And with this I had to content myself.  But more than once the next day I repented of my zeal, and wondered whether a providence with a white rose in her bosom might not turn out a trifle too human.  In the evening, at the Kursaal, I looked for Pickering, but he was not visible, and I reflected that my revelation had not as yet, at any rate, seemed to Madame Blumenthal a reason for prescribing a cooling-term to his passion.  Very late, as I was turning away, I saw him arrive—­with no small satisfaction, for I had determined to let him know immediately in what way I had attempted to serve him.  But he straightway passed his arm through my own and led me off towards the gardens.  I saw that he was too excited to allow me to speak first.

“I have burnt my ships!” he cried, when we were out of earshot of the crowd.  “I have told her everything.  I have insisted that it’s simple torture for me to wait with this idle view of loving her less.  It’s well enough for her to ask it, but I feel strong enough now to override her reluctance.  I have cast off the millstone from round my neck.  I care for nothing, I know nothing, but that I love her with every pulse of my being—­and that everything else has been a hideous dream, from which she may wake me into blissful morning with a single word!”

I held him off at arm’s-length and looked at him gravely.  “You have told her, you mean, of your engagement to Miss Vernor?”

“The whole story!  I have given it up—­I have thrown it to the winds.  I have broken utterly with the past.  It may rise in its grave and give me its curse, but it can’t frighten me now.  I have a right to be happy, I have a right to be free, I have a right not to bury myself alive.  It was not I who promised—­I was not born then.  I myself, my soul, my mind, my option—­all this is but a month old!  Ah,” he went on, “if you knew the difference it makes—­this having chosen and broken and spoken!  I am twice the man I was yesterday!  Yesterday I was afraid of her; there was a kind of mocking mystery of knowledge and cleverness about her, which oppressed me in the midst of my love.  But now I am afraid of nothing but of being too happy!”

I stood silent, to let him spend his eloquence.  But he paused a moment, and took off his hat and fanned himself.  “Let me perfectly understand,” I said at last.  “You have asked Madame Blumenthal to be your wife?”

“The wife of my intelligent choice!”

“And does she consent?”

“She asks three days to decide.”

“Call it four!  She has known your secret since this morning.  I am bound to let you know I told her.”

“So much the better!” cried Pickering, without apparent resentment or surprise.  “It’s not a brilliant offer for such a woman, and in spite of what I have at stake, I feel that it would be brutal to press her.”

“What does she say to your breaking your promise?” I asked in a moment.