am
an artist, and you are necessary to me and to my career." He lifted his
head. "And I can offer you everything that is most brilliant."

"And what about my career?" Audrey questioned inimically.

"Your career?" He seemed at a loss.

"Yes. My career. It has possibly not occurred to you that I also may have a
career."

Musa became appealing.

"You understand me," he said. "I told you you do not comprehend, but you
comprehend everything. It is that which enrages me. You have had
experience. You know what men are. You could teach me so much. I hate young
girls. I have always hated them. They are so tasteless, so insufferably
innocent. I could not talk to a young girl as I talk to you. It would be
absurd. Now as to my career--what I said----"

"Musa," she interrupted him, with a sinister quietude, "I want to tell you
something. But you must promise to keep it secret. Will you?"

He assented, impatient.

"It is not possible!" he exclaimed, when she had told him that she belonged
to precisely the category of human beings whom he hated and despised.

"Isn't it?" said she. "Now I hope you see how little you know, really,
about women." She laughed.

"It is not possible!" he repeated. And then he said with deliberate
ingenuousness: "I am so content. I am so happy. I could not have hoped for
it. It is overwhelming. I am everything you like of the most idiotic,
blind, stupid. But now I am happy. Could I ever have borne that you had
loved before I knew you? I doubt if I could have borne it. Your innocence
is exquisite. It is intoxicating to me."

"Musa," she remarked dryly; "I wish you would remember that you are in
England. People do not talk in that way in England. It simply is not done.
And I will not listen to it." Her voice grew a little tender. "Why can we
not just be friends?"

"It is folly," said he, with sudden disgust. "And it would kill me."

"Well, then," she replied, receding. "You're entitled to die."

He advanced towards her. She kept him away with a gesture.

"You want me to marry you?" she questioned.

"It is essential," he said, very seriously. "I adore you. I can't do
anything because of you. I can't think of anything but you. You are more
marvellous than anyone can be. You cannot appreciate what you are to me!"

"And suppose you are nothing to me?"

"But it is necessary that you should love me!"

"Why? I see no necessity. You want me--because you want me. That's all. I
can't help it if you