"If what I said sounded brutal, it was merely to remind you that love--the intense passionate love I have no doubt you feel for this young man who helps you to realize your renewed youth--never lasts. And when this new love of yours burns itself out--you never had the reputation of being very constant, dear Marie--you will have an alien young man on your hands, while that remarkable brain of yours will be demanding its field of action. You are European, not American--why, even your accent is stronger than mine! That may be due to an uncommonly susceptible ear, but as a matter of fact your mind has a stronger accent still. You became thoroughly Europeanized, one of us, and--I say this quite impartially--the most statesman-like woman in Europe. Your mind was still plastic when you came to us--and your plastic years are long over, _ma chere_. If your mind had become as young as your body, you would have bitterly resented it. You were always very proud of that intellect of yours--and with the best of reasons." Mary was staring out of the window. She recalled that she had faced the fact of the old mind in the young brain when she first discovered that she loved Clavering. How could she have forgotten . . . for a few short weeks--and up there? . . . She raised her eyes to the mountain. From where she sat she could not see the top. It looked like an impenetrable rampart, rising to the skies. "Can you tell me with honesty and candor," he continued in those same gentle tones that had always reminded her of limpid water running over iron, "--and for all your subtlety your mind is too arrogant and fearless to be otherwise than honest _au fond_--that you believe you could remain satisfied with love alone? For more, let us say, than a year?" She moved restlessly. "Perhaps not. But I had planned to live in Vienna. He would spend only a part of the year there with me. His own interests are here, of course. It would be a perfectly workable arrangement." "Are you sure? If you are, I must conclude that in the mental confusion love so often induces, you have lost temporarily your remarkable powers of clear and coherent thought. Do you not realize that you would no longer be Graefin Zattiany, you would be Mrs. Lee Clavering? Do you imagine for a moment that you could play the great role in Austrian affairs you have set yourself, handicapped by an American name--and an American husband? Not with all your gifts, your wealth, your genius for playing on that complex instrument called human nature. Austria may be a Republic of sorts, but it is still Austria. You would be an American and an outsider--a presumptuous interloper." She stared at him aghast. "I--oh!--I had not thought of that. It seems incomprehensible--but I had never thought of myself as Mrs. Clavering. I have been Graefin Zattiany so long!"