be happy, how thankful he was for all I
had done for him, and the new mental life I had created in him. He did
his best to keep my courage up. I cried, but he shook his tears away.
'Six months will soon be over,' he said, 'and perhaps you will come
back to me, and I shall be glad again.' Meantime he will write charming
letters to me, I'm sure.

"Would any girl take a parting like that? No; she would be jealous and
envious, and wonder why you were enjoying yourself in the South while
she was condemned to live in the rainy, cold North. Would she ask you to
tell her of all the beautiful girls you met, and whether they were
charming and bright, as the boy asked me to tell him of all the
interesting people I should meet, so that he, too, might take an
interest in them? A girl in his place would have been ill with envy and
malice and jealousy. Again I repeat, you don't know what a high romantic
passion is."

"Your argument is illogical," I cried, "if the girl is jealous, it is
because she has given herself more completely: her exclusiveness is the
other side of her devotion and tenderness; she wants to do everything
for you, to be with you and help you in every way, and in case of
illness or poverty or danger, you would find how much more she had to
give than your red-breeched soldier."

"That's merely a rude gibe and not an argument, Frank."

"As good an argument as your 'cats,'" I replied; "your little soldier
boy with his nickel-plated bicycle only makes me grin," and I grinned.

"You are unpardonable," he cried, "unpardonable, and in your soul you
know that all the weight of argument is on my side. In your soul you
must know it. What is the food of passion, Frank, but beauty, beauty
alone, beauty always, and in beauty of form and vigour of life there is
no comparison. If you loved beauty as intensely as I do, you would feel
as I feel. It is beauty which gives me joy, makes me drunk as with wine,
blind with insatiable desire...."

CHAPTER XXIII

He was an incomparable companion, perfectly amiable, yet vivid, and
eager as a child, always interested and interesting. We awoke at Avignon
and went out in pyjamas and overcoats to stretch our legs and get a bowl
of coffee on the platform in the pearly grey light of early morning.
After coffee and cigarettes he led the way to the other end of the
platform, that we might catch a glimpse of the town wall which, though
terribly restored, yet, when seen from a distanc