"Not an anchorite but
an epicure."
"Yes," answered Osmonde, "perhaps 'tis that. Any man can love a score
of women--most men do--but there are few who can love but one, as I
shall, if--" and the words came slowly--"if I ever find her."
"You may not," remarked his Grace.
"I may not," said Osmonde, and he smiled his faint, grim smile.
He could not have sworn when he returned to the Continent that he had
found her absolutely at last. Her body he had found, but herself he had
not approached nearly enough to know. But this thing he realised, that
even in the mad stories he had heard, when they had been divested of
their madness, the chief figure in them had always stood out an honest,
strong, fair thing, dwarfed by no petty feminine weakness, nor follies,
nor spites. Rules she broke, decorums she defied, but in such manner
as hurt none but herself. She played no tricks and laid no plots for
vengeance, as she might well have done; she but went her daring,
lawless way, with her head up and her great eyes wide open; and 'twas
her fearless frankness and just, clear wit which moved him more than
aught else, since 'twas they which made him feel that 'twas not alone
her splendid body commanded love, but a spirit which might mate with a
strong man's and be companion to his own. His theories of womankind,
which were indeed curiously in advance of his age, were such as
demanded great things, and not alone demanded, but also gave them.
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