‘Ah!’ she said. ‘You think I danced well?’

‘You danced—as you always danced, Madame Kharsanova.’

She drew in her breath sharply.

‘So—you have guessed.’

‘There is only one Kharsanova. No one could see you dance and forget. But why—why?’

‘What else is possible?’

‘You mean?’

She had spoken very simply. She was just as simple now. ‘Oh! but you understand. You are of the world. A great dancer—she can have lovers, yes—but a husband, that is different. And he—he did not want the other. He wanted me to belong to him as—as Kharsanova could never have belonged.’

‘I see,’ said Mr Satterthwaite. ‘I see. So you gave it up?’

She nodded.

‘You must have loved him very much,’ said Mr Satterthwaite gently.

‘To make such a sacrifice?’ She laughed.

‘Not quite that. To make it so light-heartedly.’

‘Ah, yes—perhaps—you are right.’

‘And now?’ asked Mr Satterthwaite.

Her face grew grave.

‘Now?’ She paused, then raised her voice and spoke into the shadows.

‘Is that you, Sergius Ivanovitch?’

Prince Oranoff came out into the moonlight. He took her hand and smiled at Mr Satterthwaite without self-consciousness.

‘Ten years ago I mourned the death of Anna Kharsanova,’ he said simply. ‘She was to me as my other self. Today I have found her again. We shall part no more.’

‘At the end of the lane in ten minutes,’ said Anna. ‘I shall not fail you.’

Oranoff nodded and went off again. The dancer turned to Mr Satterthwaite. A smile played about her lips.

‘Well—you are not satisfied, my friend?’

‘Do you know,’ said Mr Satterthwaite abruptly, ‘that your husband is looking for you?’

He saw the tremor that passed over her face, but her voice was steady enough.

‘Yes,’ she said gravely. ‘That may well be.’

‘I saw his eyes. They—’ he stopped abruptly.

She was still calm.

‘Yes, perhaps. For an hour. An hour’s magic, born of past memories, of music, of moonlight—That is all.’

‘Then there is nothing that I can say?’ He felt old, dispirited.

‘For ten years I have lived with the man I love,’ said Anna Kharsanova. ‘Now I am going to the man who for ten years has loved me.’

Mr Satterthwaite said nothing. He had no arguments left. Besides it really seemed the simplest solution. Only—only, somehow, it was not the solution he wanted. He felt her hand on his shoulder.

‘I know, my friend, I know. But there is no third way. Always one looks for one thing—the lover, the perfect, the eternal lover … It is the music of Harlequin one hears. No lover ever satisfies one, for all lovers are mortal. And Harlequin is only a myth, an invisible presence … unless—’

‘Yes,’ said Mr Satterthwaite. ‘Yes?’

‘Unless—his name is—Death!’

Mr Satterthwaite shivered. She moved away from him, was swallowed up in the shadows …