For a moment his voice choked. The touch of her was like a greater self. He was tortured with a vision of what it would mean to have all of this woman—to command her tenderness utterly, her bestowals, the full deep look of woman to man, the night and day presence, the child she dreamed of—this woman lovely as a golden cloud.... He trembled and his head turned away. Her face came around to his. "Romney," she whispered. "It isn’t nearly so easy as it would be if you were less a man. Oh, don’t you see that? I would have had the heart of a girl and pitied you, and thought it love. You’re enough to make that—except for the life I learned in England. Now it’s the one covenant. Why, the man I want—I’ll do the winning. I would bring the fight to him. Nothing could stand between us. I could be saint or wanton. You don’t know me. You would not want half of me. You could only want that part of me you are able to command. Perhaps, as that Hunchback said to you, ’We shall meet again.’ I feel that you are a big fellow—brave and quiet and generous—that you have the stuff to make a lover. The real lover must be a bit of a mystic and you have that—but not now, and I must go on.... See, how I have stayed—" Romney stared hard at her a moment, and then beyond. It was all black, a depth of bamboo clumps like a jungle, over her bent left shoulder. He saw his end in that blackness. She was light and power and beauty and art. A group of waiting-girls were playing the _vina_, behind the lattice by the bank of the river. It was like the slow song of nightingales. The scent of roses passed between them like a spirit hand. Her face was nearer. The warm scent of her was in his nostrils, and power came to him that he had not known at all that day. Romney spoke: "Don’t think of me as holding you. I love you too much for that—how easy to say that after once it is spoken.... I have nothing but praise and gladness to give you. Yes, you have stayed—that I might be with you—that I might have my full chance. I know what you mean by its being worth death—and what a man he would be to command your heart once, even—and live on afterward.... No, I wouldn’t hold you. I wouldn’t cry out. I would hold you by sheer love for me—but I am not great enough for that. I would cry out if you came to my arms, but they are not magnetic enough. I have had my chance. I know what a woman is. Forgive me if I disagree about there being another—for me. I’m afraid there isn’t, because I’ve known you—" His voice became very soft. "You’ll feel it," he added. "You’ll feel it following you around—a man’s love for you—mine. I win—to know what I know to-night. And when you find him—know that I drink his health. I could do that devoutly.... I have had your baggage taken to the boat. The launch will call here for you.... In a few minutes.... I think—I think you are not a woman at all—but an immortal! You see I cannot suffer thinking of you that way—" "Romney—"