"Ah, no, no!" she exclaimed indignantly. "It's nothing so commonplace I want! There's only one love possible to me--a great transcending passion, which would be so far above all earthly things that a year--a month--would compensate for a whole life of loneliness! Don't you see, it's love, an immense love, such as only comes once in a million times, that I'm seeking?" "How?" Suddenly her mood leaped into playfulness, her eyes sparkled with delight, and her clasped hands pillowed themselves against her cheek, as if imprisoning in a caress a beautiful and precious thought. "First, let's run away--away from all this ugliness, from all these eyes, from all this hateful, noisy, black-and-brown city! Run away! Oh, that's such a wonderful idea in itself, to go flying through the night, just you and I, leaving it all behind, to a place I dream of night and day--to some wonderful island, far off in the Pacific, where we can be alone, live for ourselves!" He did not check her, though he was wondering from what book she had found such ideas, curious to learn to what extent she had visualized her romance. "And how long would you keep the island, Dodo?" "Not long!" she said quietly. "Perhaps a year, perhaps only a season. That must be agreed; and when the dream is over we would come back!" "And then?" "And then we would separate and never see each other again!" "Why?" "So that it could never become commonplace or stale--so that it could live in our lives as the one great memory, with no regrets." She stopped, looked at him tensely, and went on: "You would take up your life again, and I would bury myself in my career, and you would watch me, little by little, become a great name!" "And never see each other--" "Perhaps when we are quite old," she said suddenly. "You won't believe me! I would do it!" She clasped her hands tumultuously over her heart. "Oh, how easily I would do it! Ah, to have such a romance--anything might come!" "What book have you been reading?" he asked quietly--yet feeling a little sad that he could not follow where her lawless imagination ran. She turned away hotly, clenching her fists, crying: "Ah, you will never let go of yourself! You are afraid--afraid of everything!" He followed her, laying a hand on her shoulder as she stood by the window. "Keep your island in southern seas!" he said, with such emotion in his voice that she wheeled about. "Believe in it all you want, extraordinary child, even if it ends by my paying all the penalty. Go on with your day-dreaming." His glance lay in hers, his arms were longing to take her into them, when Snyder entered, with a quick knock that gave them only time to spring apart. At this moment Dodo could have driven her out, fiercely rebelling against this constant espionage. What right had Snyder or any one to interfere with her liberty, or to say whom she should see? She resolved hotly to have an explanation when she returned. Now it was necessary to master her emotion.