"So that is something of what you think of me? for I see you are not serious! It's a folly, of course, a sentimental folly," he met Bulstrode's eyes that silently accused him of a like--"but only a man in love knows what sentimental follies are worth! There is"--the young man was suddenly serious, "a sort of prodigality in love only understood by certain temperaments, certain races: it may be degenerate: I suppose it is, and to push it quite to the last phase, is, of course, cowardly, certainly very weak, and men like you, Monsieur, will deem it so." "You mean--?" and now Bulstrode's tone urged him to make himself clear. "I mean," said De Presle-Vaulx firmly, "rather than renounce this woman I adore I will without doubt--(given the tangle in which the whole matter is!...") and he could not for the life of him put his intention into words. He smiled nevertheless unmistakably. Bulstrode leaned across the table and put his hand on the other's arm. "Then you don't love her well enough not to break her heart? Or well enough to live a commonplace life for her?" "I don't know how to do it." "Well," said Bulstrode, "I have run upon quite a good many hard moments, perhaps some, in their way, as difficult as this, and I have never thought of getting out of the muddle. Perhaps it _is_ a question, as you say, of temperament and race. I am inclined also to think, stubbornly, that it is a question of the quality of the love that one has for the woman. You won't think it impertinent of me, my dear friend,"--and his tone was such that no one could have thought it impertinent--"you won't, I am sure, take it amiss if we talk this over to-morrow, and if I try to show you something that means _life_, instead of what you plan." "You know you as good as stood for De Presle-Vaulx." Bulstrode held Mrs. Falconer's parasol, her fan, as well as a gold bag purse full of louis, a handkerchief and his own cane and field-glass. For the lady, standing on a chair the better to see the race-track, was applauding with enthusiasm the result of the first handicap. She had placed a bet on a horse called Plum-Branch "from a feeling of sentiment," as she said, because she had, that day, quite by chance, selected a hat with a decorative plum-branch amongst other garnitures. "I am _standing_, certainly, Jimmy," she replied to his remark, "and to the peril of my high heels!-- _There_, I've won! and won't you, like an angel, go and cash my bets?--give me the purse, you might have your hand picked! You can put my winnings in your pocket; they're not so enormous."