ght have been coming,
as he came five years ago, to hear her judgement on his neo-classic
drama. Strange and great things had happened to his genius since that
day. Between _Helen in Leuce_ and the Nine and Twenty Sonnets there
lay the newly discovered, heavenly countries of the soul.

"Well," he said, glancing at the poems, as he seated himself. "What do
you think of them? Am I forgiven? Do you consent?"

"So many questions? They're all answered, aren't they, if I say I
consent?"

"And do you?" There was acute anxiety in his voice and eyes. It struck
her as painful that the man, whom she was beginning to look on as
possibly the greatest poet of his age, should think it necessary to
plead to her for such a little thing.

"I do indeed."

"Without reservations?"

"What reservations should there be? Of course I could only be
glad--and proud--that you should do me so much honour. If I can't say
very much about it, don't think I don't feel it. I feel it more than I
can say."

"Do you really mean it? I was afraid that it might offend you; or
that you'd think I oughtn't to have written the things; or at any rate
that I'd no business to show them to you. And as for the dedication, I
couldn't tell how you'd feel about that."

And she, having before her eyes the greatness of his genius, was
troubled by the humility and hesitation of his approach. It recalled
to her the ways of his pathetic youth, his youth that obscurity made
wild and shy and unassured.

"I can't tell either," she replied, "I don't know whether I ought to
feel proud or humble about it; but I think I feel both. Your wanting
to dedicate anything to me would have been enough to make me very
proud. Even if it had been a little thing--but this thing is great. In
some ways it seems to me the greatest thing you've done yet. I did
think just at first that I ought perhaps to refuse because of that.
And then I saw that, really, that was what made it easy for me to
accept. It's so great that the dedication doesn't count."

"But it _does_ count. It's the only thing that counts to me. You can't
take it like that and separate it from the rest. Those sonnets would
still be dedicated to you even if you refused to let me write your
name before them. I want you to see that they _are_ the dedication."

Lucia shook her head. She had seen it. She could see nothing else when
she read them. How was it that the poet's bodily presence made her
inclined to ignore the refere