"That's the place," he said. "Keeps its own moonshine, you see. Go straight in, and tell 'em you're come to fetch your doves." "I will do so," she said, and strode off in imperious majesty. He looked after her with an irrepressible chuckle. "If she ain't locked up soon, I don't know myself," he said, and went back to his establishment. He had only just dismissed his apprentice and secured the shop for the night, when he heard the well-known tread up the staircase. "Back again! I don't have any luck," he muttered; and with reason, for the statue, wearing an expression of cold displeasure, advanced into his room. He felt a certain sense of guilt as he saw her. "Got the birds?" he inquired, with a nervous familiarity, "or couldn't you bring yourself to ask for them?" "You have misled me," she said. "My birds are not there. I came to gates in front of a stately pile--doubtless erected to some god; at the entrance stood a priest, burly and strong, with gold-embroidered garments----" ("The beadle, I suppose," commented Leander.) "I passed him unseen, and roamed unhindered over the courtyard. It was bare, save for one or two worshippers who crossed it. Presently a winged thing fluttered down to my feet. But though a dove indeed, it was no bird of mine--it knew me not. And it was draggled, begrimed, uncleanly, as never were the doves of Aphrodite. And the sparrows (for these, too, did I see), they were worse. I motioned them from me with loathing. I renounced them all. Thus, Leander, have I fared in following your counsels!" "Well, it ain't my fault," he said; "it's the London soot makes them like that. There's some at the Guildhall: perhaps they're cleaner." "No," she said, vehemently; "I will seek no further. This is a city of darkness and mire. I am in a land, an age, which know me not: this much have I learnt already. The world was fairer and brighter of old!" "You see," said Leander, "if you only go about at night, you can't expect sunshine! But I'm told there's cleaner and brighter places to be seen abroad--if you cared to go there?" he insinuated. "To one place only, to my Cyprian caves, will I go," she declared, "and with you!" "We'll talk about that some other time," he answered, soothingly. "Lady Venus, look here, don't you think you've kept that ring long enough? I've asked you civilly enough, goodness knows, to 'and it over, times without number. I ask you once more to act fair. You know it came to you quite accidental, and yet you want to take advantage of it like this. It ain't right!"