Her apartment was on the ground floor.  She stood up, revealing herself disdainfully in the moonlight that now lay full on her window, then went out quickly into the vestibule and unlocked the house door.  Her only fear was that the man would have gone, but if he were still there she was determined to walk boldly over to his skulking-place and pretend she believed him to be a burglar or a foreign spy.  In these days she carried a small pistol and a dagger.

When she had stepped out on the pavement she glanced quickly up and down the street.  Not even a polizeidiener was in sight, for this aristocratic quarter was, in peace and war, the quietest part of an always orderly town.  It was evident that the man spied alone.

Holding her head very high, she started across the street; but she had not taken three steps when the shadow detached itself and walked rapidly out into the moonlight.  She gave a sharp cry and shrank back.  It was Franz von Nettelbeck.

“You—­” she stammered.  “They sent you—­”

“They?  And why should I alarm you?  Am I so formidable?” He uttered his short harsh laugh and lifted his cap.  His head was bandaged; there was a deep scar along the outer line of his right cheek.  His face was gaunt and lined; and his shoulders sagged until he suddenly bethought himself and flung them back with a deathless instinct.

Gisela smiled and gave him her hand with a graceful spontaneity.  “The sense of being watched always shakes the nerves a bit, and I have felt up to nothing myself for a long time.  Why did not you come up to the window when you recognized me?”

“I was so sure of welcome!  And yet as soon as I was fit to travel I came here to see you.  I intended to send in my card to-morrow.  But I could not help haunting your window to-night, and when I had the good fortune to see you sitting there—­with the moon shining on your beautiful face—­”

“My face is no longer beautiful, dear Franz—­”

“You are a thousand times more beautiful than ever—­”

Something else vibrated along those steel nerves, but she said briskly:  “Standing so long must have tired you.  Come in and rest.  It is late; but if there are still conventions in this crashing world I have forgotten them.”

Her rooms were always prepared for a sudden visit of the police.  If a firing squad were her fate it would not have been invited through the usual channels.  Even the arms to be worn on the morrow were in the cellars and attics of citizens so respectable as almost to be nameless.

He followed her through the common entrance of the apartment house into her Saal.  It was a large comfortable room with many deep chairs, and on the gray walls were a few portraits of her scowling ancestors, contributed long since by her mother.  A tall porcelain stove glowed softly.  Gisela drew the curtains and lit several candles.  She disliked the hard glare of electricity at any time, and she admitted with a curious thrill of satisfaction that those manifestly sincere words of her old lover had given her vanity a momentary resurrection.  Her suspicions were by no means allayed, even when she met his eyes blazing with passionate admiration, but why not play the old game of the gods for an hour?  What better preparation for the morrow than to relax and forget?