But did she love Henry?  Of that he could not be sure.  If she did, he certainly must divorce her at once.  If she did not—­why was she wishing to marry him?  Henry was an awfully good fellow, far better than he—­but after all, she was his wife—­even though he had forfeited all right to call her so, and if she did not love Henry, no friendship toward him ought to be allowed to stand in the way of their reunion.  It is astonishing how civilization controls nature!  If we put as much force into the controlling of our own thoughts as we put into acting up to a standard of public behavior, what wonderful creatures we should become!

Here were these two human beings—­young and strong and full of passion, playing each a part with an art as great as any displayed at the Comedie Francaise!  And all for reasons suggested by civilization!—­when nature would have solved the difficulty in the twinkling of an eye!

Michael spent a breakfast hour in purgatory.  It was plain to be seen that Henry expected him to show some desire to go fishing, or to want some other sport which required solitude, or only the company of Madame Imogen—­and his afternoon looked as if it were not going to be a thing of joy.  The result of civilization then made him say: 

“May I take out that boat I saw in the little harbor after breakfast, Mrs. Howard?  I must have some real exercise.  Two days in a motor is too much.”

And his hostess graciously accorded him a permission, while her heart sank—­at least she experienced that unpleasant physical sensation of heaviness somewhere in the diaphragm which poets have christened heart-sinking!  She knew it was quite the right thing for him to have done,—­and yet she wished fervently that they could have spent another hour like the one in the turret summer-house.

Henry was radiant—­and as Michael went off through the postern and down to the little harbor where the boats lay, he asked in fine language what were his beloved’s wishes for the afternoon?

Sabine felt pettish, she wanted to snap out that she did not care a single sou what they did, but she controlled herself and answered sweetly that she would take him all over the chateau and ask his opinion and advice about some further improvements she meant to make.

They strolled first to the crenellated wall of the courtyard along which there was a high walk from which you looked down upon the boat-house and the little jetty—­this wall made the fourth side of the courtyard, and with the gate tower, and the concierge’s tower across the causeway, and part of the garden elevation, was the very oldest of the whole chateau, and dated from early feudal times.

They leaned upon the stone and looked down at the sea.