He caught at her hand again, and she let it lie in his.

“Nowhere,” she repeated, and, lifting her head, nodded twice.  Her eyes were brimming.

“But if you love me?” he began.

She waited a moment, but he did not finish.  “Ah! there it is, you see:  you cannot finish.  I was afraid to meet you to-day; but now I am glad, because we can talk about it once and for all.  Charles”—­she hesitated over the name—­“dear, I have been thinking.  Since we see this so clearly, it can be no treachery to my brothers to let our love stand where it does.  At my age”—­and Dorothea laughed nervously—­“one is more easily contented than at yours.”

“I cannot bear your talking in this way.”

“Oh yes, you can,” she assured him with a practical little nod.  “I don’t like it myself, but it has to be done.  Now in the first place, when we meet like this there must be no kissing.”  She blushed, while her voice wavered again over the word; then, as again his hand closed upon hers, she laughed.  “Well—­yes, you may kiss my hand.  But I must not have it on my conscience that I am hiding from Endymion and Narcissus what they have a right to know.  Of course they would be angry if they knew that I—­that I was fond of you at all; but they would have no right, for they could not have forbidden or prevented it.  Now if our prospects were what folks would call happier, why then in earnest of them you might kiss me, but then you would be bound to go to my brothers and tell them.  But since it can all come to nothing—­” A ghost of a smile finished the sentence.

“This war cannot last for ever.”

“It seems to have lasted ever since I can remember.  But what difference could its ending make?  Ah, yes, then I should lose you!” she cried in dismay, but added with as sudden remorse:  “Forgive my selfishness!”

“You are adorable,” said he, and they laughed and picked up their pencils.

Dorothea’s casuistry might prove her ignorant of love and its perils, as a child is of fire; but having, as she deemed, discovered the limits of her duty and set up her terms with Raoul upon them, she soon developed a wonderful cunning in the art of being loved.  Her plainness and the difference in their ages she took for granted, and subtly persuaded Raoul to take for granted; she had no affectations, no minauderies; by instinct she avoided setting up any illusion which he could not share; unconsciously and naturally she rested her strength on the maternal, protective side of love.  Raoul came to her with his woes, his difficulties, his quarrel against fate; and she talked them over with him, and advised him almost as might a wise elder sister.  She had read the Confessions; and, in spite of the missing pages, with less of fascination than disgust; yet had absorbed more than she knew.  In Raoul she recognised certain points of likeness to his great countryman—­points which had puzzled, her in the book.  Now the book helped her to treat them, though she was unaware of its help.  Still less aware was she of any likeness between her and Madame de Warens, of whom (again in spite of the missing pages) she had a poor opinion.