"It seems new, I think," said Amethyst, who, at twenty, had not quite exhausted all the ideas of life. "It is very interesting, but, practically, when Iris was so unattainable, don't you think he would have managed to get on without her--by the help of his music--and his battles?" "You see," said Sylvester, eagerly and nervously, "in a measure he found her in art, and in the struggle of life, and, in so far as she was embodied in them, she gave them value." "I am not sure that I understand," said Amethyst, in soft considerate tones. "What is it that you intend Iris to signify?" "She was his dream of perfection," said Sylvester, very low, "his vision--well, his Beatrice. He found something of perfect beauty in many things--when he sought it with sufficient pains, but--but love, of course, was the higher revelation. He could be content with nothing less." "Ah, I must read to the end. Was she always an abstraction?" "She did not always seem so," said Sylvester, as for a moment he met her eyes. Amethyst blushed, with an inward start, she had forgotten for the moment her resentment; now came a throb of triumph. So he did not hate and despise her, this man who had thought her false to his friend. Had she conquered him too? As her thoughts glanced at the other conquest awaiting her disposal, she might be pardoned for feeling that, for her at least, life held many different possibilities. "I don't think your father would believe in Iris," she said suddenly, with girlish abruptness. "I am afraid he doesn't," said Sylvester. "But why do you say so?" "He gave me some advice once, that I have found out to be true. But it wasn't at all consistent with dreams of finding perfection.--At least-- after all, I am not quite sure of that." She sat for a moment with a perfectly simple, considerate expression on her beautiful face, evidently pursuing a new idea. But she did not tell Sylvester what it was; and turned off the subject with an inquiry for Mr Riddell and other Cleverley friends.