Saint Hubert leaned forward over the back of his chair. "In what way--real?" he asked. She looked at him squarely. "Do you think there really exists such a man as you have drawn--a man who could be as tender, as unselfish, as faithful as your hero?" Saint Hubert looked away, and, picking up his pen, stabbed idly at the blotting-pad, drawing meaningless circles and dots, with a slow shrug. The scorn in her voice and the sudden pain in her eyes hurt him. "Do you know such a man, Monsieur, or is he wholly a creature of your imagination?" she persisted. He completed a complicated diagram on the sheet of blotting-paper before answering. "I do know a man who, given certain circumstances, has the ability to develop into such a character," he said eventually in a low voice. She laughed bitterly. "Then you are luckier than I. I am not very old, but during the last five years I have met many men of many nationalities, and I have never known one who in any degree resembles the _preux chevalier_ of your book. The men who have most intimately touched my life have not known the meaning of the word tenderness, and have never had a thought for any one beyond themselves. You have been more fortunate in your acquaintances, Monsieur." A dull red crept into the Vicomte's face, and he continued looking at the pen in his fingers. "Beautiful women, Madame," he said slowly, "unfortunately provoke in some men all that is basest and vilest in their natures. No man knows to what depths of infamy he may stoop under the stress of a sudden temptation." "And the woman pays," cried Diana vehemently. "Pays for the beauty God curses her with--the beauty she may hate herself; pays until the beauty fades. How much----" She pulled herself up short, biting her lips. Moved by the sense of the sympathy that had unconsciously been influencing her during the past week and which had shaken the self-suppression that she had imposed upon herself, her tongue had run away with her. She was afraid of the confidence that his manner was almost demanding of her. Her pride restrained her from the compassion that her loneliness had nearly yielded to. "Excuse me," she said coldly, "my ideas cannot possibly interest you." "On the contrary, you interest me profoundly," he corrected quickly. She noticed the slight difference in his words and laughed more bitterly than before. "As what?--a subject for vivisection? Get on your operating coat and bring your instruments without delay. The victim is all ready for you. It will be 'copy' for your next book!" "Madame!" He had sprung to his feet, and she looked up at him miserably, her hand held out in swift contrition. "Oh, forgive me! I shouldn't have said that. You haven't deserved it. You have been--kind. I am grateful. Forgive me and my rudeness. It must be the heat, it makes one very irritable, don't you think?"