"How shall I say? His sister?" She looked up anew, disarming in her naïve candor: and a swift temptation assailed her listener—the temptation that at times assails the strongest—the temptation to unburden the mind.
"Jacqueline," Max cried, impetuously, "you speak a great truth when you say that! We have all of us the two natures—the brother and the sister! Not one of us is quite woman—not one of us is all man!"
The thought sped from him, winged and potent; and Jacqueline, wise in her child's wisdom, offered no comment, put forward no opinion.
"It is a war," Max cried again, "a relentless, eternal war; for one nature must conquer, and one must fail. There cannot be two rulers in the same city."
"No," Jacqueline murmured, discreetly, "that is most true."
"It is. Most true."
"Why, then, was madame adorning herself with her beautiful hair when I had the unhappiness to enter? Has not madame already waged her war—and conquered?"
The eyes were full of innocent question, the soft lips perfectly grave.
Max paused to frame the falsehood that should fit the occasion; but, like a flood-tide, the frankness, the courage of the boy nature rose up, and the truth broke forth.
"I thought until to-night, Jacqueline, that the battle was won; but to-night, while I supped with M. Blake, a little play was played out before me—a little human play, where real people played real parts, where the woman clung to her womanhood, as you cling to yours, and the man to his manhood, as does M. Cartel; where the stage effects were smiles and glances and eyes and hair—"