with the six white horses, not in a coach with drawn
blinds. Your father shall give you to me, I tell you, in the eye of
day. What, am I an advertisement canvasser to be shown the door? Shall
my darling not have as honorable nuptials as her father's wife. Shall
the Elect of the People confess that a petty diplomatist didn't
consider him good enough for a son-in-law? Think how Bismarck would
chuckle. After all I have said to him!"

Her confidence came back. Yes, one might build one's house on the rock
of such a Will! "What have you said to him?"

He laughed softly. "I've let slip a secret, little girl."

"Tell me."

"Incredible! That baby with her little fingers,"--he seized
them--"with her fairy paws, she plunges boldly into my most precious
secrets, into my heart's casket, picks out the costliest jewel, and
asks for it."

"Well, do you like him? Is he an intellectual spirit?"

"Hum! If he is, we are not. He is iron, and of iron we make steel, and
of steel pretty weapons; but one can make nothing but weapons. I
prefer gold. Gold like my darling's hair"--he caressed it--"like my
own magic power over men. You shall see, darling, how your gold and
mine will triumph."

"But you also are always speaking of arms, of blood, of battles; and
Revolutions are scarcely forged without arms and iron."

"Child, child," he answered, drawing her golden locks to his lips,
"why do you wish to learn all in this beautiful starry night? The
conquests of thousands of years, the results of profound studies, you
ask for as for toys. To speak of battles, to call to arms, is by no
means the same thing as to sabre one's fellow, one's brother, with icy
heart and bloodstained hand. Don't you understand, sly little thing,
of what arms I speak, of the golden weapons of the spirit, eloquence,
the love of humanity, the effort to raise to manly dignity the poor,
the unfortunate, the workers. Above all, I mean--Will. These noble
weapons, these truly golden weapons, I count higher and more useful
than the rusted swords of Mediaevalism."

Her eyes filled with tears. She felt herself upborne on waves of
religious emotion towards those shining stars. The temptation was
over.

"Good-night, my love," she said humbly.

He drew her face to his in passionate farewell, and seemed as if he
would never let her go. When her window closed he strode towards the
glaciers.

An adventure next day came to show the conquered Helena that her
spiritual giant