carries on!"....

The idea did indeed flash into his mind that this moment might be
decisive and pregnant with the fate of the future, but his horror of
scenes and explanations restrained him.

Wearily he assumed the attitude of one above the storms of the soul
and sought a jest with which to recall her to herself. But before he
found it she pressed her handkerchief to her eyes and slipped from
the room.

"So much the better," he thought and lit a fresh cigarette, "If she
lets her passion spend itself in silence it will pass the
more swiftly."

Walking up and down he indulged in philosophic reflections concerning
the useless emotionality of woman, and the duty of man not to be
infected by it ... He grew quite warm in the proud consciousness of
his heart's coldness.

Then suddenly--from the depth of the silence that was about
him--resounded in a long-drawn, shrill, whirring voice that he had
never heard--his own name.

"Rrricharrd!" it shrilled, stern and hard as the command of some
paternal martinet. The voice seemed to come from subterranean depths.

He shivered and looked about. Nothing moved. There was no living soul
in the next room.