I blessed the little spots of rain that had been falling for some time, for there would be none of the usual wanderers about the place. There would be nothing but the garden's own silent and sombre contrast to the rattling and bumpy music that gesticulated at one through the wide open French windows of the ballroom. And the noise of that music was as the noise of a leering destiny, from which there could be no escape but only an occasional release.... A pleasant spectacle, this, from my dark station under an elm, but for a mind clouded with discontents and futile longings; the three large windows of brilliant light, in which were framed the passing figures of young people, here and there a very fair face reflecting the serious abandon of suiting steps to a tireless measure: those sidelong steps of the modern dance which I, anyway, find so much more attractive than the steps of the waltz, which is still regretted by people with listless feet and superior minds who take themselves but not dancing seriously. But now I had no pleasure from the spectacle, I only wished, and heartily, that the room was empty of its music and people, empty of all but Iris ... to whom, if miracles could happen at all, I would enter suddenly and brave her startled gaze with my love-making, and take her. But the most wonderful thing about miracles is that they never happen, so I could do nothing but stare at her as far as I could disjointly see her among the moving crowd; a creature of green and gold that night, for her dress was of jade, and her hair, I thought, couldn't of course be but gold to ornament it fittingly; so that, I said, she will always be her own carnival, even in a desolate place. And once again, with that white face under hair which seemed that night more than ever barbaric in its splendour, she gave me that feeling of her as a strange thing from some wild legend, a woman of doubt and desire so consummately human as to be almost inhuman: tamed into life just for this moment, but only for this moment, without a why nor whence nor whither.... Thoughts, such vain thoughts as those, are apt to engross one's mind and very senses so utterly as to shut out for a few moments the whole noise of the world. So now, as I stood under the darkness of my tree, even the rustling turmoil of the ballroom must have become lulled by the vagaries of my thoughts, for it was out of the deepest silence that suddenly a voice behind my shoulder, as though from the trunk of the tree, asked softly:-- "And is the wise sentinel posted to keep the fools in or to keep the fools out?" With a start I found behind me--Antony! a huge looming figure, his head bent to avoid the branches, a gleam of white shirt front and a red face, smiling impishly down at me. My utter surprise involuntarily took the shape of his simile, and I couldn't help saying: "The sentinel is the biggest fool of all, Antony, but he's going to stay outside." ...