. And, surely, no woman who knows that of herself can be rightly
censured for not recluding herself from the world: it is only women
without the power to love who have no right to provoke men's love.

Though Zuleika had never given her heart, strong in her were the desire
and the need that it should be given. Whithersoever she had fared, she
had seen nothing but youths fatuously prostrate to her--not one upright
figure which she could respect. There were the middle-aged men, the old
men, who did not bow down to her; but from middle-age, as from eld, she
had a sanguine aversion. She could love none but a youth. Nor--though
she herself, womanly, would utterly abase herself before her
ideal--could she love one who fell prone before her. And before her all
youths always did fall prone. She was an empress, and all youths were
her slaves. Their bondage delighted her, as I have said. But no empress
who has any pride can adore one of her slaves. Whom, then, could proud
Zuleika adore? It was a question which sometimes troubled her. There
were even moments when, looking into her cheval-glass, she cried out
against that arrangement in comely lines and tints which got for her
the dulia she delighted in. To be able to love once--would not that be
better than all the homage in the world? But would she ever meet whom,
looking up to him, she could love--she, the omnisubjugant? Would she
ever, ever meet him?

It was when she wondered thus, that the wistfulness came into her eyes.
Even now, as she sat by the window, that shadow returned to them. She
was wondering, shyly, had she met him at length? That young equestrian
who had not turned to look at her; whom she was to meet at dinner
to-night... was it he? The ends of her blue sash lay across her lap,
and she was lazily unravelling their fringes. "Blue and white!" she
remembered. "They were the colours he wore round his hat." And she gave
a little laugh of coquetry. She laughed, and, long after, her lips were
still parted in a smile.

So did she sit, smiling, wondering, with the fringes of her sash
between her fingers, while the sun sank behind the opposite wall of the
quadrangle, and the shadows crept out across the grass, thirsty for the
dew.

III

The clock in the Warden's drawing-room had just struck eight, and
already the ducal feet were beautiful on the white bearskin hearthrug.
So slim and long were they, of instep so nobly arched, that only with
a pair of glazed ox-to