"Confidence for confidence," he said teasingly. "Tell me something of your early impressions. Did you ever dream of me?--I've dreamed of you." "No." She laughed happily. "I don't dream. But I used to lean from my bedroom window and think and think and think." "What about?" he asked. "You... You peopled my world from the outset. There were nights when I lost count of time, and leaned there and watched the dawn break." "That last night?" he asked.--"When we said good-bye under the oleanders?" "That last night of course," she answered. "I stayed at the window until the sun rose." "Dear little lonely watcher!" he said. "I wish I could have been with you... And you were in trouble too that night." "I hadn't time to think of that. I was enjoying in retrospect my perfect hour. The troubles began next day." She rubbed her cheek against his shoulder caressingly. "We won't talk of that I refuse to remember unpleasant things." "Wise little woman! ... Stand here a moment. I want to listen with you to the wash of the waves between the rocks. How often have we stood here like this?" he said with his arm about her. "There is no other music--is there?--like the music of the sea." "With you beside me--no. When I listen to it in your absence it will be as sound divorced from the spirit of music." Bending over her, he asked quickly: "You wouldn't wish to keep me back?" He thought of Macfarlane's words: "You've got a girl now. You have to consider her." He had not considered her in this matter at all. He had not even consulted her. He had taken her approval for granted. "Of course I wouldn't keep you back. Only I hate war. You can't expect me to be glad." "There isn't much in it to occasion any one gladness," he replied. "It's a bad business however one lodes at it." The old reckless smile shone for a moment in his eyes. "Though, if it wasn't for a certain young woman, I think I could find the prospect somewhat alluring. Man was born to kill his enemy." "It's high time man had outgrown his primitive instincts," she said, smiling with him. "That he will never do," he answered with conviction. "Love and hate, the primordial emotions, hang together--the antithesis of each other, irreconcilable yet inseparable. Humanity without love is inconceivable--and so is a world without hate. At best civilisation teaches us to control these elemental passions--and our control is about as effective in a crisis as the outer petals which conceal the canker in the heart of a flower. If you look close enough you see the stain of evil showing through."