"Oh! I wish you had not said that. Why should a man seek to flatter a woman; in short, to insult her?"
"I would not offend you for the world!" he cried. "Indeed I am sorry."
"And I am grieved to have spoken bitterly. Pardon me, I do not know how to talk even to you, and everything is so strange," she said, flushing deeply.
"Tell me of what you like most yourself; that will interest me beyond all other subjects."
"I cannot speak of that," she answered, a gentle light playing on her face. "I can only think about it. The remembrance of it is rooted in my heart; it is a part of me."
"Mercy," he cried, his face flushing and his eyes becoming strangely brilliant, "the Countess has told me of your dream, of your search for some one who has never
existed. Ah! give it up. Do you not know that the bitterest chapter in the book of life is that which is headed 'Broken Ideals'? The pages are written in blood, they are blistered with tears. The reader must decipher that chapter alone, the shattered remains of what was once his divinity, his sunshine feeding on his heart, and poisoning even his memory."
"But humanity should not let its ideals be broken. It should fight for them, lock them safe in the inmost chamber of its mind. It should never suffer a profane hand to destroy that which is dearer than itself," she answered, with a fixed, far-away look in her eyes.
"Ah, my dear Mercy, believe me, should you appear to find he whom you seek, you will but dream, and then awake to learn that your young, fresh life has been wasted, and that your Ideal is false. Then age will be passed in useless longing and vain regrets."
"I shall find him. I did know him once, and he left me, but he will come back again." Her eyes filled with tears, and she looked so spiritual, so beautiful, that her companion could contain himself no longer.