When I rejoined Dehra she had moved forward and was looking over the audience.

“I have found an ex-compatriot of yours,” she remarked.

“Yes?” I said, rather indifferently.

“She has just come into the third box on the right.  She is wonderfully beautiful—­or, at least, she looks it from here.”

“I’ve got someone wonderfully beautiful beside me,” I answered.

“But have you no interest in the American?” she asked.

“None—­except that she interests you.  In the third box, did you say?” I asked, turning slowly toward it.

“Why, Armand, you know her!” said Dehra, suddenly.

Trust a woman to read a man’s face.

“Yes,” said I, “I have seen her before to-night.”

She gave me a sharp look.  “And have known her, too—­n’est ce pas?”

“Yes—­after a fashion,” I answered.

She studied the woman for a space.

“Is that her husband behind her?” she asked, presently.

I smiled.  “Very possibly,” I said.

“Had she a husband when you knew her?” she persisted.

“Part of the time.”  I was a bit uncomfortable.

“And the man, yonder, is not he?”

“No,” said I.

She gave me a sidelong glance.  “And her name?” she asked.

“It used to be Madeline Spencer.”

“You showed excellent taste, Armand—­both in her looks and name.”  There was something of sarcasm in the tone.

“Don’t be unjust, sweetheart,” I said.  “She never was anything to me.”

“Are you quite sure?”.

“On my honor.”

She gave a little sigh of relief.  “I am glad, dear; I would not want her for a rival.  She is much too beautiful to be forgotten easily.”

“The beauty is only external.  She is ugly in heart,” I said.  “I wonder what brings her to Dornlitz?”

“The man beside her, doubtless,” said Dehra.

“Then he’s spending money on her like water—­or she has some game afoot,” I exclaimed.

“You paint her very dark, dear.”

“Listen,” I said.  “She was the wife of Colonel Spencer of the American Army.  He married her, one summer, in Paris, where he had gone to meet her upon her graduation from a convent school.  She was his ward—­the child of the officer who had been his room-mate at the Point.  Within two years Colonel Spencer was dead—­broken-hearted; a wealthy Lieutenant of his regiment had been cashiered and had shot himself after she had plucked him clean.  Since then, she has lived in the odor of eminent respectability; yet, as I know, always waiting for a victim—­and always having one.  Money is her God.”

“And, yet, there seems to be nothing in her appearance to suggest such viciousness,” said Dehra.

“Nothing,” I said; “and, hence, her danger and her power.”

“You knew her when she was Colonel Spencer’s wife?”

“I met her at the Post where he commanded—­and, later, I saw her in Washington and New York.  She had been in Pittsburgh for several months before I left—­angling for some of the nouveaux riches, I fancy.  There was plenty of gossip of her in the Clubs; though I, alone, I think, know her true history.”