She listened, without saying a word, until I had finished.  Then she took my hand.

“I’m grateful,” she said, “and I’m proud.  And I know that I love you beyond all things on earth.  But I won’t give you an answer till I’m up and about on my feet again.”

“Why?” I insisted.

“Don’t ask.  And don’t mention the matter again.  You must be good to me, because I’m ill, and do what I say.”

She smiled and fondled my hand, and cajoled a reluctant promise from me.

Then came days in which, for no obvious reason, Lola received me with anxious frightened diffidence, and spoke with constraint.  The cheerfulness which she had hitherto exhibited gave place to dull depression.  She urged me continually to leave Berlin, where, as she said, I was wasting my time, and return to my work in London.

“I shall be all right, Simon, perfectly all right, and as soon as I can travel, I’ll come straight to London.”

“I’m not going to let you slip through my fingers again,” I would say laughingly.

“But I promise you, I’ll swear to you I’ll come back!  Only I can’t bear to think of you idling around a woman’s sick-bed, when you have such glorious things to do at home.  That’s a man’s work, Simon.  This isn’t.”

“But it is a man’s work,” I would declare, “to devote himself to the woman he loves and not to leave her helpless, a stranger in a strange land.”

“I wish you would go, Simon.  I do wish you would go!” she would say wearily.  “It’s the only favour I’ve ever asked you in my life.”

Man-like, I looked within myself to find the reason for these earnest requests.  In casting off my jester’s suit had I also divested myself of the power to be a decently interesting companion?  Had I become merely a dull, tactless, egotistical bore?  Was I, in simple, naked, horrid fact, getting on an invalid’s delicate nerves?  I was scared of the new picture of myself thus presented.  I became self-conscious and made particular efforts to bring a little gaiety into our talk; but though she smiled with her lips, the cloud, whatever it was, hung heavily on her mind, and at the first opportunity she came back to the ceaseless argument.

In despair I took her nurse into my confidence.

“She is right,” said the nurse.  “You are doing her more harm than good.  You had better go away and write to her daily from London.”

“But why—­but why?” I clamoured.  “Can’t you give me any reason?”

The nurse glanced at me with a touch of feminine scorn.

“The bandages will soon be removed.”

“Well?” said I.

“The sight of one eye may be gone.”

“I know,” said I.  “She is reconciled to it.  She has the courage and resignation of a saint.”

“She has also the very common and natural fears of a woman.”

“For Heaven’s sake,” I cried, “tell me plainly what you mean.”

“We don’t quite know what disfigurement will result,” said the nurse bluntly.  “It is certain to be very great, and the dread of your seeing her is making her ill and retarding her recovery.  So if you have any regard for her, pack up your things and go away.”