When the scene changed to the drawing-room, Lufa played tolerably and sung well, delighting Walter. She asked and received his permission to sing “my song,” as she called it, and pleased him with it more than ever. He managed to get her into the conservatory, which was large, and there he talked much, and she seemed to listen much. It was but the vague, twilight, allusive talk which, coming readily to all men in love, came the more readily to one always a poet, and not merely a poet by being in love. Every one in love sees a little further into things, but few see clearly, and hence love-talk has in general so little meaning. Ordinary men in love gain glimpses of truth more and other than they usually see, but from having so little dealing with the truth, they do not even try to get a hold of it, they do not know it for truth even when dallying with it. It is the true man’s dreams that come true. He raised her hand to his lips as at length she turned toward the drawing-room, and he thought she more than yielded it, but could not be sure. Anyhow she was not offended, for she smiled with her usual sweetness as she bade him good-night. “One instant, Mr. Colman!” she added: “I promised you a sedative! I will run and get it. No, I won’t keep you; I will send it to your room.” He had scarce shut his door when it opened again, and there was Lufa. “I beg your pardon!” she said; “I thought you would not be come up, and I wanted to make my little offering with my own hand: it owes so much to you!” She slipped past him, laid her book on his table, and went. He lighted his candles with eager anxiety, and took it up. It was a dramatic poem of some length, daintily bound in white vellum, with gilt edges. On the title-page was written “The Master’s Copy,” with the date and Lufa’s initials. He threw himself into a great soft chair that with open arms invited him, and began to read. He had taken champagne pretty freely at dinner; his mind was yet in the commotion left by the summer-wind of their many words that might seem so much; he felt his kiss on her dainty hand, and her pressure of it to his lips; as he read, she seemed still and always in the door-way, entering with the book; its inscription was continually turning up with a shine: such was the mood in which he read the poem. Through he read it, every word, some of it many times; then rose and went to his writing-table, to set down his judgment of his lady’s poem. He wrote and wrote, almost without pause. The dawn began to glimmer, the red blood of the morning came back to chase the swoon of the night, ere at last, throwing down his pen, he gave a sigh of weary joy, tore off his clothes, plunged into his bed, and there lay afloat on the soft waves of sleep. And as he slept, the sun came slowly up to shake the falsehood out of the earth. CHAPTER XV. REFLECTION.