“Madam, I crave your pardon,” he said hoarsely. “I—I have made a mistake.” Blindly he turned from the door, stumbled out into the snow. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XVII APHORISMS FOR a time Peregrine was as one distraught. It may not be far beside the mark to term him mad. He saw himself in the past mocked by a woman; he saw himself now mocked by a man. In both he saw vaguely the shadow of mockery by a Higher Power. Truly a hard state. Yet strangely, for all that, he lost not hold on his quest. Where heart’s desire had urged him in the past, fierce obstinacy now spurred him forward. The face of the woman he sought was ever before his mind. He believed her withheld and hidden from him by conspiring Fate. This roused him to battle. He would move Earth and Heaven and Hell to find her; die, if need be, in the attempt. This you may guess he was very like to do. Already his wanderings had told on him. It was now mid-winter, as we have seen, and that season is not one for e’en the hardiest to be afoot at all times, dependent on chance for shelter. Of late he had aged considerably. This was not over strange, since age comes not with the mere passing of Time, but with the pressure of his finger in the passing. He had pressed hard on Peregrine. You see him very different from the love-bathed youth, who had sat by the sundial in the flower-scented garden; the joyous youth, who had wandered the fields with Pippo; the wounded youth, who had lain in the wood, his cheek pressed to Mother Earth; the egoist, who had held his Council of Arts in Castle Syrtes; who, dauntless, had fought his way through the forest. He was a man soul-sick, weary, desperate, pursuer of a forlorn hope, so men would term it. Here it was that a certain duplex side of his character showed itself. One part of his nature would have ranged itself on the side of men, would have stood with them for the madness of his quest, its mere foolishness rather. This part of his nature he strangled very fiercely. Pride had a hand in the strangling. He would make his quest true, prove himself no fool. He saw himself in a sense creator of what he sought. He himself, by virtue of his belief in the woman, would materialize her, if she existed but in realms of fancy. Thus, I say, he would prove himself no fool. This was veritable madness. Yet I have told you Peregrine was for the moment not fully sane.