"You're a splendid thing!" he said very low. "I'm often a beast to
you--but I love you--always."

He was gone. Sophy stood looking after him for some seconds, then she
lowered her eyes to Amaldi's card, which she still held. She left the
room thinking ... thinking....

VI

When Sophy entered the drawing-room, Amaldi was standing with his hands
behind him, looking down at a drawing of herself that stood on a table
near the fireplace. The drawing had been made when she was eighteen by a
young Polish artist. It was done in yellow-and-brown chalks and had a
curious glow--a look of golden light about it. Chesney disliked it. He
pronounced it too "mystical." The truth was that it revealed a side of
Sophy's nature which was forever inaccessible to him.

As she gave Amaldi her hand, she said: "You were looking at that old
drawing. It's a strange thing, isn't it?"

"Yes. Like 'the shadow of a flame,'" he answered. Then as Sophy started
and looked at him inquiringly, he added, smiling: "Varesca told me of
your poems. I read them yesterday. I won't bore you by telling you how
beautiful I thought them. And the title-- I wondered so much how you
came to think of that lovely title. That, in itself, is a poem."

Sophy blushed like a girl. She was very sensitive about that book of
verse. Since she had known more of life, she had often wondered at her
own naivete which had allowed her to pour out from her heart, as from a
cup, those inmost feelings, for any chance buyer to possess in common
with her. The voice in that little volume was the voice of one crying in
the wilderness of youth; now she was a woman, and she blushed for the
passionate ignorance of the girl she had been.

Amaldi said quickly:

"Have I been indiscreet? Perhaps you don't like to talk of your writing.
Please forgive me if I've been indiscreet."

"No, no; indeed you haven't been," she answered. "I'm very glad you like
my verses. Only--well-- I wrote them so long ago. One changes-- I was
very young...."

"And now," said Amaldi, smiling, "you feel very old, I suppose?"

She smiled in answer.

"I certainly feel older," she said lightly.

Amaldi was thinking how much like a young girl she looked, sitting there
in her plain white gown, with her hands clasped about one knee. Having
read those impassioned early poems, he marvelled at a spirit that could
be at once so fiery and so virginal. He felt sure that there could be no
other like her in the wor