“I never dreamed you noticed me.  And every time you smiled on one of them I grew the gloomier——­”

“And what does my gaiety mean—­ save that the source of happiness lies rooted in you?  What do other men count, only that in their admiration I read some recompense for you, who made me admirable.  These gowns I wear are yours—­ these shoon and buckles and silken stockings—­ these bows of lace and furbelows—­ this little patch making my rose cheeks rosier—­ this frost of powder on my hair!  All these I wear, Euan, so that man’s delight in me may do you honour.  All I am to please them—­ my gaiety, my small wit, which makes for them crude verses, my modesty, my decorum, my mind and person, which seem not unacceptable to a respectable society—­ all these are but dormant qualities that you have awakened and inspired——­”

She broke off short, tears filling her eyes: 

“Of what am I made, then, if my first and dearest and deepest thought be not for you?  And such a man as this is jealous!”

I caught her hands, but she bent swiftly and laid her hot cheek for an instant against my hand which held them.

“If there is in me a Cinderella,” she said unsteadily, “it is you who have discovered it—­ liberated it—­ and who have willed that it shall live.  Did you suppose that it was in me to make those verses unless you told me that I could do it?  You said, ‘Try,’ and instantly I dared try....  Is that not something to stir your pride?  A girl as absolutely yours as that?  And do not the lesser and commonplace emotions seem trivial in comparison—­ all the heats and passions and sentimental vapours—­ the sighs and vows and languishing all the inevitable trappings and masqueradings which bedizzen what men know as love—­ do they not all seem mean and petty compared to our deep, sweet knowledge of each other?”

“You are wonderful,” I said humbly.  “But love is no unreal, unworthy thing, either; no sham, no trite cut-and-dried convention, made silly by sighs and vapours

“Oh, Euan, it is!  I am so much more to you in my soul than if I merely loved you.  You are so much more to me—­ the very well-spring of my desire and pride—­ my reason for pleasing, my happy consolation and my gratitude....  Seat yourself here on the pleasant, scented grasses and let me endeavour to explain it once and for all time.  Will you?

“It is this,” she continued, taking my hand between hers, when we were seated, and examining it very intently, as though the screed she recited were written there on my palm.  “We are so marvelously matched in every measurement and feature, mental and bodily almost—­ and I am so truly becoming a vital part of you and you of me, that the miracle is too perfect, too lofty, too serenely complete to vex it with the lesser magic—­ the passions and the various petty vexations they entail.

“For I would become—­ to honour you—­ all that your pride would have me.  I would please the world for your sake, conquer it both with mind and person.  And you must endeavour to better yourself, day by day, nobly and with high aim, so that the source of my inspiration remain ever pure and fresh, and I attain to heights unthinkable save for your faith in me and mine in you.”