She passed the spot where, eight months earlier, Max had saluted the flag of France.  Her heart leaped, her glance, flying before her, discovered Blake waiting at his appointed place, and all her wild sensations were suspended.

The violently beating heart seemed to stop, the blood moved with a sick slowness in her veins, it seemed impossible that she should go forward, and yet, by the curious mechanism of the human machine, her feet carried her on until Blake’s presence was tangible to all her senses—­until suspense was engulfed in actuality, and joy was singing about her in the air, a song so triumphant, so penetrating that it drowned all whispering of doubt—­all murmurs of to-morrow or of yesterday.  Tears welled into her eyes, her hands went out to him.

Standing in the full light, she was a tall, slight girl, fastidiously, if simply dressed—­veiled, gloved, shod as befitted a woman of the world; and as he gazed on her, one thought possessed Blake.  She, who typified all beauty—­whose presence was a fragrance—­had called to him, chosen him.  All the romance stored up through generations welled within him; he would have died for her at that moment as enthusiastically as his ancestors had died for their faith.  Catching her hands, he kissed them without a thought for passing glances.

“Princess!”

The sound of his voice went through her, she laughed to break the sob that caught her throat, she looked up, unashamed of the tears trembling on her lushes.

“Monsieur Ned!”

“Oh, why the ’monsieur’?”

“Why the ’princess’?”

They both smiled.

“Maxine!”

“Mon ami!  Mon cher ami!” It thrilled her to the heart to say the words; she glanced at him half fearfully, then broke forth afresh, lest he should have time to think.  “Ned, tell me!  It is true—­all this?  I am not asleep?  It is not a dream?”

He pressed her hands.  “Look round you!  It is morning.”

Her lips trembled; she obeyed him, looking slowly from the cool sky to the tree-tops, where the heavy leaves were still damp with the night’s frost.

“Yes, it is morning!” she said.  “We have all the day!”

Watching her intently, he did not add, as would the common lover, “we have many days”; she seemed to him so beautiful, so naive that her words must compass perfection.

“We have all the day,” he echoed.  “How shall it be spent?”

Then she turned to him, all graciousness, her young face lifted to the light.  “Ah, you must decide!  I do not wish even to think; the world is so—­how do you say—­enchanted?”

He laughed in delight at her charming, pleading smile, her charming, pleading hesitation; he caught her mood with swift intuition.

“That’s it!  The world is enchanted!  Away behind us, is the Dreaming Wood.  What do you say?  Shall we go and seek the Sleeping Beauty?”

She nodded silently.  He was so perfectly the Blake of old—­the Blake who understood.