these years! _C'est pas possible!_

PHILIP.

It was stupid of me to attempt to hide my feelings. [_Pressing her hand
to his lips._] But, my dear Otto--my dear girl--where's the use of our
coming into each other's lives again?

OTTOLINE.

The use--? Why _shouldn't_ we be again as we were in the old Paris
days--[_embarrassed_] well, not quite, perhaps----?

PHILIP.

[_Smiling._] Oh, of course, if you command it, I am ready to buy some
smart clothes, and fish for opportunities of meeting you occasionally
on a crowded staircase or in a hot supper-room. But--as for anything
else----

OTTOLINE.

[_Slowly withdrawing her hands and putting them behind her._] As
for--anything else----?

PHILIP.

I repeat--_cui bono_? [_Regarding her kindly but penetratingly._] What
would be the result of your reviving a friendship with an ill-tempered,
intolerant person who would be just as capable to-morrow of turning
upon you like a savage----?

OTTOLINE.

Ah, you _are_ still angry with me! [_With a change of tone._] As you
did that evening, for instance, when I came with Nannette to your
shabby little den in the Rue Soufflot----

PHILIP.

Precisely.

OTTOLINE.

[_Walking away to the front of the fauteuil-stool._] To beg you to
_proner_ my father and mother in the journal you were writing for--what
was the name of it?----

PHILIP.

[_Following her._] _The Whitehall Gazette._

OTTOLINE.

And you were polite enough to tell me that my cravings and ideals were
low, pitiful, ignoble!

PHILIP.

[_Regretfully._] You remember?

OTTOLINE.

[_Facing him._] As clearly as you do, my friend. [_Laying her hand upon
his arm, melting._] Besides, they were true--those words--hideously
true--as were many other sharp ones you shot at me in Paris. [_Turning
from him._] Low--pitiful--ignoble----!

PHILIP.

Otto----!

[_She seats herself in the chair by the fauteuil-stool
and motions him to sit by her. He does so._

OTTOLINE.

Yes, they were true; but they are true of me no longer. I