I shook my head. "For these things I care not at all. And indeed I was minded to reject your offer of service altogether. There I was wrong. You shall help me—you shall help me to make others happy."
"Dear priest, what a curious life! People whom I have never seen—people who cannot see me—why should I make them happy?"
"My poor lad—perhaps in time you will learn why. Now begone: commence. On this very hill sits a young lady for whom I have a high regard. Commence with her. Aha! your face falls. I thought as much. You cannot do anything. Here is the conclusion of the whole matter!"
"I can make her happy," he replied, "if you order me; and when I have done so, perhaps you will trust me more."
Emily's mother had started home, but Emily and the little friend still sat beside the tea-things—she in her white piqué dress and biscuit straw, he in his rough but well-cut summer suit. The great pagan figure of the Faun towered insolently above them.
The friend was saying, "And have you never felt the appalling loneliness of a crowd?"
"All that," replied Emily, "have I felt, and very much more—"
Then the Faun laid his hands upon them. They, who had only intended a little cultured flirtation, resisted him as long as they could, but were gradually urged into each other's arms, and embraced with passion.
"Miscreant!" I shouted, bursting from the wood. "You have betrayed me."
"I know it: I care not," cried the little friend. "Stand aside. You are in the presence of that which you do not understand. In the great solitude we have found ourselves at last."