June the beating of the heart of summer; deny
to the flowers their deepening hues, or to winged life its slumbrous
buzzing, as stifle in such a lover his conviction of fulfilment....

He lay down on a couch, and there stayed a long time quite still, his
forehead pressed against the wall. His will was already beginning to
recover for a fresh attempt. It was merciful that she was going away
from Cramier, going to where he had in fancy watched her feed her doves.
No laws, no fears, not even her commands could stop his fancy from
conjuring her up by day and night. He had but to close his eyes, and she
was there.

A ring at the bell, repeated several times, roused him at last to go
to the door. His caller was Robert Cramier. And at sight of him, all
Lennan's lethargy gave place to a steely feeling. What had brought
him here? Had he been spying on his wife? The old longing for physical
combat came over him. Cramier was perhaps fifteen years his senior, but
taller, heavier, thicker. Chances, then, were pretty equal!

"Won't you come in?" he said.

"Thanks."

The voice had in it the same mockery as on Sunday; and it shot through
him that Cramier had thought to find his wife here. If so, he did not
betray it by any crude look round. He came in with his deliberate step,
light and well-poised for so big a man.

"So this," he said, "is where you produce your masterpieces! Anything
great since you came back?"

Lennan lifted the cloths from the half-modelled figure of his bull-man.
He felt malicious pleasure in doing that. Would Cramier recognize
himself in this creature with the horn-like ears, and great bossed
forehead? If this man who had her happiness beneath his heel had come
here to mock, he should at all events get what he had come to give. And
he waited.

"I see. You are giving the poor brute horns!"

If Cramier had seen, he had dared to add a touch of cynical humour,
which the sculptor himself had never thought of. And this even evoked in
the young man a kind of admiring compunction.

"Those are not horns," he said gently; "only ears."

Cramier lifted a hand and touched the edge of his own ear.

"Not quite like that, are they--human ears? But I suppose you would call
this symbolic. What, if I may ask, does it represent?"

All the softness in Lennan vanished.

"If you can't gather that from looking, it must be a failure."

"Not at all. If I am right, you want something for it to tread on, don't
you, to get