"You mustn't think, because I have spoken about Mr. de Nérac, that I am discontented. I wouldn't have him a bit altered integrally, for there is no one like him living. And I'm utterly happy in the fulfilment of the great romance of my life. Isn't it wonderful, Asticot? Have you ever heard the like outside a story book? To meet again after thirteen years and to find the old--the old----" "Love," I whispered, as I saw that she suddenly blushed at the word. "As strong and true as ever. It is the inner things that matter, Asticot. The outside ones are nothing. Dreadful things have happened to each of us during those years, but they haven't clouded the serenity of our souls." "Ah, Madame," said I, with a smile--it strikes me now that I was slightly impertinent--"I am sure my master said that." "Yes," she admitted, raising wide innocent eyes. "How did you guess?" "You yourself once detected echoes in me!" We both laughed. "That is what brought us together, Asticot. You seemed to regard him as a god rather than as a man--and I loved you for it." She put out her left hand. I touched it with my lips. "That's a charming French way we haven't got in England. And--you did it very nicely, Asticot." I almost scowled at the servant who entered with the announcement that tea was waiting in the drawing-room. * * * * * I think of all human utterances I have heard fall from the lips of those I love and honour, that formula of Paragot's echoed by Joanna was the most pathetically vain. And they believed it. Indeed it was the vital article of their faith. On its truth the whole fabric of their love depended. It counted for nothing in Joanna's romantic eyes that the brilliant eager youth, "rich in the glory of his rising-sun," who had won her heart long ago--(she shewed me his photograph: alas poor Paragot!)--was now the tongue-tied spectre, the tale of whose ungentle past was scarred upon his face: who stalked grotesquely comfortless in his ill-fitting clothes: who with the art of dress had lost in the boozing-kens of Europe the graces of social intercourse. It counted for nothing that he was middle-aged, deserted forever by the elusive wanton, inspiration, condemned (she knew it in her heart) to artistic barrenness in perpetuity. It counted for nothing that her gods awakened his contempt, and his gods her fear. It counted for nothing that they had scarcely a single taste or thought in common--half-educated, half-bred boy that I was, I vow I entered a sweeter chamber of intimacy in my dear lady's heart than was open to Paragot.