It seemed as if her moods, like her chameleon eyes, took colour from her surroundings, and there all was primitive simplicity and nature and peace.

Paul himself was in a state of ecstasy. He hardly knew whether he trod on air or no. No siren of old Greek fable had ever lured mortal more under her spell than this strange foreign woman thing—Queen or Princess or what you will. Nothing else in the world was of any consequence to him—and it was all the more remarkable because subjection was in no way part of his nature. Paul was a masterful youth, and ruled things to his will in his own home.

The lady talked of him—of his tastes—of his pleasures. There was not an incident in his life, or of his family, that she had not fathomed by now. All about Isabella even—poor Isabella! And she told him how she sympathised with the girl, and how badly he had behaved.

"Another proof, my Paul, of what I said today—no one must make vows about love."

But Paul, in his heart, believed her not. He would worship her for ever, he knew.

"Yes," she said, answering his thoughts. "You think so, beloved, and it may be so because you do not know from moment to moment how I shall be—if I shall stay here in your arms, or fly far away beyond your reach. You love me because I give you the stimulus of uncertainty, and so keep bright your passion, but once you were sure, I should become a duty, as all women become, and then my Paul would yawn and grow to see I was no longer young, and that the expected is always an ennui when it comes!"

"Never, never!" said Paul, with fervour.

Presently their conversation drifted to other things, and Paul told her how he longed to see the world and its people and its ways. She had been almost everywhere, it seemed, and with her talent of word-painting, she took him with her on the magic carpet of her vivid description to east and west and north and south.

Oh! their entr'actes between the incoherence of just lovers' love were not banal or dull. And never she forgot her tender ways of insinuated caresses—small exquisite touches of sentiment and grace. The note ever of One—that they were fused and melted together into one body and soul.

Through all her talk that night Paul caught glimpses of the life of a great lady, surrounded with state and cares, and now and then there was a savage echo which made him think of things barbaric, and wonder more than ever from whence she had come.

It was quite late before the chill of night airs drove them into their salon, and here she made him some Russian tea, and then lay in his arms, and purred love-words to him, and nestled close like a child who wants petting to cure it of some imaginary hurt. Only, in her tenderest caresses he seemed at last to feel something of danger. A slumbering look of passion far under the calm exterior, but ready to break forth at any moment from its studied control.

It thrilled and maddened him.

"Beloved, beloved!" he cried, "let us waste no more precious moments. I want you—I want you—my sweet!"

* * * * *

At the first glow of dawn, he awoke, a strange sensation, almost of strangling and suffocation, upon him. There, bending over, framed in a mist of blue-black waves, he saw his lady's face. Its milky whiteness lit by her strange eyes—green as cats' they seemed, and blazing with the fiercest passion of love—while twisted round his throat he felt a great strand of her splendid hair. The wildest thrill as yet his life had known then came to Paul; he clasped her in his arms with a frenzy of mad, passionate joy.

CHAPTER XI

The next day was Sunday, and even through the silk blinds they could hear the rain drip in monotonous fashion. Of what use to wake? Sleep is blissful and calm when the loved one is near.

Thus it was late when Paul at last opened his eyes. He found himself alone, and heard his lady's voice singing softly from the sitting-room beyond, and through the open door he could perceive her stretched on the tiger, already dressed, reclining among the silk pillows, her guitar held in her hands.

"Hasten, hasten, lazy one. Thy breakfast awaits thee," she called, and
Paul bounded up without further delay.

This day was to be a day of books, she said, and she read poetry to him, and made him read to her—but she would not permit him to sit too near her, or caress her—and often she was restless and moved about with the undulating grace of a cat. She would peep from the windows, and frown at the scene. The lake was hidden by mist, the skies cried, all nature was weeping and gloomy.

And at last she flung the books aside, and crept up to Paul, who was huddled on the sofa, feeling rather morose from her decree that he must not touch or kiss her.

"Weeping skies, I hate you!" she said. Then she called Dmitry in a sharp voice, and when he appeared from the passage where he always awaited her pleasure, she spoke to him in Russian, or some language Paul knew not, a fierce gleam in her eyes. Dmitry abased himself almost to the floor, and departing quickly, returned with sticks and lit a blazing pine-log fire in the open grate. Then he threw some powder into it, and with stealthy haste drew all the orchid-silk curtains, and departed from the room. A strange divine scent presently rose in the air, and over Paul seemed to steal a spell. The lady crept still nearer, and then with infinite sweetness, all her docility of the first hours of their union returned, she melted in his arms.

"Paul—I am so wayward to-day, forgive me," she said in a childish, lisping voice. "See, I will make you forget the rain and damp. Fly with me to Egypt where the sun always shines."

And Paul, like a sulky, hungry baby, who had been debarred, and now received its expected sweetmeat, clasped her and kissed her for a few minutes before he would let her speak.

"See, we are getting near Cairo," she said, her eyes half closed, while she settled herself among the cushions, and drew Paul down to her until his head rested on her breast, and her arms held him like a mother with a child.

Her voice was a dream-voice as she whispered on.