'I never mentioned politics. I know better. No man in his senses would expect politics from any woman so demoralisingly feminine as yourself. Besides, that isn't your rôle. Your rôle is to be soft, idle; a toy; a siren; the negation of enterprise. Work and woman--the terms contradict one another. The woman who works, or who tolerates work, is only half a woman. The most you can hope for,' he said with scorn, 'is to inspire--and even that you do unconsciously, and very often quite against your will. You sap our energy; you sap and you destroy.' She had not often heard him speak with so much bitterness, but she did not know that his opinions in this more crystallised form dated from that slight moment in which he had divined her own untrustworthiness. 'You are very wise. I forget whether you are twenty-two or twenty-three?' 'Oh, you may be sarcastic. I only know that I will never have my life wrecked by women. To-morrow the elections take place, and, after that, whatever their result, I belong to the Islands.' 'I think I see you with a certain clearness,' she said more gently, 'full of illusions, independence, and young generosities--_nous passons tous par là_.' 'Talk English, Eve, and be less cynical; if I am twenty-two, as you reminded me, you are nineteen.' 'If you could find a woman who was a help and not a hindrance?' she suggested. 'Ah!' he said, 'the Blue Bird! I am not likely to be taken in; I am too well on my guard.--Look!' he added, 'Fru Thyregod and your Russian friend; I leave you to them,' and before Eve could voice her indignation he had disappeared into the surrounding woods. IV On the next day, the day of the elections, which was also the anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Herakleion blossomed suddenly, and from the earliest hour, into a striped and fluttering gaudiness. The sun shone down upon a white town beflagged into an astonishing gaiety. Everywhere was whiteness, whiteness, and brilliantly coloured flags. White, green, and orange, dazzling in the sun, vivid in the breeze. And, keyed up to match the intensity of the colour, the band blared brassily, unremittingly, throughout the day from the centre of the _platia_.