And when on his honor he swears he has never loved before, his honor goes unscathed, for he may never yet have loved a woman as he loves the one to whom he swears. With Justine this was the primal verdure. Had she not met Roland Mistrial, she might, and in all probability would, have exhibited constancy in affection, but love would have been uncomprehended still. As it was, she had come into her own; she was confident in it and secure; and now, though by nature she was rebellious enough, as he caught her hand her being went out to him, and as it went it thrilled. "I love you," he said; and his voice was so flexible that it would have been difficult to deny that he really did. "I will love you always, my whole life through." The words caressed her so well she could have pointed to the sky and repeated with Dona Sol: "Regarde: plus de feux, plus de bruit. Tout se tait. La lune tout a l'heure a l'horizon montait: Tandis que tu parlais, sa lumiere qui tremble Et ta voix, toutes deux m'allaient au coeur ensemble: Je me sentais joyeuse et calme, o mon amant! Et j'aurais bien voulu mourir en ce moment." But at once some premonition seemed to visit her. "Roland," she murmured, "what if we leave our happiness here?" And Roland, bending toward her, whispered sagely: "We shall know then where to find it." VI. New York meanwhile, in its effeminateness, had forgotten the snow, and was listening to the sun. And the day after the return from Aiken, as Roland, in accordance with an agreement of which the _locus sigilli_ had a kiss for token, went down to knock at Mr. Dunellen's office door, the sky was as fair as it had been in the South. Yet to him it was unobtrusive. His mind was occupied with fancies that had a birth, a little span of life, and which in passing away were succeeded by others as ephemeral as themselves--thoughts about nothing at all that came and went unnoticed: a man he had met in Corfu, and whom a face in the street recalled; the glisten of silk in a window that took him back to Japan;--but beneath them was a purpose settled and dominant, a resolution to trick Fate and outwit it--one which, during the journey from Aiken, had so possessed him that, in attending to the wants of Mrs. Metuchen or in ministering to Justine, at times he had been quasi-somnambulistic, at others wholly vague. But now, as he gave his card to an office-boy, to all outward intent he was confident and at ease; he picked up a paper and affected to lose himself in its columns. Presently the boy returned, and he was ushered into the room which he had previously visited. On this occasion Mr. Dunellen was not seated, but standing, his back to the door. As Roland entered he turned, and the young man stepped forward, his hand outstretched.