Between these two, when the countess was not present, we are compelled to admit that the conversation sometimes waxed perilous, notwithstanding Cecil's resolute platonism, when the large liquid eyes of Margarita, under their thick dark fringes, met his, and her scarlet lips, which we have said were rather sensuous, quivered and smiled, with an expression all their own; and one of those perilous times was when, somehow, they fell on the subject of love--a natural one enough between a handsome young fellow and a beautiful woman. 'There are times,' said Cecil, after a pause, in reply to something Margarita had said, 'when men dare not love.' 'Dare not--when?' asked Margarita, as she made a false move, and had to play her king. 'I mean when to love is rashness, or would be presumption,' said he, thinking, as no doubt he was, of Mary and her vain old guardian. 'There may be rashness, but there is no presumption in any man offering his true and honest love to any woman--even a princess.' 'But would the princess accept it?' said Cecil. 'Perhaps,' replied Margarita, looking at him with one of her smiles, and then drooping her lashes; 'love is romance,' she added. 'Then I have lived the romance of my life,' said Cecil, a little bitterly, and perhaps unwisely, 'and have only its grim realities before me now.' 'Already--and you so young?' she asked, with dilated eyes. 'Already!' 'I trust you mistake, and that romance may come again,' said she, softly. 'It is utterly past, so far as hope goes now.' 'Does the grass of the grave grow above it?' she asked after a pause. 'In one sense--for my hope is buried.' 'I do not think any grave is so deep that we can bury in it all hope of another love and other happiness,' said Margarita, perhaps misunderstanding him, and making a rather leading remark, which Cecil--though not obtuse on such matters--failed, in his utter preoccupation, to perceive. Margarita bit her lip, and shoved her pawns about. She, accustomed to adulation and much admiration, was rather piqued by Cecil's coldness. 'All the world is alike to me now,' said he, rather absently; but she gathered the conviction that he was neither married nor engaged. 'Are you so much of a misogynist that you cannot even be the friend of a woman?' she asked. 'I have not said so,' said he; 'nor am I in any degree a misogynist,' he added, with animation. 'Then you can conceive a friendship?' 'Yes, and a most tender one--and go where I may,' he added, coming rather to the point, as Margarita thought, 'I shall never forget the friendship I have conceived for you.' 'That emotion is not always a lasting one.' 'Why--how?' he asked. 'Because it often ends where--love begins,' she replied, with a laugh and a downcast smile. Cecil felt his heart beat quicker. 'Oh, by Jove!' thought he, 'this sort of thing won't do--what must I say next? This is making awful running, and I have only been a fortnight here!'