for me?"

"_Hein?_"--and she showed all her little white pointed
teeth--"Thou?--Thou art very rich, _mon chou_. Women will always feel
for thee!"

It went in like a knife it was so true--.

"I was a very fine Englishman once," I said.

"It is possible, thou art still, sitting, and showing the right
profile--and full of _chic_--and then rich, rich!"

"You could not forget that I am rich, Suzette?"

"If I did I might love you--_Jamais!_"

"And does the sea help to prevent an attack?"--

"Absence--and I go to a poor place I knew when I was young, and I wash
and cook, and make myself remember what _la vie dure_ was--and would be
again if one loved--Bah! that does it. I come back cured--and ready only
to please such as thou, Nicholas!--rich, rich!"

* * * * *

And she laughed again her rippling gay laugh--

We had a pleasant evening, she told me the history of her life--or some
of it--They were ever the same from Lucien's Myrtale.

* * * * *

When all of me is aching--Shall I too, find solace if I go to the sea?

Who knows?

II

I have been through torture this week--The new man wrenches my shoulder
each day, it will become straight eventually, he says. They have tried
to fit the false leg also, so those two things are going on, but the
socket is not yet well enough for anything to be done to my left eye--so
that has defeated them. It will be months before any real improvement
takes place.

There are hundreds of others who are more maimed than I--in greater
pain--more disgusting--does it give them any comfort to tell the truth
to a journal?--or are they strong enough to keep it all locked up in
their hearts?--I used to care to read, all books bore me now--I cannot
take interest in any single thing, and above all, I loathe myself--My
soul is angry.

Nina came again, to luncheon this time. It was pouring with rain, an
odious day. She told me of her love affairs--as a sister might--Nina a
sister!

She can't make up her mind whether to take Jim Bruce or Rochester
Moreland, they are both Brigadiers now, Jim is a year younger than she
is.

"Rochester is really more my mate, Nicholas," she said, "but then there
are moments when I am with him when I am not sure if he would not bore
me eventually, and he has too much character for me to suppress--Jim
fascinates me, but I only hold him because he is not sure of me--If I
marry him he will