assumed that its power and significance were lost to
an interested world for something like six months. What is certain is
that the late Henry Allegre's man of affairs found himself comparatively
idle. The holiday must have done much good to his harassed brain. He
had received a note from Dona Rita saying that she had gone into retreat
and that she did not mean to send him her address, not being in the
humour to be worried with letters on any subject whatever. "It's enough
for you"--she wrote--"to know that I am alive." Later, at irregular
intervals, he received scraps of paper bearing the stamps of various post
offices and containing the simple statement: "I am still alive," signed
with an enormous, flourished exuberant R. I imagine Rose had to travel
some distances by rail to post those messages. A thick veil of secrecy
had been lowered between the world and the lovers; yet even this veil
turned out not altogether impenetrable.

He--it would be convenient to call him Monsieur George to the end--shared
with Dona Rita her perfect detachment from all mundane affairs; but he
had to make two short visits to Marseilles. The first was prompted by
his loyal affection for Dominic. He wanted to discover what had happened
or was happening to Dominic and to find out whether he could do something
for that man. But Dominic was not the sort of person for whom one can do
much. Monsieur George did not even see him. It looked uncommonly as if
Dominic's heart were broken. Monsieur George remained concealed for
twenty-four hours in the very house in which Madame Leonore had her cafe.
He spent most of that time in conversing with Madame Leonore about
Dominic. She was distressed, but her mind was made up. That
bright-eyed, nonchalant, and passionate woman was making arrangements to
dispose of her cafe before departing to join Dominic. She would not say
where. Having ascertained that his assistance was not required Monsieur
George, in his own words, "managed to sneak out of the town without being
seen by a single soul that mattered."

The second occasion was very prosaic and shockingly incongruous with the
super-mundane colouring of these days. He had neither the fortune of
Henry Allegre nor a man of affairs of his own. But some rent had to be
paid to somebody for the stone hut and Rose could not go marketing in the
tiny hamlet at the foot of the hill without a little money. There came a
time when Monsieur George had to