“Have you ever seen me dance?” she asked abruptly.

Surely if he had ever seen that wonderful artistry which she knew was hers, witnessed the half-crazy enthusiasm with which her audience received her, he would make allowance, judge her a little less harshly for what was, after all, a very natural assumption on the part of a stage favourite.

An expression of unwilling admiration came into his eyes.

“Have I seen you dance?” he repeated.  “Yes, I have.  Several times.”

He did not add—­which would have been no more than the truth—­that during her last winter’s season at the Imperial Theatre he had hardly missed a dozen performances.

“Then—­then——­” Magda spoke with a kind of incredulous appeal.  “Can’t you understand—­just a little?”

“Oh, I understand.  I understand perfectly.  You’ve been spoilt and idolised to such an extent that it seems incredible to you to find a man who doesn’t immediately fall down and worship you.”

Magda twisted her hands together.  Once more he was thrusting at her with the rapier of truth.  And it hurt—­hurt inexplicably.

“Yes, I believe that’s—­almost true,” she acknowledged falteringly.  “But if you understand so well, couldn’t you—­can’t you”—­with a swift supplicating smile—­“be a little more merciful?”

“No.  I—­I hate your type of woman!”

There was an undertone of passion in his voice.  It was almost as though he were fighting against some impulse within himself and the fierceness of the struggle had wrung from him that quick, unvarnished protest.

“Then you despise dancers?”

“Despise?  On the contrary, I revere a dancer—­the dancer who is a genuine artist.”  He paused, then went on speaking thoughtfully.  “Dancing, to my mind, is one of the most consistent expressions of beauty.  It’s the sheer symmetry and grace of that body which was made in God’s own likeness developed to the utmost limit of human perfection. . . .  And the dancer who desecrates the temple of his body is punished proportionately.  No art is a harder taskmistress than the art of dancing.”

Magda listened breathlessly.  This man understood—­oh, he understood!  Then why did he “hate her type of woman”?

Almost as though he had read her thoughts he pursued: 

“As a dancer, an artist—­I acknowledge the Wielitzska to be supreme.  But as a woman——­”

“Yes?  As a woman?  Go on.  What do you know about me as a woman?”

He laughed disagreeably.

“I’d judge that in the making of you your soul got left out,” he said drily.

Magda forced a smile.

“I’m afraid I’m very stupid.  Do you mind explaining?”

“Does it need explanation?”

“Oh—­please!”

“Then—­one of my best pals was a man who loved you.”

Magda threw him a glance of veiled mockery from beneath her long white lids.