ermione. "Have you
never seen a caique pull through the Devil's Stream on the Bosphorus, at
Bala Hissar? It is hard work, but it generally succeeds."

"A man may fight against the devil, but he cannot struggle against what
he worships. Or, if he can, you must teach me how to do it, and give me
some weapon to fight with."

"You must rely on yourself for that. You must say, 'I will not,' and it
will be very easy. Besides," she added, with another laugh, in which
there was a rather nervous ring,--"besides, you know all this is only a
comedy, or a pastime. You are not in earnest."

"I wish I were not," answered Alexander, softly. "You tell me to rely
upon myself. I rely on you. I love you, and that makes you stronger than
me."

Hermione believed him, and perhaps she was right. She felt, and he made
her feel, that she dominated him, and could turn him whither she would.
Her pride was flattered, and though she promised herself that she would
make him give up his love for her by the mere exertion of a superior
common sense, she was conscious that the task was not wholly
distasteful. She enjoyed the sensation of being the stronger, of
realizing that Alexander was wholly at her feet and subject to her
commands. That he should have gradually grown so intimate as to speak so
freely to her is not altogether surprising. They were own cousins, and
called each other by their Christian names. They met daily, and were
often together for many consecutive hours, and Madame Patoff did her
best to promote this state of things. Hermione had become accustomed to
his devotion, for he had advanced by imperceptible stages. When he first
said that he loved her, she took it as she might have taken such an
expression from her brother,--as the exuberant expression of an
affection purely platonic, not to say brotherly. When he had repeated it
more earnestly, she had laughed at him, and he had laughed with her in a
way which disarmed all her suspicions. But each time that he said it he
laughed less, until she realized that he was not jesting. Then she
reproached herself a little for having let the intimacy grow, and
determined to persuade him by gentle means that he had made a mistake.
She felt that she was responsible for his conduct, because she had not
been wise enough to stop him at the outset, and she therefore felt also
that it would be unjust to make a violent scene, and that it was
altogether out of the question to speak to Paul about the