“Did they talk—­disagreeably?”

“Gossip—­chatter—­half malicious without malicious intention—­ don’t you know the way of the sweet creatures?  I would tell you more if I could.  The simple truth is that Irene has never spoken to me about it—­never once.  When it happened, she came suddenly to Paris, to a hotel, and from there wrote me a letter, just saying that her marriage was off; no word of explanation.  Of course I fetched her at once to my house, and from that moment to this I have heard not one reference from her to the matter.  You would like to know something about the hero?  He has been away a good deal—­ building up the Empire, as they say; which means, of course, looking after his own and other people’s dividends.”

“Thank you.  Now let us talk about the Castle.”

But Mrs. Borisoff was not in a good humour to-day, and Piers very soon took his leave.  Her hand felt rather hot; he noticed this particularly, as she let it lie in his longer than usual—­part of her absent-mindedness.

Piers had often resented, as a weakness, his susceptibility to the influence of others’ moods; he did so to-day, when having gone to Mrs. Borisoff in an unusually cheerful frame of mind, he came away languid and despondent.  But his scheme of life permitted no such idle brooding as used to waste his days; self-discipline sent him to his work, as usual, through the afternoon, and in the evening he walked ten miles.

The weather was brilliant.  As he stood, far away in rural stillness, watching a noble sunset, he repeated to himself words which had of late become his motto, “Enjoy now!  This moment will never come again.”  But the intellectual resolve was one thing, the moral aptitude another.  He did not enjoy; how many hours in all his life had brought him real enjoyment?  Idle to repeat and repeat that life was the passing minute, which must be seized, made the most of; he could not live in the present; life was to him for ever a thing postponed.  “I will live—­I will enjoy—­some day!” As likely as not that day would never dawn.

Was it true, as admonishing reason sometimes whispered, that happiness cometh not by observation, that the only true content is in the moments which we pass without self-consciousness?  Is all attainment followed by disillusion?  A man aware of his health is on the verge of malady.  Were he to possess his desire, to exclaim, “I am happy,” would the Fates chastise his presumption?

That way lay asceticism, which his soul abhorred.  On, rather, following the great illusion, if this it were!  “The crown of life” —­philosophise as he might, that word had still its meaning, still its inspiration.  Let the present pass untasted; he preferred his dream of a day to come.

Next morning, very unexpectedly, he received a note from Mrs. Borisoff inviting him to dine with her a few days hence.  About her company she said nothing, and Piers went, uncertain whether it was a dinner tete-a-tete or with other guests.  When he entered the room, the first face he beheld was Irene’s.