He laughed rather brutally at the thought of her greatest physical peculiarity, but then suddenly stopped short. She had lifted her face and those same eyes were fastened upon him, the black and the gray, in a look so savage and fierce that even he was checked, if not startled. “They are certainly very remarkable eyes,” he said, more calmly, and with a certain uneasiness which Unorna did not notice. “I wonder whom you have found who is able to look you in the face without losing himself. I suppose it can hardly be my fascinating self whom you wish to enthrall,” he added, conscious after a moment’s trial that he was proof against her influence. “Hardly,” answered Unorna, with a bitter laugh. “If I were the happy man you would not need that means of bringing me to your feet. It is a pity that you do not want me. We should make a very happy couple. But there is much against me. I am an old man, Unorna. My figure was never of divine proportions, and as for my face, Nature made it against her will. I know all that--and yet, I was young once, and eloquent. I could make love then--I believe that I could still if it would amuse you.” “Try it,” said Unorna, who, like most people, could not long be angry with the gnome-like little sage. CHAPTER VI “I could make love--yes, and since you tell me to try, I will.” He came and stood before her, straightening his diminutive figure in a comical fashion as though he were imitating a soldier on parade. “In the first place,” he said, “in order to appreciate my skill, you should realise the immense disadvantages under which I labour. I am a dwarf, my dear Unorna. In the presence of that kingly wreck of a Homeric man”--he pointed to the sleeper beside them--“I am a Thersites, if not a pigmy. To have much chance of success I should ask you to close your eyes, and to imagine that my stature matches my voice. That gift at least, I flatter myself, would have been appreciated on the plains of Troy. But in other respects I resemble neither the long-haired Greeks nor the trousered Trojans. I am old and hideous, and in outward appearance I am as like Socrates as in inward disposition I am totally different from him. Admit, since I admit it, that I am the ugliest and smallest man of your acquaintance.” “It is not to be denied,” said Unorna with a smile. “The admission will make the performance so much the more interesting. And now, as the conjurer says when he begins, observe that there is no deception. That is the figure of speech called lying, because there is to be nothing but deception from beginning to end. Did you ever consider the nature of a lie, Unorna? It is a very interesting subject.” “I thought you were going to make love to me.”