'Begun what?'
'I have begun by liking you. You don't object, do you?'
'Oh no! I like to be liked—by everybody!' Margaret laughed again, and watched him.
'It only remains for you to like everybody yourself. Will you kindly include me?'
'Yes, in a general way, as a neighbour, in the biblical sense, you know. Are you English enough to understand that expression?'
'I happen to have read the story of the Good Samaritan in Greek,' Logotheti answered. 'Since you are willing that we should be neighbours, "in the biblical sense," you cannot blame me for saying that I love my neighbour as myself.'
Once more her instinct told her that the words were meant less carelessly than they were spoken, though she could not possibly seem to take them in earnest. Yet her curiosity was aroused, as he intended that it should be.
'I remember that the Samaritan loved his neighbour, "in the biblical sense," at first sight,' he said, with a quick glance.
'But those were biblical times, you know!'
'Men have not changed much since then. We can still love at first sight, I assure you, even after we have seen a good deal of the world. It depends on meeting the right woman, and on nothing else. Do you suppose that if the Naples Psyche, or the Syracuse Venus, or the Venus of Milo, or the Victory of Samothrace suddenly appeared in Paris or London, all the men would not lose their heads about her—at first sight? Of course they would!'