'I can't stay here with you alone.' 'You're not going away?' 'Before, there was no harm in our being together at the hotel; but now--' 'Oh, Valentia, don't leave me. I can't--I can't live without you.' She heard the unhappiness in his voice. She turned to him again and laid her two hands on his shoulders. 'Why can't you forget it all, and let us be good friends again? Forget that you are a man. A woman can remain with a man for ever, and always be content to walk and read and talk with him, and never think of anything else. Can you forget it, Ferdinand? You will make me so happy.' He did not answer, and for a long time they stood on the bridge in silence. At last he sighed--a heartbroken sigh. 'Perhaps you're right. It may be better to pretend that we are friends. If you like, we will forget all this.' Her heart was too full; she could not answer; but she held out her hands to him. He took them in his own, and, bending down, kissed them. Then they walked home, side by side, without speaking. V Next morning Valentia received M. Rollo's answer to her letter. He apologised for his delay in answering. '_You are a philosopher_,' he said--she could see the little snigger with which he had written the words--'_You are a philosopher, and I was afraid lest my reply should disturb the course of your reflections on friendship. I confess that I did not entirely understand your letter, but I gathered that the sentiments were correct, and it gave me great pleasure to know that your experiment has had such excellent results. I gather that you have not yet discovered that there is more than a verbal connection between Friendship and Love._' The reference is to the French equivalents of those states of mind. '_But to speak seriously, dear child. You are young and beautiful now, but not so very many years shall pass before your lovely skin becomes coarse and muddy, and your teeth yellow, and the wrinkles appear about your mouth and eyes. You have not so very many years before you in which to collect sensations, and the recollection of one's loves is, perhaps, the greatest pleasure left to one's old age. To be virtuous, my dear, is admirable, but there are so many interpretations of virtue. For myself, I can say that I have never regretted the temptations to which I succumbed, but often the temptations I have resisted. Therefore, love, love, love! And remember that if love at sixty in a man is sometimes pathetic, in a woman at forty it is always ridiculous. Therefore, take your youth in both hands and say to yourself, "Life is short, but let me live before I die!"_' She did not show the letter to Ferdinand. * * * * *