woman,
gravely gay, a woman of the world, not of the great world, perhaps, and
not of the half-world--just a woman aware of and experienced in life.
And poised.

"You are English?"

"Not English. Irish."

Poised she was, but she was like a player playing a game, and the breaks
against her. He knew the smile. He had seen it often on Alan Donn's
face, playing in some of the great title matches. Four holes to go, and
he must better par. It's all right, the smile said; there's nothing
wrong. But in Alan Donn's was the glint of a naked knife, and in this
woman's eyes, down deep, veiled, but ill concealed, was appeal.

[Illustration]

They stopped at her house. He helped her out.

"_Adieu, Monsieur_. And again a thousand thanks."

"_C'etait un vrai plaisir!_"

"Monsieur!"

"Madame!"

The cabman looked surprised when ordered to return. He turned and
regarded his fare with amazement.

"_Quai de la Fraternite_," I said.

"_Hup, alors!_" The cabby shrugged his shoulders. And they trotted
ploddingly through the dusk of Pontius Pilate to the burning cloud which
was Marseilles....

Section 5

He knew he should meet her again, and where he should meet her, and he
did, on the Prado. He knew when. In the Midi dusk. A touch of mistral
was out, and the wind blew seaward. She was sitting down, looking toward
Africa.

"You oughtn't to come out here alone," he said. "Marseilles is a bad
port."

"I know," she said. "I know. But it draws me, this spot. You leave
soon?" she asked.

"In a few days."

"But you will be back."

"Yes, I will be back," he told her. "I don't know why, but I think I'd
rather die than not see Marseilles again. It is a second home, and yet I
know so few people here."

"If one has the temperament, and conditions are--as they should
be--Marseilles is wonderful."

"One could be happy here."

"Yes," and she sighed.

The spell of the archaic dusk came on him again; a dusk old as the
world. About them brooded the welter of passion and romance that
Marseilles is. Once it was a Phocaean village, and hook-nosed Afric folk
had stepped through on long, thin feet. And then had come the Greeks,
with their broad, clear brows, their gray eyes. And further back the
hairy Gauls had crept, snarling like dogs. And Greece died. And came the
clash of the Roman legions, ruthless fighting hundreds, who saw, did
massive things. And Rome died. And over the sea came the Saracens, their
high heads, their har