He understood that this meeting was of paramount importance in Mr. Skale’s purpose.

“How do you do, Mr. Spinrobin,” he heard a soft voice saying, and the commonplace phrase served to bring him back to a more normal standard of things.  But the tone in which she said it caused him a second thrill almost more delightful than the first, for the quality was low and fluty, like the gentle note of some mellow wind instrument, and the caressing way she pronounced his name was a revelation.  Mr. Skale had known how to make it sound dignified, but this girl did more—­she made it sound alive.  “I will give thee a new name” flashed into his thoughts, as some memory-cell of boyhood discharged its little burden most opportunely and proceeded to refill itself.

The smile of happiness that broke over Spinrobin’s face was certainly reflected in the eyes that gazed so searchingly into his own, without the smallest sign of immodesty, yet without the least inclination to drop the eyelids.  The two natures ran out to meet each other as naturally as two notes of music run to take their places in a chord.  This slight, blue-eyed youth, light of hair and sensitive of spirit, and this slim, dark-skinned little maiden, with the voice of music and the wide-open grey eyes, understood one another from the very first instant their atmospheres touched and mingled; and the big Skale, looking on intently over their very shoulders, saw that it was good and smiled down upon them, too, in his turn.

“The harmony of souls and voices is complete,” he said, but in so low a tone that the secretary did not hear it.  Then, with a hand on a shoulder of each, he half pushed them before him into the dining room, his whole face running, as it were, into a single big smile of contentment.  The important event had turned out to his entire satisfaction.  He looked like some beneficent father, well pleased with his two children.

But Spinrobin, as he moved beside the girl and heard the rustle of her dress that almost touched him, felt as though he stood upon a sliding platform that was moving ever quicker, and that the adventure upon which he was embarked had now acquired a momentum that nothing he could do would ever stop.  And he liked it.  It would carry him out of himself into something very big....

And at dinner, where he sat opposite to the girl and studied her face closely, Mr. Skale, he was soon aware, was occupied in studying the two of them even more closely.  He appeared always to be listening to their voices.  They spoke little enough, however, only their eyes met continually, and when they did so there was no evidence of a desire to withdraw.  Their gaze remained fastened on one another, on her part without shyness, without impudence on his.  That Mr. Skale wished for them an intimate and even affectionate understanding was evident, and the secretary warmed to him on that account more than ever, if on no other.