'I wonder is that girl still sitting where I left her? Is she sitting on that couch still, or has she left the room? How commonplace the room would be without her! All the things would look cold and cheerless. I have been in that room only once, and yet I know it would look mean and paltry without her. But when she is there everything gathers splendour from her, commonplace things are lifted up and made partakers of her glory. 'I in love with her! No more than the Straits of Dover are with Homer.' The cold began to pinch him a little, and letting go his musings, he walked rapidly back to the hotel. Without thinking of where he went, he walked into the drawing-room. By this time it was almost dark, but the gas had not yet been lighted. At first Osborne thought he was alone, but before he had reached the middle of the room that voice came to him, saying,-- 'Oh, Mr Osborne, I am so glad you have come back to flirt with me. I have been doing my best to fall in love with Mr Nevill, but I couldn't. So I sent him away.' He could not have mistaken that voice. He could not mistake her voice, but he must have mistaken the words. What, his divinity speak thus! Monstrous! 'Shall I light the gas for you, Miss Gordon?' he asked, in a cold, formal tone. 'Yes, turn up the gas for _us_. You can bear the gaslight, he can't. Thank you. Now come over here and sit down and amuse me. Don't get a hassock at my feet, and say you want to worship me. It is all very well to worship solemn people, but I am not a bit solemn, and I want to be amused. Mr Nevill wanted to worship me and I sent him away.' 'I am afraid you will find me less amusing than Mr Nevill.' Why, it wasn't the feet of the idol alone, but the whole of the idol was clay! What clay! What glorious clay! Was ever so frivolous a spirit in so splendid a mould? 'Nonsense! Come and sit down here. Not on a hassock, but on a good stout oak chair. That one will answer. Come nearer--nearer still. That will do.' She was more flippant than Nevill. Why had he come back? Why had he not gone on and found some other place to stay at and there preserve his ideal? It was cruel, too cruel. Now he could never conjure up the image of her who sat before him, without hearing, not the music he had listened to that day at dinner, but these disenchanting, discordant, flippant words. What a magnificent creature she was! 'Well,' she said, fixing those dark eyes on him, 'where have you been since?' 'I have been out taking my first daylight look at London.' 'And how do you like it?' 'I think London is the most wonderful place in the world.' 'The most wonderful place in the world for dulness?' 'No; for everything that is great and noble and significant.' 'Whe-ew!' A whistle! A lady whistling! A lady whistling at the idea of London being great and august! Well, he might expect anything now. No doubt she smoked. 'Now, look here, Mr Osborne.' He wondered she didn't call him simple 'Osborne.'