But Ste. Marie was very
far away, and did not hear. So then he fell to watching the man's dark
and handsome face, and to thinking how little the years at Eton and the
year or two at Oxford had set any real stamp upon him. He would never be
anything but Latin, in spite of his Irish mother and his public school.
Hartley thought what a pity that was. As Englishmen go, he was not
illiberal, but, no more than he could have altered the color of his
eyes, could he have believed that anything foreign would not be improved
by becoming English. That was born in him, as it is born in most
Englishmen, and it was a perfectly simple and honest belief. He felt a
deeper affection for this handsome and volatile young man whom all women
loved, and who bade fair to spend his life at their successive feet--for
he certainly had never shown the slightest desire to take up any sterner
employment--he felt a deeper affection for Ste. Marie than for any other
man he knew, but he had always wished that Ste. Marie were an
Englishman, and he had always felt a slight sense of shame over his
friend's un-English ways.

After a moment he touched him again on the arm, saying:

"Come along! We shall be late, you know. You can finish your little
concert another time."

"Eh!" cried Ste. Marie. "Quoi, donc?" He turned with a start.

"Oh yes!" said he. "Yes, come along! I was mooning. Allons! Allons, my
old!" He took Hartley's arm and began to shove him along at a rapid
walk. "I will moon no more," he said. "Instead, you shall tell me about
the wonderful Miss Benham whom everybody is talking about. Isn't there
something odd connected with the family? I vaguely recall something
unusual--some mystery or misfortune or something. But first a moment!
One small moment, my old. Regard me that!" They had come to the end of
the bridge, and the great Place de la Concorde lay before them.

"In all the world," said Ste. Marie--and he spoke the truth--"there is
not another such square. Regard it, mon brave! Bow yourself before it!
It is a miracle."

The great bronze lamps were alight, and they cast reflections upon the
still damp pavement about them. To either side, the trees of the
Tuileries gardens and of the Cours la Reine and the Champs-Elysees lay
in a solid black mass; in the middle, the obelisk rose slender and
straight, its pointed top black against the sky; and beneath, the water
of the Nereid fountains splashed and gurgled. Far beyond, the gay lights
of