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 before the trial begun, Olivia had brought Madame Koller to mind.

"Have you seen Elise—Madame Koller—lately?" The first name slipped out involuntarily. He rarely called Madame Koller by it at any time—but now, by one of those tricks which memory serves all people, her name came to his lips not only without his will, but against it. His face turned a deep red, and he bit his lip in anger and vexation. Olivia straightened herself up on her horse and smiled at him that peculiar indulgent smile, and addressed him in those gentle tones that betokened the freezing up of her sympathies and the coming to life of her contempt. He knew only too well the meaning of that appalling sweetness. "No, I have not. But to-morrow I will probably see her. Shall I remember you to her?"

"If you please," replied Pembroke, wishing Madame Koller at the devil, as he often did. Often—but not always.

Then they drifted into commonplace, and presently they parted, Pembroke galloping back to the village, despising himself almost as much as the day he had allowed his anger to lead him into the quarrel with Ahlberg.

But when he reached his dingy little office, Olivia Berkeley, Madame Koller, Ahlberg, all faded rapidly out of his mind. That great game of skill in which he was engaged, the stake being a human life, again absorbed him. And then the critical time came, when, after having tried to prove that