of the wood
nymph. One evening I climbed on the pedestal of my divinity, my cheek
was pale ..."

"For God's sake, leave out the poetics, and come to the facts."

"If you don't let me tell my story in my own way I won't tell it at
all. Out of my agony prayer rose to Alice, for now it pleased me to
fancy there was some likeness between this statue and Lady Alice. The
dome of leafage was sprinkled with the colour of the sunset, and as I
pressed my lips to the wooden statue, I heard dead leaves rustling
under a footstep. Holding the nymph with one arm, I turned and saw a
lady approaching. She asked me why I kissed the statue. I looked away
embarrassed, but she told me not to go, and she said, 'You are a
pretty boy.' I said I had never seen a woman so beautiful. Again
I grew ashamed, but the lady laughed. We stood talking in the
stillness. She said I had pretty hands, and asked me if I regretted
the nymph was not a real woman. She took my hands. I praised hers,
and then I grew frightened, for I knew she came from the castle; the
castle was to me what the Ark of the Covenant was to an Israelite.
She put her arm about me, and my fears departed in the thrilling of
an exquisite minute. She kissed me and said, 'Let us sit down.'"

"I wonder who she was! What was her name? You can tell me."

"No, I never mention names; besides, I am not certain she gave her
right name."

"Are you sure she was staying at the castle? For if so, there would
be no use for her to conceal her name. You could easily have found
it out."

"Oh, yes, she was staying at the castle; she talked about you all.
Don't you believe me?"

"What, all about the nymph? I am certain you thought you ought to
have loved her, and if what Harding says is right, that there is more
truth in what we think than in what we do, I'm sure you might say
that you had been on a wedding-tour with one of the gargoyles."

Mike laughed; and Frank did not suspect that he had annoyed him.
Mike's mother was a Frenchwoman, whom John Fletcher had met in Dublin
and had pressed into a sudden marriage. At the end of three years of
married life she had been forced to leave him, and strange were the
legends of the profanities of that bed. She fled one day, taking her
son with her. Fletcher did not even inquire where she had gone; and
when at her death Mike returned to Ireland, he found his father in a
small lodging-house playing the flute. Scarcely deigning to turn his
head, he said--"Oh