"Marjory," he called again.
"Coming," she answered, with a quiet intake of breath.
Hatless and with a silk shawl over her shoulders, she hurried to where he was waiting. He too was hatless, even as he had been that night long ago when he had sat beside her. Something, too, of the same light of youth was in his eyes now as then.
Side by side they strolled through the quaint village of stone houses and to the top of a near-by hill, where they found themselves looking down upon Joigny outlined against the hazy tints of the pink-and-gold horizon.
"Oh, it's beautiful!" she exclaimed enthusiastically. "It's a fairy world."
"Better; it's a real world," he answered.
"I doubt it, Monte," she disagreed, with a touch of regret. "It's too perfect."
It would not last. It would begin to fade in a moment, even as her fairy prince would fade and become just Monte. She knew from the past. Besides, it was absolutely essential that this should not last. If it did—why, that would be absurd. It would be worse. It made her uncomfortable even to imagine this possibility for a moment, thus bringing about the very condition most unfavorable for fairy princes. For, if there is one advantage they have over ordinary princes, it is the gift of keeping their princesses always happy and content.
Somewhat shyly she glanced up at Monte. He was standing with his uninjured hand thrust into the pocket of his Norfolk jacket, staring fixedly at the western sky as if he had lost himself there. She thought his face was a bit set; but, for all that, he looked this moment more as she had known him at twenty-one than when he came back at twenty-two. After his travels of a year he had seemed to her so much wiser than she that he had instantly become her senior. She had listened to him as to a man of the world, with something of awe. It was more difficult then to have him for a prince, because princes, though brave and adventurous, must not be too wise.
She smiled as she realized that, as he stood there now, Monte did not in the least inspire her with awe or fear or a sense of superior wisdom. The mellow light softened his features and the light breeze had tousled his hair, so that for all his years told he might have been back in his football days. He had been like that all the afternoon.