He said:  “My dear—­you mustn’t decide anything so important to you in a hurry.”

A tremor passed over her, and he thought she was going to dissolve in hysterics.  But she exhibited once more that marvelous and mysterious self-control, whose secret had interested and baffled him.  She said in her dim, quiet way: 

“It seems to me I just can’t stay on.”

“You can always go, you know.  Why not try it a few days?”

He could feel the trend of her thoughts, and in the way things often amuse us without in the least moving us to wish to laugh, he was amused by noting that she was trying to bring herself to stay on, out of consideration for his feelings!  He said with a kind of paternal tenderness: 

“Whenever you want to go, I am willing to arrange things for you—­so that you needn’t worry about money.  But I feel that, as I am older than you, I ought to do all I can to keep you from making a mistake you might soon regret.”

She studied him dubiously.  He saw that she—­naturally enough—­did not believe in his disinterestedness, that she hadn’t a suspicion of his change, or, rather collapse, of feeling.  She said: 

“If you ask it, I’ll stay a while.  But you must promise to—­to be kind to me.”

There was only gentleness in his smile.  But what a depth of satirical self-mockery and amusement at her innocent young egotism it concealed!  “You’ll never have reason to speak of that again, my dear,” said he.

“I—­can—­trust you?” she said.

“Absolutely,” replied he.  “I’ll have another room opened into this suite.  Would you like that?”

“If you—­if you don’t mind.”

He stood up with sudden boyish buoyance.  “Now—­let’s go shopping.  Let’s amuse ourselves.”

She rose with alacrity.  She eyed him uncertainly, then flung her arms round his neck and kissed him.

“You are so good to me!” she cried.  “And I’m not a bit nice.”

He did not try to detain her, but sent her to finish dressing, with an encouraging pat on the shoulder and a cheerful, “Don’t worry about yourself—­or me.”

XVII

About half an hour later the door into the bedroom opened and she appeared on the threshold of the sitting room, ready for the street.  He stared at her in the dazed amazement of a man faced by the impossible, and uncertain whether it is sight or reason that is tricking him.  She had gone into the bedroom not only homely but commonplace, not only commonplace but common, a dingy washed-out blonde girl whom it would be a humiliation to present as his wife.  She was standing there, in the majesty of such proud pale beauty as poets delight to ascribe to a sorrowful princess.  Her wonderful skin was clear and translucent, giving her an ethereal look.  Her hair reminded him again of what marvels he had seen in the sunlight of Sunday afternoon.  And looking at her form and the small head so gracefully capping it, he could think only of the simile that had always come to him in his moments of ecstasy—­the lily on its tall stem.