamberger.

‘Don’t quite know.  Thought perhaps you might.’

‘No.’

‘He was attentive to her last winter,’ Feist said.  ’That’s all I know for certain.  He’s a brutal sort of man, and maybe he offended her somehow.’

‘Well,’ returned Isidore Bamberger, ’maybe; but singers aren’t often offended by men who have money.  At least, I’ve always understood so, though I don’t know much about that side of life myself.’

’It would be just one thing more to break his character if Cordova would say something against him,’ suggested Feist.  ’Her popularity is something tremendous, and people always believe a woman who says that a man has insulted her.  In those things the bare word of a pretty lady who’s no better than she should be is worth more than an honest man’s character for thirty years.’

‘That’s so,’ said Bamberger, looking at him attentively.  ’That’s quite true.  Whatever you are, Feist, you’re no fool.  We may as well have the pretty lady’s bare word, anyway.’

‘If you approve, I’m nearly sure I can get it,’ Feist answered.  ’At least, I can get a statement which she won’t deny if it’s published in the right way.  I can furnish the materials for an article on her that’s sure to please her—­born lady, never a word against her, highly connected, unassailable private life, such a contrast to several other celebrities on the stage, immensely charitable, half American, half English—­every bit of that all helps, you see—­and then an anecdote or two thrown in, and just the bare facts about her having had to escape in a hurry from a prominent millionaire in a New York hotel—­fairly ran for her life and turned the key against him.  Give his name if you like.  If he brings action for libel, you can subpoena Cordova herself.  She’ll swear to it if it’s true, and then you can unmask your big guns and let him have it hot.’

’No doubt, no doubt.  But how do you propose to find out if it is true?’

‘Well, I’ll see; but it will answer almost as well if it’s not true,’ said Feist cynically.  ‘People always believe those things.’

‘It’s only a detail,’ said Bamberger, ’but it’s worth something, and if we can make this man Leven begin a suit against his wife, everything that’s against Van Torp will be against her too.  That’s not justice, Feist, but it’s fact.  A woman gets considerably less pity for making mistakes with a blackguard than for liking an honest man too much, Feist.’

Mr. Bamberger, who had divorced his own wife, delivered these opinions thoughtfully, and, though she had made no defence, he might be supposed to know what he was talking about.

Presently he dismissed his visitor with final injunctions to lose no time, and to ‘find out’ if Lady Maud was interested in any one besides Van Torp, and if not, what was at the root of her eccentric hours.