“The first is by far the prettiest name,” said Dimitrius. “It evokes a charming vision of olden time when women sat at their spinning wheels, each one waiting for Faust, _à la Marguerite_, unaware of the Devil behind him! ‘Old maid’ is a coarse English term,--there _are_ coarse English terms! and much as I adore England and the English, I entirely disapprove of their ‘horseplay’ on women! No doubt you know what I mean?” “I think I do,” replied Diana, slowly. “It is that when a woman is neither a man’s bound slave nor his purchased toy, she is turned into a jest.” “Precisely! You have expressed it perfectly!” and his keen eyes flashed over her comprehensively. “But let us keep to business. You are a spinster, and I presume you are, in the terms of my advertisement, ‘alone in the world, without claims on your time or your affections.’ Is that so?” Quietly she answered: “That is so.” “Now you will remember I asked for ‘a courageous and determined woman of mature years.’ You do not look very ‘mature’----” “I am past forty,” said Diana. “A frank, but unnecessary admission,” he answered, smiling. “You should never admit to more years than your appearance gives you. However, I am glad you told me, as it better suits my purpose. And you consider yourself ‘courageous and determined’?” She looked at him straightly. “I think I am--I hope I am,” she said. “I have had many disillusions and have lost all I once hoped to win; so that I can honestly say even death would not matter to me, as I have nothing to live for. Except the love of Nature and its beauty----” “And its wisdom and mastery of all things,” finished Dimitrius. “And to feel that unless we match its wisdom with our will to be instructed, and its mastery with our obedience and worship, we ‘shall surely die’!” His eyes flashed upon her with a curious expression, and just for a passing moment she felt a little afraid of him. He went on, speaking with deliberate emphasis: “Yes,--if you are indeed a student of Nature, you surely know _that_! And you know also that the greatest, deepest, most amazing, and most enlightening discoveries made in science during the last thirty years or so are merely the result of cautious and sometimes casual probing of one or two of this vast Nature’s smaller cells of active intelligence. We have done something,--but how much remains to do!” He paused,--and Diana gazed at him questioningly. He smiled as he met her eager and interested look. “We shall have plenty of time to talk of these matters,” he said--“if I decide that you can be useful to me. What languages do you know besides your own?” “French, Italian and a little Russian,” she answered. “The two first quite fluently,--Russian I have studied only quite lately--and I find it rather difficult----” “Being a Russian myself I can perhaps make it easy for you,” said Dimitrius, kindly. “To study such a language without a teacher shows considerable ambition and energy on your part.”