he cried fiercely. "Yes! you were kind! You were mine for the
moment, you lay in my arms, you gave me your lips! It was an impression!
It amused you to see any human being so much in earnest. Then the mood
passed. Your dole of charity had been given! I must sit apart and you
must smooth your hair. What did it all amount to? An episode, a trifling
debauch in sentiment--and for me--God knows!"

"To return once more," she said patiently, "to your complaint. Is it
that I will not marry you?"

"I did not ask that--at first," he answered. "It is a good deal, I
know."

"Then do you want to come and kiss me every day?" she asked, "because I
don't think that that would suit me either."

"I can believe it," he said.

"I am inclined to think," she said, "that you are a very grasping and
unreasonable person. I have permitted you privileges which more men than
my modesty permits me to tell you of have begged for in vain. You have
accepted them--I promised nothing beyond, nor have you asked for it. Yet
because I was obliged to talk reasonably to you, you flung yourself out
of my house, and I am left to rescue you at the expense of my pride,
perhaps also of my reputation, from associations which you ought to be
ashamed of."

"To talk reasonably to me," he repeated slowly. "Do you remember what
you said?"

She shrugged her shoulders.

"Naturally! And what I said was true enough."

"I was to be content with scraps. To go away and forget you, until
chance or a whim of yours should bring us together again."

"Did you want so much more?" she asked, with a swift maddening glance at
him.

He fell on his knees before her couch.

"Oh! I love you!" he said. "Forgive me if I am unreasonable or foolish.
I can't help it. You came so unexpectedly, so wonderfully! And you see I
lost my head as well as my heart. I have so little to offer you--and I
want so much."

Her hands rested for a moment caressingly upon his shoulders. A whole
world of wonderful things was shining out of her eyes. It was only her
lips that were cruel.

"My dear boy," she said, "you want what I may not give. I am very, very
sorry. I think there must have been some sorcery in the air that night,
the spell of the roses must have crept into my blood. I am sorry for
what I did. I am very sorry that I did not leave you alone."

He rose heavily to his feet. His face was grey with suffering.

"I ought to have known," he said. "I think that I did know."

"All the