go to Paris, he was
far from admitting that Irene's presence was influencing him. He had not
been there two days before he owned that the wish to see her had
been more than half the reason. In England one did not admit what was
natural. He had thought it might be well to speak to her about the
letting of her flat and other matters, but in Paris he at once knew
better. There was a glamour over the city. On the third day he wrote to
her, and received an answer which procured him a pleasurable shiver of
the nerves:

"MY DEAR JOLYON,

"It will be a happiness for me to see you.

"IRENE."

He took his way to her hotel on a bright day with a feeling such as he
had often had going to visit an adored picture. No woman, so far as
he remembered, had ever inspired in him this special sensuous and yet
impersonal sensation. He was going to sit and feast his eyes, and come
away knowing her no better, but ready to go and feast his eyes again
to-morrow. Such was his feeling, when in the tarnished and ornate little
lounge of a quiet hotel near the river she came to him preceded by a
small page-boy who uttered the word, "Madame," and vanished. Her face,
her smile, the poise of her figure, were just as he had pictured, and
the expression of her face said plainly: 'A friend!'

"Well," he said, "what news, poor exile?"

"None."

"Nothing from Soames?"

"Nothing."

"I have let the flat for you, and like a good steward I bring you some
money. How do you like Paris?"

While he put her through this catechism, it seemed to him that he had
never seen lips so fine and sensitive, the lower lip curving just a
little upwards, the upper touched at one corner by the least conceivable
dimple. It was like discovering a woman in what had hitherto been a sort
of soft and breathed-on statue, almost impersonally admired. She owned
that to be alone in Paris was a little difficult; and yet, Paris was so
full of its own life that it was often, she confessed, as innocuous as a
desert. Besides, the English were not liked just now!

"That will hardly be your case," said Jolyon; "you should appeal to the
French."

"It has its disadvantages."

Jolyon nodded.

"Well, you must let me take you about while I'm here. We'll start
to-morrow. Come and dine at my pet restaurant; and we'll go to the
Opera-Comique."

It was the beginning of daily meetings.

Jolyon soon found that for those who desired a static condition of the
affections, Paris was