"
"Immediately?"
"To-day--as soon as you can get ready."
He looked at me, surprised, and little by little he blushed. "There is
something I have not told you," he said; "something that your saying that
Madame Blumenthal has no reputation to lose has made me half afraid to
tell you."
"I think I can guess it. Madame Blumenthal has asked you to come and
play her game for her again."
"Not at all!" cried Pickering, with a smile of triumph. "She says that
she means to play no more for the present. She has asked me to come and
take tea with her this evening."
"Ah, then," I said, very gravely, "of course you can't leave Homburg."
He answered nothing, but looked askance at me, as if he were expecting me
to laugh. "Urge it strongly," he said in a moment. "Say it's my
duty--that I _must_."
I didn't quite understand him, but, feathering the shaft with a harmless
expletive, I told him that unless he followed my advice I would never
speak to him again.
He got up, stood before me, and struck the ground with his stick. "Good!"
he cried; "I wanted an occasion to break a rule--to leap a barrier. Here
it is. I stay!"
I made him a mock bow for his energy. "That's very fine," I said; "but
now, to put you in a proper mood for Madame Blumenthal's tea, we will go
and listen to the band play Schubert under the lindens.
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