But it wasn’t avarice alone that inflamed Franz Lindner’s desire; it was love, it was revenge, it was wounded vanity. At once the idea rose up clear in his mind that if he could go to Monte Carlo and win a fortune, as the bookmaker had done, he might come home and lay it all at Linnet’s feet, with a very good chance of final acceptance. His experience at the London Pavilion had led him to believe that women in general, and theatrical stars in particular, had all their price, and might all be bought, if you only bid high enough. He didn’t doubt that Linnet was like the rest of her kind in this matter. She didn’t love Andreas; she couldn’t love Andreas. If a good-looking man, with a very fine figure and a very black moustache, laid the untold gold of Monte Carlo at her feet, could Linnet resist? Would she care to resist him? Franz opined she would not. He didn’t think it likely. There was only one thing needed to break the slender tie that bound her to Andreas. That one thing he would get—money, money, money!
So, from that day forth, Franz Lindner’s life was changed. He began to work on quite a new basis. Hitherto, like most others of his trade and class, he had spent all he earned as fast as he got it. Now, he began to save and lay by for love, with the thrift of his countrymen. One great object in life swam clear before his eyes; he must manage to scrape together five hundred pounds, and take it to Monte Carlo, where he could make it by a stroke or two of that wonder-working roulette-table into twenty thousand. And, with twenty thousand pounds, he didn’t for a moment doubt he’d be able to pay his suit once more to Linnet.
While _Cophetua’s Adventure_ was running at the Harmony, Will necessarily saw a good deal of Linnet. Signora Casalmonte was now the talk of the town. Her name cropped up everywhere. Many men paid her most assiduous court. She was greatly in request for meets of the Four-in-hand Club, for Sundays at the Lyric, for picnics at Virginia Water, for little dinners at Richmond. To all of them Linnet went in her innocent way—that deeper-seated innocence that sees and knows much evil, yet passes unscathed through it; for the innocence that springs from mere ignorance alone is hardly worth counting. Andreas accompanied her everywhere with marital solicitude; the foolish were wont to say he was a jealous fellow; wiser heads saw well he was only making sure that the throat which uttered such valuable notes should take no hurt from night air or injudicious ices. It was the singer, not the woman, Andreas guarded so close—the singer herself, and the money she brought him.