"You should not have sent to Nice for the books" (it ran), "yet I should be ungrateful not to thank you. If you care to come and see the violet-bed I was telling you of I will thank you in person. Papa says would you like one of Minèrve's next litter, but I say you will not be here then? Besides, in England, are not your dogs of the chase of the best? Accept, Milord, my most grateful thanks and remembrances. "C. DE C." There was only a fragment of the letter next in sequence, that ran as follows: ". . . and if you really wish it, I will with pleasure embroider a collar for the pup. Papa says I am to say he is glad you are staying on, as he never meets a gentleman here. It is amiable of you to admire my singing, though I fear it is sadly uncultured after what you are used to, but I too love the Provençal songs. You suggest Sunday evening to come and begin translating them into French, that would suit us admirably. My father is, alas! in bed with the gout, but perhaps you would be kind enough to go up and see him? It is true our garden is lovely by moonlight--you do not see then how neglected it is, but I am not sure if I ought to show it to you then. Perhaps if . . ." The rest of the page was missing, and Bernardy picked up the next letter. "Bien-aimé" (he read), "how can I write you and what can I say? What do the women of your world say when they feel as I do? Ah! I hope you do not know, I hope you have never made any other woman feel what I do. Every one must adore you, but only I must love you. There, I have said it! Edmund, I love you. But it is not so very dreadful to say it, is it, since, you love me? I cannot play with the truth to you, Edmund. To you I must always be "CANDIDE." A week later a frightened chord was sounded. "Edmund," she wrote, "do not again kiss me as you did last night. I feel wicked creeping out to meet you as it is, and last night--Edmund, you made me feel ashamed. It was not like kissing, it was as though you wished to eat me. Do not think me unkind, but I am feeling afraid, even of you. That is unkind-- forgive me. "CANDIDE." Another week, and the key had shifted again.