I don't know," he said, "but I shall make it a point to examine my
bank-account to-night. I haven't done so--for some time."

"We will go to Venice, and drift about in a gondola on one of those gray
days when the haze comes in from the Adriatic and touches the city with
the magic of the past. Sometimes I like the gray days best--when I am
happy. And then," she added, regarding him critically, "although you are
very near perfection, there are some things you ought to see and learn
to make your education complete. I will take you to all the queer
places I love. When you are ambassador to France, you know, it would be
humiliating to have to have an interpreter, wouldn't it?"

"What's the use of both of us knowing the language?" he demanded.

"I'm afraid we shall be--too happy," she sighed, presently.

"Too happy!" he repeated.

"I sometimes wonder," she said, "whether happiness and achievement go
together. And yet--I feel sure that you will achieve."

"To please you, Victoria," he answered, "I think I should almost be
willing to try."

CHAPTER XXX. P.S.

By request of one who has read thus far, and is still curious.

Yes, and another who, in spite of himself, has fallen in love with
Victoria and would like to linger a while longer, even though it
were with the paltry excuse of discussing that world-old question of
hers--Can sublime happiness and achievement go together? Novels on the
problem of sex nowadays often begin with marriages, but rarely discuss
the happy ones; and many a woman is forced to sit wistfully at home
while her companion soars.

"Yet may I look with heart unshook
On blow brought home or missed--
Yet may I hear with equal ear
The clarions down the List;
Yet set my lance above mischance
And ride the barriere--
Oh, hit or miss, how little 'tis,
My Lady is not there!"

A verse, in this connection, which may be a perversion of Mr. Kipling's
meaning, but not so far from it, after all. And yet, would the eagle
attempt the great flights if contentment were on the plain? Find the
mainspring of achievement, and you hold in your hand the secret of the
world's mechanism. Some aver that it is woman.

Do the gods ever confer the rarest of gifts upon him to whom they have
given pinions? Do they mate him, ever, with another who soars as high as
he, who circles higher that he may circle higher still? Who can answer?
Must those w