"Be
loved; never love."

If both parts of this creed had not been equally imperative, Lewis might
have escaped. His aloofness was what doomed him. Like all big-game
hunters, Folly loved the rare trophy, the thing that's hard to get. By
keeping his distance, Lewis pressed the spring that threw her into
action. Almost instinctively she concentrated on him all her forces of
attraction, and Folly's forces of attraction, once you pressed the
spring, were simply dynamic. Beneath that soft, breathing skin of hers
was such store of vitality, intensity, and singleness of purpose as only
the vividly monochromatic ever bring to bear on life.

Lewis, unconsciously in very deep waters indeed, reached London in a
state of ineffable happiness. Not so Folly. Lewis had awakened in her
desire. With her, desire was merely the prelude to a natural
consummation. Folly was worried because one of the first and last things
Lewis had said to her was, "Darling, when will you marry me?" To which
she had replied, but without avail, "Let's think about that afterward."

When Lewis reached the flat on a Saturday night, he did not have to tell
his father that something wonderful had happened. Leighton saw it in his
face--a face suddenly become more boyish than it had ever been before.
They rushed feverishly through dinner, for Lewis's mood was contagious.
Then they went into the living-room, and straight for the two big
leather chairs which, had they lacked that necessary measure of
discretion which Nelton had assigned to them, might have told of many a
battle of the mind with the things that are.

"Well, Boy," said Leighton, "what is it?"

"Dad," cried Lewis, with beaming face, "I've found the woman--the
all-embracing woman."

Leighton's mind wandered back to the tales of Lewis's little pal
Natalie.

"Tell me about her--again," he said genially.

"Again!" cried Lewis. "But you've never heard of her--not from me,
anyway."

"What's her name?" asked Leighton, half aroused.

"Her name," said Lewis, smiling absently into the fire, "is Folly--Folly
Delaires."

Leighton was a trained stalker of dangerous game. Surprise never
startled him into movement. It stilled him. Old Ivory had once said of
him that he could make his heart stop beating at the smell of elephant;
which is quite a different thing from having your heart stop beating on
its own hook. When Lewis said, "Folly--Folly Delaires," Leighton
suddenly became intensely still. He remaine