"Do you still mean to do it?" "I told you that I had to have the papers." "Yes, and I told you that I should make it as difficult as I could for you. And I'm going to. Because I don't want you to go." She laughed, then sighed very frankly: "Of course," she added, "I don't suppose I could keep them very long if you have made up your mind to take them." "Is that your idea of me?" he asked, laughing. She nodded, thoughtfully: "You take what you want, sooner or later. There is no hope in opposing you. You are that kind of man. I have learned that." She touched the orchid to her chin meditatively. "It surprised me," she added. "I have not been accustomed to authority like yours. I am my own mistress, and I supposed I was accountable to myself alone. But--" she lifted her eyes, "it appears that I am accountable to you. And the realization does not seem to anger me very deeply." He looked away: "I do not try to control you, Karen," he said in a low voice. "You have done so whether or not you have tried. I don't know what has happened to me. Do you?" "Nothing," he said, forcing a laugh. "Except you are learning that the greatest pleasure of friendship is a confidence in it which nothing can disturb." "Confidence in friendship--yes. But confidence in _you_!--that ended in our stateroom. Without confidence I thought friendship impossible.... And here I am asking you not to go away--because I--shall miss you. Will you tell me what is the matter with a girl who has no confidence in a man and who desires his companionship as I do yours?" Her cheeks flushed, but her eyes were steady, bright, and intelligent: "Am I going to fall in love with you, Kervyn?" He laughed mirthlessly: "No, not if you can reason with yourself about it," he said. "It merely means that you are the finest, most honest, most fearless woman I ever knew, capable of the most splendid friendship, not afraid to show it. That is all it means, Karen. And I am deeply, humbly grateful.... And very miserable.... Because----" The entrance of Frau Bergner with the breakfast tray checked him. They both turned toward the long oak table. Fortunately the culinary school where the housekeeper had acquired her proficiency was not German. She had learned her art in Alsace. So the coffee was fragrant and the omelette a dream; and there were grapes from the kitchen arbour and ham from a larder never lacking the succulent by-products of the _sanglier_ of the Ardennes. Frau Bergner took his letters and telegram, promising that Fritzl should find somebody with a bicycle at Trois Fontaines to carry the other note to Lesse Forest. She hovered over them while they ate. The breakfast was a silent one. Afterward Karen wrote a number of notes addressed to her modiste in Berlin and to various people who might, in her present emergency, supply her with something resembling a wardrobe.