ad shown him the
way, and had helped him. He pressed her hand to his cheek and looked
down thoughtfully, wishing that he could find such simple words that
could say so much, but not trusting himself to speak. For though, in
love, a man speaks first, he always finds the least to say of love when
it has strongest hold of him; but a woman has words then, true and
tender, that come from her heart unsought. Yet by and by, if love is not
enduring, so that both tire of it, the man plays the better comedy,
because he has the greater strength, and sometimes what he says has the
old ring in it, because it is so well said, and the woman smiles and
wonders that his love should have lasted longer than hers, and desiring
the illusion, she finds old phrases again; yet there is no life in them,
because when love is dead she thinks of herself, and instead, it was
only of him she thought in the good days when her heart used to beat at
the sound of his footfall, and the light grew dim and unsteady as she
felt his kiss. But the love of these two was not born to tire; and
because he was so young, and knew the world little, save at his sword's
point, he was ashamed that he could not speak of love as well as she.

"Find words for me," he said, "and I will say them, for yours are better
than mine."

"Say, 'I love you, dear,' very softly and gently--not roughly, as you
sometimes do. I want to hear it gently now, that, and nothing else."

She turned a little, leaning towards him, her face near his, her eyes
quiet and warm, and she took his hands and held them together before her
as if he were her prisoner--and indeed she meant that he should not
suddenly take her in his arms, as he often did.

"I love you, dear," he repeated, smiling, and pretending to be very
docile.

"That is not quite the way," she said, with a girlish laugh. "Say it
again--quite as softly, but more tenderly! You must be very much in
earnest, you know, but you must not be in the least violent." She
laughed again. "It is like teaching a young lion," she added. "He may
eat you up at any moment, instead of obeying you. Tell me, you have a
little lion that follows you like a dog when you are in your camp, have
you not? You have not told me about him yet. How did you teach him?"

"I did not try to make him say 'I love you, dear,'" answered Don John,
laughing in his turn.

As he spoke a distant sound caught his ear, and the smile vanished from
his face, for though he heard