Coming out of the beer-garden, the captain stalked along with a gloomy aspect.  She, on the other hand, was laughing at her memories surveying across the years, with a flattering optimism, this far-away adventure of her Bohemian days, and growing very merry on recalling the remains of the Inca on his passage from hotel to hotel.

Suddenly Ulysses’ wrath blazed forth....  The Dutch, officer, the natural history sage, the singer who killed himself in one shot and now the fabricator of antiquities....  How many more men had there been in her existence?  How many were there still to be told of?  Why had she not brought them all out at once?...

Freya was astounded at his abrupt violence.  The sailor’s wrath was terrifying.  Then she laughed, leaning heavily on his arm, and putting her face close to his.

“You are jealous!...  My shark is jealous!  Go on talking.  You don’t know how much I like to hear you.  Complain away!...  Beat me!...  It’s the first time that I’ve seen a jealous man.  Ah, you Southerners!...  Meridionals!...  With good reason the women adore you.”

And she was telling the truth.  She was experiencing a new sensation before this manly wrath, provoked by amorous indignation.  Ulysses appeared to her a very different man from all the others she had known in her former life,—­cold, compliant and selfish.

“My Ferragut!...  My Mediterranean hero!  How I love you!  Come ... come....  I must reward you!”

They were in a central street, near the corner of a sloping little alley with stairs.  She pushed him toward it, and at the first step in the narrow and dark passageway embraced him, turning her back on the movement and light in the great street, in order to kiss him with that kiss which always made the captain’s knees tremble.

Although his temper was soothed, he continued complaining during the rest of the stroll.  How many had preceded him?...  He must know.  He wished to know, no matter how horrible the knowledge might be.  It was the delight of the jealous who persist in scratching open the wound.

“I want to know you,” he repeated.  “I ought to know you, since you belong to me.  I have the right!...”

This right recalled with childish obstinacy made Freya smile dolorously.  Long centuries of experience appeared to peep out from the melancholy curl of her lips.  In her gleamed the wisdom of the woman, more cautious and foresighted than that of the man, since love was her only preoccupation.

“Why do you wish to know?” she asked discouragingly.  “How much further could you go on that?...  Would you perchance be any happier when you did know?...”

She was silent for some steps and then said as though disclosing a secret: 

“In order to love, it is not necessary for us to know one another.  Quite the contrary.  A little bit of mystery keeps up the illusion and dispells monotony....  He who wishes to know is never happy.”