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Captivated by the Lyon
The Lyon’s Den Connected World

C.H. Admirand
Captivated by the Lyon
The Lyon’s Den Connected World

C.H. Admirand
© Copyright 2023 by C.H. Admirand
Text by C.H. Admirand
Cover by Dar Albert

Dragonblade Publishing, Inc. is an imprint of Kathryn Le Veque Novels, Inc.

P.O. Box 23
Moreno Valley, CA 92556
ceo@dragonbladepublishing.com

Produced in the United States of America

First Edition March 2023

Kindle Edition

Reproduction of any kind except where it pertains to short quotes in relation to advertising or promotion is strictly prohibited.

All Rights Reserved.

The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not
intended by the author.

License Notes:
This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook, once purchased, may not be re-sold. If you would like to share this
book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it or
borrow it, or it was not purchased for you and given as a gift for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. If this
book was purchased on an unauthorized platform, then it is a pirated and/or unauthorized copy and violators will be prosecuted to the full
extent of the law. Do not purchase or accept pirated copies. Thank you for respecting the author’s hard work. For subsidiary rights,
contact Dragonblade Publishing, Inc.
© Copyright 2023 by C.H. Admirand
Text by C.H. Admirand
Cover by Dar Albert

Dragonblade Publishing, Inc. is an imprint of Kathryn Le Veque Novels, Inc.

P.O. Box 23
Moreno Valley, CA 92556
ceo@dragonbladepublishing.com

Produced in the United States of America

First Edition March 2023

Kindle Edition

Reproduction of any kind except where it pertains to short quotes in relation to advertising or promotion is strictly prohibited.

All Rights Reserved.

The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not
intended by the author.

License Notes:
This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook, once purchased, may not be re-sold. If you would like to share this
book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it or
borrow it, or it was not purchased for you and given as a gift for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. If this
book was purchased on an unauthorized platform, then it is a pirated and/or unauthorized copy and violators will be prosecuted to the full
extent of the law. Do not purchase or accept pirated copies. Thank you for respecting the author’s hard work. For subsidiary rights,
contact Dragonblade Publishing, Inc.
 ARE YOU SIGNED UP FOR DRAGONBLADE’S BLOG?
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releases, sales, free books, cover reveals and more.
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Dearest Reader;
Thank you for your support of a small press. At Dragonblade Publishing, we strive to bring you the
highest quality Historical Romance from some of the best authors in the business. Without your
support, there is no ‘us’, so we sincerely hope you adore these stories and find some new favorite
authors along the way.
Happy Reading!

CEO, Dragonblade Publishing

 ARE YOU SIGNED UP FOR DRAGONBLADE’S BLOG?
You’ll get the latest news and information on exclusive giveaways, exclusive excerpts, coming
releases, sales, free books, cover reveals and more.
Check out our complete list of authors, too!
No spam, no junk. That’s a promise!
Sign Up Here

Dearest Reader;
Thank you for your support of a small press. At Dragonblade Publishing, we strive to bring you the
highest quality Historical Romance from some of the best authors in the business. Without your
support, there is no ‘us’, so we sincerely hope you adore these stories and find some new favorite
authors along the way.
Happy Reading!

CEO, Dragonblade Publishing

Additional Dragonblade books by Author C.H. Admirand
The Duke’s Guard Series
The Duke’s Sword
The Duke’s Protector
The Duke’s Shield

The Lords of Vice Series

Mending the Duke’s Pride
Avoiding the Earl’s Lust
Tempering the Viscount’s Envy
Redirecting the Baron’s Greed
His Vow to Keep (Novella)

The Lyon’s Den Series

Rescued by the Lyon
Captivated by the Lyon
Additional Dragonblade books by Author C.H. Admirand
The Duke’s Guard Series
The Duke’s Sword
The Duke’s Protector
The Duke’s Shield

The Lords of Vice Series

Mending the Duke’s Pride
Avoiding the Earl’s Lust
Tempering the Viscount’s Envy
Redirecting the Baron’s Greed
His Vow to Keep (Novella)

The Lyon’s Den Series

Rescued by the Lyon
Captivated by the Lyon
 Other Lyon’s Den Books
Into the Lyon’s Den by Jade Lee
The Scandalous Lyon by Maggi Andersen
Fed to the Lyon by Mary Lancaster
The Lyon’s Lady Love by Alexa Aston
The Lyon’s Laird by Hildie McQueen
The Lyon Sleeps Tonight by Elizabeth Ellen Carter
A Lyon in Her Bed by Amanda Mariel
Fall of the Lyon by Chasity Bowlin
Lyon’s Prey by Anna St. Claire
Loved by the Lyon by Collette Cameron
The Lyon’s Den in Winter by Whitney Blake
Kiss of the Lyon by Meara Platt
Always the Lyon Tamer by Emily E K Murdoch
To Tame the Lyon by Sky Purington
How to Steal a Lyon’s Fortune by Alanna Lucas
The Lyon’s Surprise by Meara Platt
A Lyon’s Pride by Emily Royal
Lyon Eyes by Lynne Connolly
Tamed by the Lyon by Chasity Bowlin
Lyon Hearted by Jade Lee
The Devilish Lyon by Charlotte Wren
Lyon in the Rough by Meara Platt
Lady Luck and the Lyon by Chasity Bowlin
Rescued by the Lyon by C.H. Admirand
Pretty Little Lyon by Katherine Bone
The Courage of a Lyon by Linda Rae Sande
Pride of Lyons by Jenna Jaxon
The Lyon’s Share by Cerise DeLand
The Heart of a Lyon by Anna St. Claire
Into the Lyon of Fire by Abigail Bridges
Lyon of the Highlands by Emily Royal
The Lyon’s Puzzle by Sandra Sookoo
Lyon at the Altar by Lily Harlem
 Other Lyon’s Den Books
Into the Lyon’s Den by Jade Lee
The Scandalous Lyon by Maggi Andersen
Fed to the Lyon by Mary Lancaster
The Lyon’s Lady Love by Alexa Aston
The Lyon’s Laird by Hildie McQueen
The Lyon Sleeps Tonight by Elizabeth Ellen Carter
A Lyon in Her Bed by Amanda Mariel
Fall of the Lyon by Chasity Bowlin
Lyon’s Prey by Anna St. Claire
Loved by the Lyon by Collette Cameron
The Lyon’s Den in Winter by Whitney Blake
Kiss of the Lyon by Meara Platt
Always the Lyon Tamer by Emily E K Murdoch
To Tame the Lyon by Sky Purington
How to Steal a Lyon’s Fortune by Alanna Lucas
The Lyon’s Surprise by Meara Platt
A Lyon’s Pride by Emily Royal
Lyon Eyes by Lynne Connolly
Tamed by the Lyon by Chasity Bowlin
Lyon Hearted by Jade Lee
The Devilish Lyon by Charlotte Wren
Lyon in the Rough by Meara Platt
Lady Luck and the Lyon by Chasity Bowlin
Rescued by the Lyon by C.H. Admirand
Pretty Little Lyon by Katherine Bone
The Courage of a Lyon by Linda Rae Sande
Pride of Lyons by Jenna Jaxon
The Lyon’s Share by Cerise DeLand
The Heart of a Lyon by Anna St. Claire
Into the Lyon of Fire by Abigail Bridges
Lyon of the Highlands by Emily Royal
The Lyon’s Puzzle by Sandra Sookoo
Lyon at the Altar by Lily Harlem
 Dedication
For D.J. ~ Warrior Guardian Angel and KOMH
 Dedication
For D.J. ~ Warrior Guardian Angel and KOMH
 Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Publisher’s Note
Additional Dragonblade books by Author C.H. Admirand
Other Lyon’s Den Books
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Note to Readers
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Epilogue
About the Author
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Epilogue
About the Author
 Acknowledgements
Thank you to Tara Nina ~ author extraordinaire, plot warrior, and sister-of-my-heart, for her
suggestion when I confessed, “I think I have the wrong heroine…”
Thank you to Kathryn Le Veque ~ and her fabulous Dream Team at Dragonblade Publishing! My
Dream Publisher is constantly finding new ways to introduce my books to new readers while
allowing me to keep my voice. Actually, it isn’t really my voice…it’s the collective voice of my
characters who keep telling me what to write, whether it follows along with my synopsis or not. LOL!
 Acknowledgements
Thank you to Tara Nina ~ author extraordinaire, plot warrior, and sister-of-my-heart, for her
suggestion when I confessed, “I think I have the wrong heroine…”
Thank you to Kathryn Le Veque ~ and her fabulous Dream Team at Dragonblade Publishing! My
Dream Publisher is constantly finding new ways to introduce my books to new readers while
allowing me to keep my voice. Actually, it isn’t really my voice…it’s the collective voice of my
characters who keep telling me what to write, whether it follows along with my synopsis or not. LOL!
 Note to Readers
I love using family names in my books. In this book, my heroine, Adelaide, is named after my great-
great-aunt Adelaide—Addy—Lippincott. There have bits and pieces of my ancestors passed down
to my brother, sisters, and I over the years. My sisters and I (depending on who was not speaking
to whom at the time) shared the mahogany four-poster bed that belonged to Aunt Addy. It has
carved pineapples on the top of the posters. It was set up in our guest bedroom until we needed to
convert it to a nursery. Since then, it’s been in the closet under the eaves. I’m thinking it’s time to
change things up, and instead of the platform bed DJ made for us before we got married, I’m going
to set up Aunt Addy’s bed in its place. I hope my darling Heavenly Hubby won’t mind…
So, pour a cup of tea and settle into your comfy reading spot while I tell you a story…
 Note to Readers
I love using family names in my books. In this book, my heroine, Adelaide, is named after my great-
great-aunt Adelaide—Addy—Lippincott. There have bits and pieces of my ancestors passed down
to my brother, sisters, and I over the years. My sisters and I (depending on who was not speaking
to whom at the time) shared the mahogany four-poster bed that belonged to Aunt Addy. It has
carved pineapples on the top of the posters. It was set up in our guest bedroom until we needed to
convert it to a nursery. Since then, it’s been in the closet under the eaves. I’m thinking it’s time to
change things up, and instead of the platform bed DJ made for us before we got married, I’m going
to set up Aunt Addy’s bed in its place. I hope my darling Heavenly Hubby won’t mind…
So, pour a cup of tea and settle into your comfy reading spot while I tell you a story…
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
 The Russian tenor was a dismal failure. Save for the fact that he was
Russian and therefore wildly exotic, he would have been impossible, for he
sang in a bleating voice a popular ballad or two by Tosti and a dreary bit of
folk music, still half-caught in the mists of slumber. In the back of the room,
seated against the wall so that the figures of the other guests rose in
silhouette between them and the lights of the low stage, Richard Callendar
and the ugly Sabine sat like naughty children, jeering. They were bored by
such spectacles; they were interested only in the individuals which
comprised it. They saw that the others were a little restless.
And then there was a brief hush broken presently by the music of the
Tzigane orchestra augmented by drums and clarinets, rising slowly at first
and then breaking into a crescendo of Arab music, filled with insinuating
and sensual rhythms, accentuated by the beating of a tom-tom, and from
behind the lacquered screen there arose a faint tinkling sound like the music
of a million tiny bells heard from a great distance. Then as the music rose to
a climax the sound grew suddenly more and more clear and from behind the
screen sprang the Javanese dancer, gyrating, now bending low, now rising
with a motion of a tawny lily swept by a breeze. It was a beautiful body,
soft yet muscular, wild yet restrained. She wore the costume of a Burmese
dancer, all gold with a towering hat like a pagoda made all of gold. Her
breasts were covered with gold and her thighs, and on her hands she wore
gauntlets of gold that ran out into long tapering pinnacles; but the rest of her
was naked. The skin of café au lait satin glistened, voluptuous and
extravagant. There were tiny gold bells on her wrists and ankles.
For an instant a faint gasp, barely audible, swept the little group seated
on collapsible chairs. From her hiding place in the shadows Sabine Cane
nudged her companion and whispered again, “Look at Boadicea!”
Before her eyes, between her and the dancer, Mrs. Champion had raised
her fan; her daughters had done likewise. Between her and “his wa’am
friend” Mrs. Mallinson, the Bishop stirred uneasily. Some leaned forward;
others feigned indifference. One or two of the men assumed expressions of
boredom. For none of them, save in brothels in Paris, had ever seen a
woman dancing without tights, utterly naked.
Withdrawn a little from the others Thérèse Callendar sat staring at the
dancer through her lorgnettes. She was immovable but interested, as if the
barbaric music and the sight of the Hindu woman’s naked body roused in
her a train of dim racial memories. And slowly in another part of the room
Sabine Cane became aware that Thérèse Callendar’s son no longer had any
interest in her. He no longer heard the malicious sallies she uttered in a
whisper. He had risen now and was standing so that he might have a clearer
view of the little dais bathed in light where the golden dancer swayed and
whirled to the wild music of the Tziganes. Slowly his body stiffened and
into the weird gray eyes there came a look of fierce concentration. The dark
muscular hands, clasping the chair, so near to Sabine that she could have
touched them, grew taut and white. It was not mere sensuality that was
roused by the sight; Sabine, with her hard intelligence, must have known
that it was something more profound, something that savored of a
passionate and barbaric excitement, as if the man was stirred in the depths
of his spirit. She must have understood then for the first time that he was of
a race so different, so alien that there was a part of him forever beyond
comprehension.
Sabine said nothing. Fascinated, she watched him quietly until, as the
music died suddenly, the dancer stood motionless as a statue of bronze and
gold. There was a ripple of embarrassed applause and she disappeared, then
another hush and the nervous murmur of many voices. On her little throne
Thérèse, like a plump Buddha, nodded her approval and beat her plump
hands together. “C’est une vraie artiste,” she murmured, leaning toward
Mrs. Sigourney, in whose eyes there glittered the light of jealousy at being
outdone in spectacularity by a hired entertainer.
In her corner Sabine said, “Beautiful!” To which young Callendar made
no reply. He fingered his mustache and presently, smiling slowly, he
murmured, “Mama shouldn’t have done it. She has shocked some of them.
This isn’t Paris. Not yet!”
They were different from the others—Thérèse and her son.

While he was still speaking the gypsies deserted the stage, leaving it bare
now save for the great piano. Again a brief hush and there emerged from
behind the painted screen with a curious effect of abruptness and lack of
grace a tall girl, very tall and very straight, with smooth black hair done in
the style of Cléo de Merode and cheeks that were flushed. She wore a plain
gown of black very tight and girdled with rhinestones that, shimmering,
threw off shattered fragments of light as she walked. Her strong white arms
were bared to the shoulder. There was pride in her walk, and assurance, yet
these things hid a terror so overpowering that only those who sat quite near
saw that her lip was bleeding where she had bitten it.
On her little throne Thérèse Callendar in cold blood waited. She
wondered, doubtless, whether Sanson had failed her, and slowly she began
to perceive that he had not. Somehow as she emerged from behind the
screen, the American girl captured the imagination of her audience; it was
as if she dominated them by some unreal power. They stirred and looked
more closely. It was not altogether a matter of beauty, for the dancer who
had preceded her was by all the rules far more beautiful. It was something
beyond mere physical beauty. It emanated from her whole body, running
outward, engulfing all the little audience. They became aware of her.
“Hm!” murmured Mrs. Callendar. “Here is something new. Something
magnificent. A born actress ... crude still, but with magnetism!” And she
raised her lorgnettes and peered very hard with her short sighted little eyes.
To Richard Callendar, Sabine murmured, “Interesting! Who is she?”
“She’s very handsome.... A discovery of Mama’s.”
And then, seating herself the girl began after a shower of liquid notes, to
play, softly and suggestively, a Chopin valse, one that was filled with
melody and simple rhythm. After the hot passion of the dancer she filled the
great room with the effect of a soft wind infinitely cool and lovely, serene in
its delicacy. She appeared presently to forget her fright and gave a
performance that was beautiful not alone in sound but in manner as well. It
may have been that old Sanson taught her that a great performance meant
more than merely making beautiful sounds. All her face and body played
their part in the poise, the grace of every movement, the sweep and the
gesture. But it is more probable that she was born knowing these things, for
they are a matter more of instinct than of training and lie thus beyond the
realm of mere instruction.
There could be no doubt of the impression she made, yet in all the
audience there was none, unless it was old Thérèse Callendar, who
suspected that she had never before played in the presence of anything but a
small town audience. There was in her performance the fire of wild
Highland ancestors, the placidity of English lanes, the courage of men who
had crossed mountains into a wilderness, perhaps even the Slavic passion of
a dim ancestress brought from Russia to live among the dour Scots of
Edinburgh, the hard, bright intelligence of Gramp, and the primitive energy
of Hattie Tolliver. There was all the stifled emotion pent so long in a heart
dedicated to secrecy, and the triumph of wild dreams; and there was too a
vast amount of passion for that little company who believed in her, whom
she dared not betray by failure ... for Lily whose very gown she wore, and
the withered Miss Ogilvie; for Gramp, and young Fergus who worshiped
her with his eyes, for her gentle father and the fierce old woman in Shane’s
Castle; but most of all for that indomitable and emotional woman whom she
must repay one day by forcing all the world to envy her.

When she had finished she was forced to return because overtones of all
this wild emotion had filtered vaguely into the very heart of the restless,
distracted audience on stiff collapsible chairs. They applauded; it was as if
she had suddenly claimed them.
Then she played savagely the Revolutionary Prelude and disappeared
behind the lacquered screen. There was a hush and then more talk and then
a sudden excitement which began at the screen and ran in little ripples
through all the stiff gathering. From the alcove there emerged the bass
rumbling of the Russian, stirred suddenly into somnolent activity, and again
a wild tinkling of little bells and a torrent of French in the shrill voice of the
Javanese dancer. The screen parted and the dancer, half naked, covered only
by the heavy gold ornaments and a wrapper of scarlet silk, emerged
chattering French and gesticulating. She addressed Mrs. Callendar who
stirred herself into a sudden dull glitter of movement. The son left the ugly
Sabine and joined his mother, calm but with a fierce, bright look in his eyes.
The American girl ... the unknown pianist had fainted!
 24

W HEN at length Ellen became conscious of her surroundings, it was

with the faint odor of stables in her nostrils and in her ears the jingling
of harness and the steady, brisk clop! clop! made by the hoofs of
spirited horses upon wet asphalt. The cabriolet, flitting through the streaks
of light made by street lamps on the wet pavement, was passing through an
open space where the light shone on the bare branches of trees and banks of
wet and dirty snow. Otherwise everything was silent.
When she stirred presently and moved into an upright posture, she saw
by her side a mass of sable, the sudden glint of a brilliant yellow dress,
captured and fixed by a stray beam of light and then the face and bright lips
of the bizarre woman with red hair, who stirred and murmured,
“It’s all right. I’m Miss Cane. On the other side is Mr. Callendar ... Mrs.
Callendar’s son.”
The dark man removed his top hat and bowed. “We’re taking you
home,” he said, “to the Babylon Arms.... That’s right, isn’t it?”
There was a faint trace of accent in his voice ... vaguely familiar,
confused somehow with a memory of mimosa and the figure of Lily
standing beneath the glowing Venice in the drawing room of Shane’s
Castle. The same sort of accent....
“That’s right, isn’t it?” continued the voice of the dark young man. “The
Babylon Arms?”
Then for the first time, Ellen spoke, slowly and with a certain shyness.
“Yes. I live there.... But how did you know?”
The man laughed. “Two reasons,” he said. “First. Sanson told my
mother. Second. My mother owns the Babylon Arms.”
Again a wandering ray of light flitted across the window of the cabriolet
illuminating for an instant the brilliant lips of Miss Cane. The lips were
smiling, as if conscious that they were shielded by the darkness, but it was a
mocking smile and the memory of it haunted Ellen long afterward. It was as
if the painted lips were really speaking and said, “The Babylon Arms is a
preposterous pretentious place.” And for the first time, perhaps, Ellen
doubted the magnificence of that vast pile.
 Her next speech was dictated by the careful precepts of Hattie Tolliver.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t have fainted.... It ruined everything.”
There was a stifled laugh from Sabine Cane. “Nonsense! It gave us a
chance to get into the air.”
Then silence once more and the echoing clop! clop! clop! clop! regular
as the beams of light which flashed past the open door of Thérèse
Callendar’s cabriolet.

Long after midnight the carriage came to a halt before the gigantic
Syrian lions of cast iron that ornamented the entrance to the Babylon Arms.
It was young Callendar who descended first, lending his arm with a grave
and alien grace to Ellen who, having recovered entirely, emerged with a
sure and vigorous step. The third occupant, instead of remaining behind as
she might well have been expected to do, followed them, driven by an
overpowering desire to miss nothing. So with Ellen between them,
Callendar in a top hat, and Sabine Cane, muffled in sables and holding her
full yellow train high above the wet pavements, descended upon the
astonished negro who ran the elevator.
Here Ellen bade them good night. “I’m all right now.... It was good of
you to have come.”
But they insisted upon accompanying her. There were protests, into
which there entered a sudden note of desperation as if the girl were striving
to conceal something which lay hidden at the top of the flamboyant
apartment.
“But you might faint again,” protested Sabine firmly. “I shan’t be
satisfied until I see you safe in your flat.”
“Besides,” observed young Callendar, smiling, “some day the Babylon
Arms will be mine. I should like to see what it looks like, abovestairs.”
So they pressed her until at last she yielded and in their company was
borne aloft in the swaying elevator. As it jolted to a halt, she bade them
good night once more, saying, “The elevator only runs this far and I live
two flights above. I’ll go the rest of the way alone.”
But they went with her through the red painted corridors under the light
of the flickering gas up the flights of stairs to a door which she opened with
her own key. There at last the farewells were made, for she did not invite
them to enter.
“My mother will call in the morning,” said Callendar, “to see that you
are not really ill.... Oh yes! You couldn’t prevent her! You don’t know her
as well as I do!”
“Good night.”
“Good night.”
And as the door closed they caught a sudden glimpse of a man, standing
timidly in the dim light of an inner room, listening with an air of curiosity
to their talk. He was a small man and rather thin, and stood dressed in a
shirt and trousers. His hair was rumpled; obviously he had been “sitting
up.” Behind him there was a table covered with papers and accounts. All
this the shrewd eye of Sabine captured in one swift instant.
As they descended under the guidance of the negro, Callendar said, “The
man ... who was he?”
“Some one ... perhaps her lover. Musicians have lovers....”
Her companion turned sharply. “No ...” he said, “not a lover. A woman
with such spirit wouldn’t have that sort of lover.”
Sabine laughed softly and with a hint of wickedness in her voice. “You
don’t know women ... how queer they can be. Besides....” And she indicated
with a nod of her red head the listening negro. “One must be careful.” But
she regarded Callendar with a new interest and during the long ride back
through the park she remained silent save to comment now and then upon
the bits of gossip which he discussed. Knowing him so well, perhaps she
understood that a new source of disturbance had crossed his path. There
was between them a remarkable sense of intimacy, as if each expected the
other to understand him perfectly.
By the time they reached the solid house on Murray Hill the party was
already on the wane and the guests had begun, in a motley stream, to leave.
Mrs. Champion and her daughters disappeared among the first after Mrs.
Callendar had the audacity to bring forward the artists and beg them to join
the guests. The Russian tenor stood awkwardly alone and in a corner and
the tiny dancer, in a turban and gown of crimson and gold brocade, sat
surrounded by young men. She had learned the business of entertaining
during those early days in Alexandria.
 25

T HE prediction of young Callendar came true, for in the morning, while

Ellen sat in a purple wrapper practising her scales, the bell rang
suddenly and into the room came Mrs. Callendar, dressed coquettishly
in a very tight black suit, a hat much too large for her short, plump figure,
and a voluminous stole of sable. The climb up the two flights of stairs
above the elevator had been very nearly too much for her and she greeted
Ellen with much panting and blowing.
“Good morning, my dear,” she said. “I hope you’re none the worse for
last night’s experience.”
Ellen smiled respectfully and bade her guest seat herself in the padded
arm chair that was the property of Clarence. “I’m all right again. I can’t
imagine what could have made me faint. I’m sorry. It must have spoiled the
party.”
At this Mrs. Callendar, settling herself in the chair, chuckled, “Not at all.
Not at all. They’ll talk of it for days. You could not have done better. It was
dramatic ... dramatic.”
“I’m all right. You needn’t have come. It is good of you.”
“Perhaps you lace too tightly,” suggested Mrs. Callendar, returning to the
subject of Ellen’s collapse.
“I don’t lace at all,” said Ellen. “I can’t play if I’m all boxed in.”
Mrs. Callendar threw back her stole and nodded her head sagely. “You’re
much wiser, my dear. Much wiser. When I was a girl I was famous for my
waist. Sixteen inches it was ... only sixteen inches.” And she brought
together her plump fingers in a gesture which implied that once she might
have encircled her waist with her two hands. “But I fainted.... I used to faint
daily. I don’t lace tightly any more, but it makes no difference. It’s just
stayed that way. You see, my corsets are quite loose.” And she thrust a
finger into the space between her ample bosom and her corset to prove her
statement. “I know my figure is bad in these days. Too many curves and too
little height. But I’m past forty and it doesn’t matter so much.”
Secretly Ellen must have compared the figure of her guest with that of
her own vigorous mother. Mrs. Tolliver was ten years the older, yet her
appearance was that of a woman much younger than Mrs. Callendar. It was
in this difference that the Levantine blood of the latter betrayed her. She
was a friendly woman, certainly, and one who was quite sure of herself,
fortified clearly by the conviction that the king can do no wrong.
“You shouldn’t have climbed the stairs just to see if I was all right.”
“But you see,” said Mrs. Callendar, “I’m interested in you. Sanson tells
me you have a great future. He doesn’t tell me such things if he doesn’t
believe them.... But don’t let that turn your head. Nothing comes without
work ... least of all, anything to do with the arts.”
For a moment Ellen did not reply. At last she said, thoughtfully, “I know
that.”
“You are bitter,” observed Mrs. Callendar, “and perhaps unhappy,” she
added with a shrewd glance of her near sighted eyes. “Well, that’s a good
thing. It shows character, and no artist ever existed without character.
Character is the thing that counts.” Here, having regained her breath, she
rose and placing the lorgnettes against her slanting eyes, she wandered to
the window. “It’s a fine view you have from here,” and after a moment’s
consideration, “Not so fine as it appears at first. Too many locomotives and
signboards. You see,” she added, turning toward the girl, “I came here this
morning for other reasons too. I own the Babylon Arms.”
“So your son told me.”
“But I’ve never seen it before. I’m only in New York for a month or two
at a time. I own a great deal of property here and there. I don’t have to look
at it. I have a good agent ... a young Jew, trustworthy ... a fellow who knows
values up and down. I pay him well and he knows that if he played me a
trick, I’d throw him out at once. Oh, I can trust him. Besides, I’m a
Levantine myself and in every Levantine there is a Jew hidden away. We
understand each other ... Minsky and I. It’s a fine building but the elevator
ought to run all the way up. Then I could charge you more rent. I suppose
there’s no room for it. The architect made these upper floors too fancy. No
eye for comfort and common sense.”
And having uttered this torrent of opinions, she returned to the plush
chair and said, “But tell me about yourself. I have a terrible curiosity about
people. You’re American, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” replied Ellen. There was about this preposterous visitor a quality
that was irresistible. It was impossible to know whether you liked or
disliked her, because she gave you no time to consider. Even if you decided
against her, it availed nothing; she swept over you with the persuasion of a
mountain torrent ... a powerful woman and one whose friendliness was
disarming. For a moment or two, the absurd thought that she might have
been drinking lingered in Ellen’s mind.
“Well,” observed Mrs. Callendar, “some day this raw country is going to
produce a superb art. Maybe you’re one of the first artists. Who can say?”
Fumbling in the reticule of black jet she brought out at last a tiny cigarette
case, made of onyx with the name Thérèse in small diamonds, a bizarre box
which in the possession of a woman less powerful and less foreign would
have been vulgar. “I suppose you smoke?”
“No,” said Ellen, “I never have.”
“Well, you will.” And she thrust the case back into the reticule. “You
don’t mind if I do?”
“Certainly not.” Ellen brought out the small table consecrated to the
smoking apparatus of her husband. It was a violation of Clarence’s
principles. On this subject he had spoken to Ellen many times, saying
always, “Women who smoke are all of one kind.”
“Wouldn’t you have a cup of tea or a bit of cake?” asked Ellen. “I owe
you something for the climb up the stairs.”
“Thank you, no. Not at this hour of the day, and besides there is my
figure to consider. It is real suffering to possess at the same time a tendency
toward fat and an appetite for rich food.”
She paused for a moment to breathe in the smoke of the tiny scented
cigarette. All this time her eyes, aided by the lorgnettes, had been roving the
room, as if somewhere within its walls she might find other clues to Ellen’s
history. To Ellen this action must have been disconcerting, especially since
the drooping lid which half concealed one eye of the visitor made it
impossible ever to know in what direction or in what object she was
interested.
“But tell me about yourself,” she continued. “You like Sanson?”
“He is a good teacher.”
“No monkey business about him ... no fanfaronade and nonsense. I’ve
known him a great many years. I see him in Paris more often than here.
He’s not so busy over there.”
 Ellen sat on the edge of her chair, like a school girl in the presence of an
elderly aunt. In the age and self-possession of her guest there was some
quality which caused her to feel an awful sense of youth and inexperience.
“I’m going to Paris to study in a year or two,” she said modestly. It was
almost as if Mrs. Callendar had the power of making her enact a rôle.
“Of course. So you must. Nobody here would pay to hear an American
musician. And you must take a foreign name. That’s important. Some day it
won’t be. But it is now. We’re still afraid to trust ourselves. People spend
money for names as well as music. You must have a good foreign name, the
fancier the better so long as it doesn’t sound like a music hall. Have you any
friends over there?”
“I have a cousin.” Her manner was better now, a little more contained
and far less shy, for the amazing friendliness of Mrs. Callendar had begun
to accomplish the inevitable effect. This dowager was perhaps the first
woman in all the city who had been friendly toward her, the first woman
who had not been a little on her guard, a little uncertain ... the way Bunce’s
wife was uncertain and hostile. And there was something in the manner of
Mrs. Callendar which must have reminded Ellen of her mother ... a certain
recklessness, a quality that was quite beyond barriers of any sort.
“Is the cousin male or female?” asked Mrs. Callendar, “because in Paris
it makes a difference.”
“Female,” replied Ellen.
“Indeed! Perhaps I know her?”
“Her name is Shane,” said Ellen. “Lily Shane.”
For a time Mrs. Callendar regarded the blue smoke of her cigarette in
silence, thoughtfully. “Shane,” she murmured. “Shane? I don’t think I know
any one named Shane? I know most of the Americans in Paris. Has she
lived there long?”
“Many years.”
“Shane? Shane?” Mrs. Callendar continued to murmur with an air of
searching the recesses of her excessively active brain; and then, all at once,
she grew alert. “Shane! Shane! Of course. Reddish hair. Tall. Beautiful.
Madame Shane. I’ve never met her, but I’ve seen her somewhere. She’s
been pointed out to me ... maybe at the races, maybe at the Opéra. Madame
Shane ... to be sure. A beauty! A widow, isn’t she?”
 There was in Ellen’s reply no haste: indeed she waited for a long time as
if turning the simple inquiry over and over in her mind. Lily a widow! Lily
who had never been married! She did not, as her mother might have done,
spring impulsively to a blundering answer. Perhaps out of her memory there
emerged old thoughts, old gossip, bits of instinct and emotion which
presently fashioned itself into a comprehensible pattern—such things as her
own pride of race, the tribal sense that was so strong in her family, the
memory of gossip about a child, indeed all those fragments of mystery
which surrounded the existence of her cousin. When she replied it was
calmly in a manner that protected Lily. “Yes,” she said, “a widow. That’s
the one,” as if nothing had occurred that was in the least surprising.
“A beautiful woman,” continued Mrs. Callendar crushing out the ember
of her cigarette upon the tray dedicated to the ashes of Clarence. “And
now,” she added, “coming to the point, I wanted to know whether you
would come sometimes and play for me in the evenings.... Not a
performance, you understand, but simply to play once in a while for me and
perhaps my son and Miss Cane and one or two friends.... Miss Cane—you
may remember her—came home with you last night ... a clever woman. I’d
pay you well ... understand that. I’d like to have you once or twice a week. I
don’t go out frequently. I love music but I dislike musicians. You’ll
understand that when you come to see more of them.”
For Ellen it was, of course, the opening of a new world in which she
might become independent, a world such as she had imagined the city to be.
It was as if, overnight, the whole course of her life had been changed. There
were chances now, subtle, hidden gambits for which she had an instinct.
“Yes,” she replied quietly. “I think I could arrange it to come.”
“And very likely,” said Mrs. Callendar, “I could get other engagements
for you.” She had risen now and was wrapping the sable stole about her
short fat neck. “I’ll let you know when I’ll want you to come. I’ll write you
a note that will be a sort of contract between us. I believe in contracts.
Never trust the human race.... And now good-by, Miss Tolliver. I’m glad
you’re all right again. You may have fainted out of fright. There were
people there last night ... stupid people ... who would have frightened
Rubinstein himself.”
So Ellen thanked her, bade her good-by and walked with her to the top of
the stairs. Half way down, Mrs. Callendar turned. “I suppose,” she said with
a rising inflection, “that you live here alone.”
“No,” said Ellen; but that was all she said, and Mrs. Callendar, smiling
to herself, disappeared amused, no doubt, by the memory of the story which
Sabine Cane had told her when she had returned across the park from the
Babylon Arms.

Once the door was closed, Ellen flung herself into a chair and sat staring
out of the window into the gray clouds that swept across the sky high above
the North River. It must have occurred to her then that Mrs. Callendar had
departed with an amazing amount of information ... knowledge which
concerned herself and her family, her future, her plans, even the details of
the very flat in which she lived. Her guest had, after a fashion, absorbed her
and her life much as a sponge absorbs water. By now Mrs. Callendar could
doubtless have drawn a detailed and accurate picture of the flat and written
a history of its occupant. Indeed she had very nearly tripped Ellen into one
unfortunate truthfulness. That was a fascinating thought ... Lily and her
strange foreign life. Lily a widow? What were her morals? How did she live
in Paris? Surely no one in the Town could have had the faintest idea. But
Madame Shane! Still Mrs. Callendar might have been mistaken. It would
have been, under the circumstances, a natural error. It was as though Lily
was destined in some unreal fashion to play a part in Ellen’s own life.
Always she was there, or at least some hint of her. Even Clarence talked of
her in a way he did not use when speaking of other women. Yet no one
knew anything of Lily.
Smiling dimly she rose, and before returning to her music she took the
brass ash tray containing the remains of Mrs. Callendar’s scented cigarette
and cleaned it thoroughly, taking care to bury the offending morsels well
out of sight where Clarence could never find them. Certainly she performed
this act through no fear of him. Rather it was with an air of secrecy as if
already she and her visitor had entered into a conspiracy. It may have been
only a touch of that curious understanding which flashes sometimes
between persons of great character.
 26

T HE life of Mr. Wyck was no longer of interest to any one; yet there were
times, usually after a stronger dose than usual of his wife’s power and
independence, when Clarence sought the company of Wyck with the air
of a man in need of refreshment and rest. For she had brought into the lives
of both men a sense of strain which, during the days of their amiable
companionship on the top floor of the Babylon Arms, had been utterly
lacking. To Clarence, this new condition of affairs remained a mystery; but
Wyck, with an intuition that was feminine, must sometimes have come
close to the real reason.
He knew, beyond all doubt, that Ellen, for all her indifference, was his
enemy—an enemy who never once considered her foe, an enemy who in
her towering self-sufficiency had not troubled to include him in her
reckoning. There were times, during the lunches the two men had together
in a tiny restaurant in Liberty Street, when he came very close to speaking
the truth, so close that Clarence, moved by a shadowy and pathetic loyalty,
turned the talk of his companion into other channels. People said that a wife
made a difference with one’s friends, that marriage ended old friendships
and began new ones. There were, to be sure, old ones that had come very
near to the end of the path, but in their place there were no new ones. It was
wonderful how Ellen appeared to exist without friends.
“She is busy, I suppose,” he confided in admiration to Wyck over the
greasy table, “and she is more independent than most women but still I
don’t see how she stands it. She might have had Bunce’s wife for a friend.”
Wyck said, “Oh, no! She’s not good enough for her.” And then as if he
had spoken too bitterly, he added, “I can understand that. Bunce’s wife is a
vulgar woman.” He had never forgiven the contractor’s daughter the theft of
Bunce. He hated her so strongly that in order to disparage her, it was
necessary by comparison to reflect praise upon another enemy.
There were at times long silences when neither man spoke at all, for
even their talk of shop came to an end after it had been turned over and over
a hundred times. What thoughts occurred in those tragic silences neither
one could have revealed to the other because they were in the realm of
those things which friends, or even those who cling to the rags of
friendship, cannot afford to tell each other.
Clarence with his nose-glasses and neat white collar drank his thin
coffee and thought, “Wyck is a dull fellow. How could I ever have liked
him? Funny how men grow apart.”
And across the table Wyck, finishing his apple sauce, thought, “Ah, if
only there was some way to save him. That woman is destroying him
slowly, bit by bit. He should never have married her. If only I could get him
back where he would be happy again.”

There were in these thoughts the vestiges of truth. At one time they were
more filled with truth than at another, for no thing is true persistently and
unutterably. Yet in their truth Clarence was the happier of the two because
he had discovered in his marriage a freedom of a new and different sort;
through Ellen he was strong enough to yield nothing to the shabby little
man who sat opposite him. In some way he had caught a sense of her
independence, a knowledge that she was not as other women, or even as
most men. She belonged to the ruthless and the elect. As for Wyck, he had
only his sense of loss, for which there was no reward, and a pang which he
was resolved one day to heal by some revenge, as yet vague and unplanned.
And in his heart he believed that friendship between men was a bond far
finer, far more pure than any relation between a man and woman.
“See!” he thought, over his apple sauce, “what it is doing to Clarence. It
is destroying him. His love for her is consuming him.”
And when they had finished eating and had paid the yellow-haired
cashier who sat enthroned behind the till, it was their habit to saunter into
the streets and lose themselves in the noon crowds of lower Broadway.
Sometimes they wandered as far as the Battery to sit on a bench and watch
the fine ships going proudly across a bay of brilliant blue out to the open
sea. But there was not much pleasure in their promenade. It ended always in
the same fashion with Clarence looking at his watch to observe, “It’s time
we started back.”
And so they would return, back the same way over the same streets and
over the same doorstep. There were times when the sight of the blue sea and
the great ships sliding silently through the green water filled the heart of
Mr. Wyck with a wild turbulence which was beyond his understanding.
Those were times when he hated both his friend and the woman who held
him prisoner.
But no one was really interested in Mr. Wyck. In the evening when he
returned to the gas-lit bed room in Lexington Avenue there was nothing for
him to do. He read sometimes, but not frequently, and on warm nights he
sat on the doorstep watching the passers-by and exchanging a word now
and then with the grim woman who was his landlady. There were long
hours in which there was nothing to do but to think, and not even the gray
cat, watching the shadow of her tail against the decaying brownstone of the
doorstep, could have guessed the dark trend of those secret thoughts.
His life, his happiness had been ruined by a stranger who scorned even
to think of him.

Other changes came in the life of Clarence.

Once he had been a great one for organizations. He had been vice
president of the Mutual Benefit Association of the Superba Electrical
Company and a member of no less than three lodges. In the days before his
marriage the duties concerned with all these organizations had required
much of his time, but when Ellen arrived he came to stay more and more at
home, and little by little these gaieties too lost their place in his life. It
seemed that he was content to remain in the flat reading the newspaper,
working over his accounts and now and then merely listening to his wife’s
music with a strange expression of bewilderment as if it were impossible
for him ever to understand her; and that little vein in his throat, which Lily
had observed with such interest, throbbed and throbbed with a desire which
sometimes must have terrified him.
Sitting there in the long evenings, silhouetted as she played, against the
brilliant blue of a sky that stretched out interminably beyond the windows
of the Babylon Arms, she had an air of lofty magnificence, an aloofness that
was unconquerable. There were times when she seemed a very symbol of
all that was unattainable; and always she was related to the wild dreams that
became gradually less and less turbulent.
When she told him of these new engagements to play for Mrs. Callendar,
he frowned and said, “But what of me? What am I to do?”
“It means more money for us ... and we need money. You see, Mrs.
Callendar pays me well. My music will cost me nothing. Perhaps I shall be
able to put something aside. Besides there is the experience which must not
be overlooked.”
These things were true, and of late the mention of the money she might
earn seemed not so unpleasant to Clarence as it had once been. He was, it
appeared, more troubled by the fear of her escaping him, for he said, “I
don’t think it’s wise to go too much with these people. They’re not our
sort.... I’ve heard stories of how they live. They’re society people.”
At which Ellen mocked him, laughing, to say, “But I have nothing to do
with them. I work for them. I entertain them ... that’s all.”
“And Wyck says that young Callendar has a reputation for being a bad
one.”
Ellen laughed again, scornfully. “How does he know anything about
young Callendar? Wyck and his boarding house. It’s because he hates me. I
know what he’s like ... a mean, nasty little man who hates me.”
“He has friends.... His family was rich once in New York.”
What Clarence said was true. Wyck did know because, although he had
long since ceased to have any existence for such people as the Callendars,
there were channels by way of housemaids and distant relatives through
which news of their world penetrated at last, somewhat distorted and
magnified, to the spinster aunts in Yonkers, and so at length to Mr. Wyck
himself. For the old ladies had known young Callendar’s father as a boy and
they still lived in the world of those early days when, ensconced on lower
Fifth Avenue behind plush curtains ornamented with ball fringe, they had
received the Sunday procession of fashionables. The vulgar, new city of this
early twentieth century, for all its noise and show, did not exist for them any
more than they, for all their thin blooded pride, existed for the Callendars. It
was after all an affair merely of dollars and cents. The Callendars had
increased their fortune; the Wycks had lost theirs.
“I shall go to the Callendars’ and play for them because it is necessary,”
said Ellen. “I am not a fool. I can take care of myself.”
To this abrupt statement, Clarence found no answer. He yielded quietly
and, presently, on the nights when Ellen played in the great house on
Murray Hill, he found himself going back once more to his three lodges and
the Mutual Benefit Association of the Superba Electrical Company. There
were members of the latter organization who thought it queer that their vice
president attended the annual ball, held that year in a Brooklyn Hotel, as he
had always done, alone, without his wife. It happened that she played that
night in the solid house on Murray Hill.

And what then of Ellen herself? She was not, surely, unconscious of all
that was happening so slowly, so imperceptibly about her. It is true that she
was one of those who are born to success, one for whom the past does not
exist and the present has reality only in so far as it provides a step into the
future. Indeed, during those years in the city, even the Town itself became a
very distant and shadowy memory. She was concerned, desperately, with
what lay before her, confused perhaps by a sense of imminent disaster so
vague that it could have for her no real meaning or significance.
But of course she never spoke of these things to her husband, perhaps
because she was conscious that he might not understand them. At times the
old pity for him, the same pity which had seized her so unaccountably upon
the night of their flight, overwhelmed her, and at such moments it was her
habit to be tender with him in a fashion that sent him into extravagant
flights of happiness. But these moments became, after a while, conscious
things on the part of Ellen so that presently she used them cheaply to quiet
his unhappiness as one might use a gaudy stick of candy to quiet an
unhappy child. Such little things made him happy.

Sometimes in the night she would lie in one of the green beds
ornamented with garlands of salmon pink roses, listening to the sounds of
the city that lay far beneath them ... the distant rumble which rose and
mingled somehow with the glow of light that filled all the dome of the sky,
a rumble pierced sharply by the sudden shrill cry of a city child playing late
in the streets, or the faint clop! clop! of hoofs upon asphalt blurred now and
again by the ghostly boom of a great ship’s whistle rising from the fog-
veiled river ... marvelous, splendorous sounds of a great world close at
hand. There lay in these sounds a wonderful sense of the crowd—in which
she herself was not a part. Lying there, her fingers would clutch the
bedclothes tightly and presently she would become conscious that in her
listening she was not alone, that beside her, separated by the little chasm
which divided the two green beds, Clarence too lay awake ... listening. She
must have known in those hours an unreal consciousness of something that
was waiting ... a Thing destined not to become clear until long afterward ...
a Thing which waited silently and with a terrible patience. It was an
experience that was not rare; it happened many nights, so that presently she
came to be happy in the weeks when Clarence, traveling through the night
hundreds of miles from her, was not there at all.
Sometimes her hand would steal out and in the darkness be touched and
clasped by another hand that trembled and clung to hers in a sort of terror.
 27

E LLEN’S awareness of Richard Callendar came over her slowly, a

sensation neither desired nor anticipated, but one which stole upon her
in some obscure fashion through the corridors of her own music. It
would have been impossible to fix the moment at which this awareness took
form; certainly it was not during that first damp drive through the park,
when, wedged between his slim body and that of the yellow-clad Sabine,
she had her first view of him. On that occasion she had remarked him
merely as a young man perhaps of thirty (in this she was wrong by five
years) who possessed a beauty of a kind new to her, a beauty of which there
were traces to be found among certain of the workers in the Mills that
hugged the dying hedges of Shane’s Castle. It was, in short, a kind of
mystical, unearthly beauty born of an old, old race that was sensual and
filled with an intense capacity for suffering ... a kind of beauty never to be
found among her own Scotch and English friends and relatives. It had its
determining quality in the extraordinary blackness of his hair, the dark olive
of his skin and the unreality of gray eyes so queerly placed in so much
darkness.
Sabine Cane, so completely civilized, so disillusioned, understood this
beauty with the mind of one capable of an amazing detachment and power
of analysis, for she had an extraordinary power of pulling herself up short in
the midst of her emotions and saying, “This is indeed interesting. Here am I
giving way to a good wholesome passion. Well! Well!...” and then, “It’s all
very good so long as I don’t allow myself to be hurt by it.” For Sabine had
the sort of intelligence which is the equipment of every potential sensualist.
This awareness on the part of Ellen forced its way through a torrent of
impressions and emotions into a consciousness never too well organized. At
the “parties” of Mrs. Callendar, there were, as the amusing woman
predicted, never more than three or four people. There was always herself
and usually her son. Sometimes Sabine Cane, whose relationship to the
older woman was that of one who shares a complete understanding, was
present, and now and then an elderly beau or two, of the sort which appears
at concerts and the opera where they sit in the rear of boxes obscured
somewhat by bedizened dowagers.