'Julian, I cherish such endless dreams! I loathe my life of petty adventures; I undertake them only in order to forget the ideal which until now has been denied me. I have crushed down the vision of life with you, but always it has remained at the back of my mind, so wide, so open, a life so free and so full of music and beauty, Julian! I would work--for you. I would create--for you. I don't want to marry you, Julian. I value my freedom above all things. Bondage is not for you or me. But I'll come with you anywhere--to Aphros if you like.' 'To Aphros?' he repeated. 'Why not?' She put in, with extraordinary skill,-- 'I belong to the Islands no less than you.' Privately she thought,-- 'If you knew how little I cared about the Islands!' He stared at her, turning her words over in his mind. He was as reckless as she, but conscientiously he suggested,-- 'There may be danger.' 'I am not really a coward, only in the unimportant things. And you said yourself that they could never invade the island,' she added with complete confidence in his statement. He dreamt aloud,-- 'I have only just found her. This is Herakleion! She might, who knows? be of use to Aphros.' She wondered which consideration weighed most heavily with him. 'You were like my sister,' he said suddenly. She gave a rueful smile, but said nothing. 'No, no!' he cried, springing up. 'This can never be; have you bewitched me? Let me go, Eve; you have been playing a game with me.' She shook her head very slowly and tears gathered in her eyes. 'Then the game is my whole life, Julian; put me to any test you choose to prove my sincerity.' She convinced him against his will, and he resented it. 'You have deceived me too often.' 'I have been obliged to deceive you, because I could not tell you the truth.' 'Very plausible,' he muttered. She waited, very well acquainted with the vehemence of his moods and reactions. She was rewarded; he said next, with laughter lurking in his eyes,-- 'Ever since I can remember, I have quarrelled with you several times a day.' 'But this evening we have no time to waste in quarrelling,' she replied, relieved, and stretching out her hands to him again. As he took them, she added in a low voice, 'You attract me fatally, my refractory Julian.' 'We will go to Aphros,' he said, 'as friends and colleagues.' 'On any terms you choose to dictate,' she replied with ironical gravity.