loved! You don't know
what love is."

I looked at him whimsically.

"Don't I?"

My thoughts sped back down the years to a garden in France. Her name was
Clothilde. We met in a manner outrageous to Gallic propriety, as I used
to climb over the garden wall to the peril of my epidermis. We loved. We
were parted by stern parents--not mine--and Clothilde was packed off to
the good Sisters who had previously had care of her education. Now she
is fat and happy, and the wife of a banker and the mother of children.

But the romance was sad and bad and mad enough while it lasted; and when
Clothilde was (figuratively) dragged from my arms I cursed and swore and
out-Heroded Herod, played Termagant, and summoned the heavens to fall
down and crush me miserable beneath their weight. And then her brother
challenged me to fight a duel, whereupon, as the most worshipped of all
She's had not received a ha'porth of harm at my hands, I called him a
silly ass and threatened to break his head if he interfered any more
in my legitimate despair. I smile at it now; but it was real at
two-and-twenty--as real, I take it, as Dale's consuming passion for the
lady of the circus.

There was also, I remembered, a certain ---- But this had nothing to do
with Dale. Neither had the tragedy of my lost Clothilde. The memories,
however, brought a wistful touch of sympathy into my voice.

"You soberly think, my dear old Dale," said I, "that I know nothing of
love and passion and the rest of the divine madness?"

"I'm sure you don't," he cried, with an impatient gesture. "If you did,
you wouldn't--"

He came to an abrupt and confused halt.

"I wouldn't--what?"

"Nothing. I forgot what I was going to say. Let us talk of something
else."

"It was on the tip of your impulsive tongue," said I cheerfully, "to
refer to my attitude towards Miss Faversham."

"I'm desperately sorry," said he, reddening. "It was unpardonable. But
how did you guess?"

I laughed and quoted the Latin tag about the ingenuous boy of the
ingenuous visage and ingenuous modesty.

"Because I don't feverishly search the postbag for a letter from Miss
Faversham you conclude I'm a bloodless automaton?"

"Please don't say any more about it, Simon," he pleaded in deep
distress.

A sudden idea struck me. I reflected, walked to the window, and, having
made up my mind, sat down again. I had a weapon to hand which I had
overlooked, and with the discovery came a weak craving for the