"Do you know it well?" "Yes." "What does it say to you?" "It is ever a reminder of what to avoid." "What to avoid! but it is perfectly beautiful. Why should you want to avoid beauty?!" "I do not--it is what this was meant to stand for and what human beings failed in allowing it to do--that is the lesson." I was frightfully interested. "Tell me what you mean?" "The architects were great, the king's thought was great--but only in one way--and everyone--the whole class--forgot the real meaning of _noblesse oblige_, and abused their power--and so the revolution swept them away--They put false value upon everything--false values upon birth and breeding--and no value upon their consequent obligations, or upon character--." "You believe in acknowledging your obligations I know"-- "Yes--I hope so--Think in that palace the immense importance which was given to etiquette and forms and ceremonies--and to a quite ridiculous false sense of honour--they could ruin their poor tradesmen and--yet--." "Yes"--I interrupted--"it was odd, wasn't it?--a gentleman was still a gentleman, never paying his tailor's bills--but ceased to be one if he cheated at cards--." Miss Sharp suddenly dropped her dark blue parasol and bent to pick it up again--and as she did she changed the conversation by remarking that there were an unusual quantity of aeroplanes buzzing from Buc. This was unlike her--I cannot think why she did so. I wanted to steer her back to the subject of Versailles and its meaning--. Burton puffed a little as we went up the rather steep slope by the _Aile du Nord_, and Miss Sharp put her hand on the bar and helped him to push the chair. "Is it not hateful for me being such a burden"--I could not help saying--. "It leaves you more time to think--." "Well! that is no blessing--that is the agony--thinking." "It should not be--to have time to think must be wonderful"--and she sighed unconsciously. Over me came a kind of rush of tenderness--I wanted to be strong again, and protect her and make her life easy, and give her time and love and everything in the world she could wish for--But I dared not say anything, and she hung back again a little, and once more it made the conversation difficult--and when we reached a sheltered spot by the "_point du jour_" I felt there was a sort of armour around her, and that it would be wiser to go straight to work and not talk further to-day. She went directly from the _parc_ to catch her train at five o'clock--and I was wheeled back to the hotel. And now I have the evening alone before me--but the day is distinctly a step onward in the friendship line. VIII I spent a memorable day with Miss Sharp in the _parc_ yesterday. I do not even remember what I did in the intermediate time--it seems of so little importance--but this Thursday will always stand out as a landmark of our acquaintance.