Ernest conducted Ethel Brandenbourg to his room and helped her to remove
her cloak.

While he was placing the garment upon the back of a chair, she slipped a
little key into her hand-bag. He looked at her with a question in his
eyes.

"Yes," she replied, "I kept the key; but I had not dreamed that I would
ever again cross this threshold."

Meanwhile it had grown quite dark. The reflection of the street lanterns
without dimly lit the room, and through the twilight fantastic shadows
seemed to dance.

The perfume of her hair pervaded the room and filled the boy's heart
with romance. Tenderness long suppressed called with a thousand voices.
The hour, the strangeness and unexpectedness of her visit, perhaps even
a boy's pardonable vanity, roused passion from its slumbers and once
again wrought in Ernest's soul the miracle of love. His arm encircled
her neck and his lips stammered blind, sweet, crazy and caressing
things.

"Turn on the light," she pleaded.

"You were not always so cruel."

"No matter, I have not come to speak of love."