She looked lovelier than ever in her anger, and he was taken by surprise at the impetuous and instinctive guess she had made at the complexity of his moods, which he himself scarcely understood. For a moment he stood inert, embarrassed by her straight, half-scornful glance--then he regained his usual mental poise and smiled with provoking good humour and tolerance. "Temper, Manella!--temper again! A pity, a pity! Your Spanish blood is too fiery, Manella!--it is indeed! You have been very rude--do you know how rude you have been? But there! I forgive you! You are only a naughty child! As for love---" He paused, and going to the door of the hut looked out. "Manella, there is a big cloud in the west just over the ocean. It is shaped like a great white eagle and its wings are edged with gold,--it is the beginning of a fine sunset. Come and look at it,--and while we watch it floating along I will talk to you about love!" She hesitated,--her whole spirit was up in arms against this man whom she loved, and who, so she argued with herself, had allowed her to love HIM, while having no love for HER; and yet,--since Gwent had told her that his mysterious occupation might result in disaster and danger to his life, her devotion had received a new impetus which was wholly unselfish,--that of watchful guardianship such as inspires a faithful dog to defend its master. And, moved by this thought, she obeyed his beckoning hand, and stood with him on the sward outside the hut, looking at the cloud he described. It was singularly white,--new-fallen snow could be no whiter,--and, shaped like a huge bird, its great wings spread out to north and south were edged with a red-gold fire. Seaton pushed an old tree stump into position and sat down upon it, making Manella sit beside him. "Now for this talk!" he said--"Love is the subject,--Love the theme! We are taught that we must love God and love our neighbor--but we don't, because we can't! In the case of God we cannot love what we don't know and don't see,--and we cannot love our neighbor because he is often a person whom we DO know and CAN see, and who is extremely offensive. Now let us consider what IS love? You, Manella, are angry because I say there is no such thing--and you accuse me of indulging in love for a woman myself. Yet--I still declare, in spite of you, there is no such thing as love! I ought to be ashamed of myself for saying this--so YOU think!--but I'm not ashamed. I know I'm right! Love is a divine idea, never realised. It is like a ninth new note in the musical scale--not to be attained. It is suggested in the highest forms of poetry and art, but the suggestion can never be carried out. What men and women call 'love' is the ordinary attraction of sex,--the same attraction that pulls all male and female living things together and makes them mate. It is very unromantic! And to a man of my mind, very useless." She looked at him in a kind of sorrowful perplexity.