the offer simply, nobly, unreservedly. My heart
was filled with great gratitude. She was so true, so loyal, so thorough.
Why could I not take her at her word? I murmured:

"I'll remember what you say."

She put out her hand. "Good-bye!"

"Good-bye and God bless you!" I said.

I accompanied her to the front door, hailed a passing cab, and waited
till she had driven off. Was there ever a sweeter, grander, more loyal
woman? The three little words had changed the current of my being.

I returned to take leave of Agatha. I found her in the drawing-room
reading a novel. She twisted her head sideways and regarded me with a
bird-like air of curiosity.

"Eleanor gone?"

Her tone jarred on me. I nodded and dropped into a chair.

"Interview passed off satisfactorily?"

"We were quite comfortable, thank you. The only drawback was the tea.
Why a woman in your position can't give people China tea instead of that
Ceylon syrup will be a mystery to me to my dying day."

She rose in her wrath and shook me.

"You're the most aggravating wretch on earth!"

"My dear Tom-Tit," said I gravely. "Remember the moral tale of
Bluebeard."

"Look here, Simon"--she planted herself in front of me--"I'm not a bit
inquisitive. I don't in the least want to know what passed between you
and Eleanor. But what I would give my ears to understand is how you
can go through a two hours' conversation with the girl you were engaged
to--a conversation which must have affected the lives of both of
you--and then come up to me and talk drivel about China tea and
Bluebeard."

"Once on a time, my dear," said I, "I flattered myself on being an
artist in life. I am humbler now and acknowledge myself a wretched
bungling amateur. But I still recognise the value of chiaroscuro."

"You're hopeless," said Agatha, somewhat crossly. "You get more flippant
and cynical every day."

CHAPTER XX

I went home to my solitary dinner, and afterwards took down a volume of
Emerson and tried to read. I thought the cool and spacious philosopher
might allay a certain fever in my blood. But he did nothing of the kind.
He wrote for cool and spacious people like himself; not for corpses
like me revivified suddenly with an overcharge of vital force. I pitched
him--how much more truly companionable is a book than its author!--I
pitched him across the room, and thrusting my hands in my pockets and
stretching out my legs, stared in a certain wonder at myself.

I, Simon de