“Yes,” he cried.  “It’s the only thing on this earth that I’m afraid of.”

“Why?”

“The sneers.  First you’d hate them.  Then you’d hate and despise me.”

She grew serious.  “Calme-toi, my dearest. just consider things practically.  Who is going to sneer at a great man?”

“I the first,” replied Paul bitterly, his self-judgment warped by the new knowledge of the vanities and unsubstantialities on which his life had been founded.  “I a great man, indeed!”

“A very great man.  A brilliant man I knew long ago.  A brave man I have known, in spite of my pride, these last two or three awful weeks.  But last night I knew you were a great man—­a very great man.  Ah, mon Paul.  La canaille, whether it lives in Whitechapel or Park Lane, what does it matter to us?”

“The riff-raff, unfortunately,” said Paul, “forms the general judgment of society.”

The Princess drew herself up in all her aristocratic dignity.  “My Paul well-beloved,” said she, “you have still one or two things to learn.  People of greatness and rank march with their peers, and they can spit upon the canaille.  There is canaille in your House of Lords, upon which, the day after to-morrow, you can spit, and it will take off its coronet and thank you—­and now,” she said, resuming her seat on the sofa, among the cushions, “let us stop arguing.  If there is any more arguing to be done, let us put it off to another occasion.  Let us dismiss the questions of marriage and Ionian islands altogether, and let us talk pleasantly like dear friends who are reconciled.”

And with the wit of the woman who loves and the subtlety of the woman of the world she took Paul in her delicate hands and held him before her smiling eyes and made him tell her of all the things she wanted to know.  And so Paul told her of all his life, of Bludston, of Barney Bill, of the model days, of the theatre, of Jane, of his father; and he showed her the cornelian heart and expounded its significance; and he talked of his dearest lady, Miss Winwood, and his work on the Young England League, and his failure to grip in this disastrous election, and he went back to the brickfield and his flight from the Life School, and his obsessing dream of romantic parentage and the pawning of his watch at Drane’s Court; and in the full tide of it all a perturbed butler appeared at the door.

“Can I speak a word to Your Highness?”

She rose.  The butler spoke the word.  She burst out laughing.  “My dear,” she cried, “it’s past nine o’clock.  The household is in a state of agitation about dinner.  We’ll have it at once, Wilkins.”

The butler bowed and retired.

The Princess laughed again.  “Of course you’ll stay.  I left Stephanie at Morebury.”

And Paul stayed to dinner, and though, observing the flimsy compact, they dismissed the questions of Ionian islands and marriage, they talked till midnight of matters exceedingly pleasant.