time, until Owen's thoughts went back to Evelyn, and
looking from the portrait by Ingres to the drawing by Boucher he
seemed suddenly to lose control; tears rose to his eyes, and Harding
watched him, wondering whither Owen's imagination carried him. "Is
he far away in Paris, hearing her sing for the first time to Madame
Savelli? Or is he standing with her looking over the bulwarks of the
_Medusa_, seeing the shape of some Greek island dying in the
twilight?" And Harding did not speak, feeling the lover's meditation
to be sacred. Owen flung himself into an arm-chair, and without
withdrawing his eyes from the picture, said, relying on Harding's
friendship:

"It is very like her, it is really very like her. I am much obliged
to you, Harding, for having bought it. I shall come here to see it
occasionally."

"And I'll present you with a key, so that when I am away you can
spend your leisure in front of the picture.... Do you know whom I
shall feel like? Like the friend of King Condules."

"But she'll not ask you to conspire to assassinate me. My murder
would profit you nothing. All the same, Harding, now I come to think
of it, there's a good deal of that queen in Evelyn, or did she
merely desire to take advantage of the excuse to get rid of her
husband?"

"Ancient myths are never very explicit; one reads whatever psychology
one likes into them. Perhaps that is why they never grow old."

The door opened... Harding's servant brought in a parcel of proofs.

"My dear Asher, the proof of an article has just come, and the editor
tells me he'll be much obliged if I look through it at once."

"Shall I wait?"

"Well, I'd sooner you didn't. Correcting a proof with me means a
rewriting, and--"

"You can't concentrate your thoughts while I am roving about the
room. I understand. Are you dining anywhere?"

"I'm not engaged."

The thought crossed Harding's mind when Owen left the room that it
would be better perhaps to write saying that the proofs detained
him, for to spend the evening with Owen would prove wearisome. "No
matter what the subject of conversation may be his mind will go back
to her very soon.... But to leave him alone all the evening would be
selfish, and if I don't dine with him I shall have to dine
alone...." Harding turned to his writing-table, worked on his proof
for a couple of hours, and then went to meet Owen, whom he found
waiting for him at his club.

"My dear friend, I quite agree with you," he s