The change in Valentine was far less marked to a careless eye. There was still a peculiar cleanness in his large blue eyes, a white delicacy in his features. The lips of his mouth were red and soft, not dry, as were the lips of Julian. The crisp gold of his hair caught the light, and his lithe figure rested in his chair in a calm posture of pleasant ease. Yet he, too, was changed. Expression of a new nature now no longer lurked furtively in his face, but boldly, even triumphantly, asserted itself. It did not shrink behind a soft smile, or glide and pass in a fleeting gaiety, but stared upon the world with something of the hard and fixed immobility of a mask. Every mask, whatever expression be painted upon it, wears a certain aspect of shamelessness. Valentine's was a hard and shameless face, although his features, if coarser than of old, were still noble, and, in line, a silent legend of almost priestly intellectuality. He was looking across at Julian, who held idly between his lax fingers a letter written with violet ink upon pink paper, which had a little bird stamped in the left-hand corner. "When did you get it?" he said. "Two or three days ago, I think. I can't remember. I can't remember anything now," Julian answered heavily. "And you have had two since?" "Yes. And to-day she called." "You were out?" "Yes." "She shows herself very exigent all of a sudden. She is afraid of losing you. I told you long ago she cherished absurd ambitions with regard to you. Do you intend to answer her notes?" "Oh yes," Julian said. "Cuckoo has always been very fond of me; very fond." He glanced at the absurdly vulgar little bird in the corner of the letter. "And that's something," he added slowly. "You are weighed down with gratitude? No wonder. Are you grateful to others who have always cared for you in a different way--unselfishly, that is?" "I don't seem to feel very much about anybody now," Julian said. "I do such a lot. The more you do, the less you feel. Damnable life! All cruelty. I can't feel satisfied. But there must be something; something I haven't tried. I must find it," he said, almost fiercely, and, stirring in a sudden energy, "I must find it--or--curse you, Val, why don't you find it for me?" Valentine laughed. "The last novelty has failed? You are a very discontented sinner, Julian. And yet London begins to think you too enterprising. I hear that Lady Crichton is the last person to shut her doors against you. What did she hear of?" "How should I know?" He laughed bitterly. "She oughtn't to be particular. She used to receive Marr. I met him first in her yellow drawing-room." "London had not discussed him, perhaps. You are rapidly becoming a legend and a warning. That is fame. To be the accepted warning for others." "Or infamy; which is much the same thing."