"No, it is the truth," said Maria Dolores, "the true truth. He is too proud to live in luxury at his wife's expense." "I like a man making conditions, when it is a question of marrying you," said Frau Brandt, with scorn. "So do I," said Maria Dolores, with heartiness. "Well, at any rate, I am glad to see that he is not after you for your money," Frau Brandt reflected. "I suppose we shall have to dress in sackcloth and dine on lentils," said Maria Dolores. "Of course you will tell him to take his conditions to the Old One," said Frau Brandt. "It is out of the question for you to change the manner of your life." "I feel indeed as if it were," admitted Maria Dolores. "But if he insists?" "Then tell him to go to the Old One himself," was Frau Brandt's blunt advice. Maria Dolores laughed. "It seems like an _impasse_," she said. "Who is to break the news to my brother?" "We will wait until there is some news to break," the old woman amiably grumbled. Again at the sunset hour Maria Dolores met him in the garden. He was seated on one of their marble benches, amongst marble columns, (rose-tinted by the western light, and casting long purple shadows), in a vine-embowered pergola. He was leaning forward, legs crossed, brow wrinkled, as one deep in thought. But of course at the sound of her footstep he jumped up. "What mighty problem were you revolving?" she asked. "You looked like Rembrandt's _philosophe en méditation_." "I was revolving the problem of human love," he answered. "I was mutilating Browning. '_Was it something said, Something done, Was it touch of hand, Turn of head?_' I was also thinking about you. I was wondering whether it would be my cruel destiny not to see you this evening, and thinking of the first time I ever saw you." "Oh," said she, lightly, "that morning among the olives,--when you gathered the windflowers for me?" "No," said he. "That was the second time." "Indeed?" said she, surprised. She sat down on the marble bench. John stood before her. "Yes," said he. "The first time was the day before. You were crossing the garden--you were bending over the sun-dial--and I spied upon you from a window of the _piano nobile_. Lady Blanchemain was there with me, and she made a prediction." "What did she predict?" asked Maria Dolores, unsuspicious. "She predicted that I would fall--" But he dropped his sentence in the middle. "She predicted what has happened." "Oh," murmured Maria Dolores, and looked at the horizon. By-and-by, "That morning among the olives was the first time that I saw you--when you dashed like a paladin to my assistance. I feel that I have never sufficiently thanked you." "A paladin oddly panoplied," said John. "Tell me honestly, weren't you in two minds whether or not to reward me with largesse? You had silver in your hand." Maria Dolores laughed. I think she coloured a little.