“And I told you I should remember that remark.”
“What a wonderful memory you’re getting these days! What else do you remember?”
So I told her other memories, some of which had to be hurriedly suppressed by kisses, until the tread of Paulos’s bearers in the passage caused her to fly upstairs like a startled deer. And it was a long time before she joined us in the dining-hall, very neat and tidy as to hair and frock, but with warm cheeks and eyes that refused to be disguised.
Paulos—as ever—was very understanding, although he did express anxiety about our appetites. After dinner, when the servants had left and we three were sitting round the fire, Aryenis next to me, but very far off—nearly a foot away she must have been—I decided to burn my boats.
“Paulos,” said I, “do you remember our talk about land?”
“Yes, lad, I do quite well.”
“Then I thought I’d tell you now that I’ve decided to take your offer and stop in Sakaeland.” I caught Aryenis as she tried to escape. “You see, I’ve found some one to help me with your people, some one to make me really one of you. To-morrow you will see a favour of mauve ribbon upon your steel cap that I wear. And your mail is going to be worn by Aryenis’s husband.”
“I always thought so from the first day I gave it you and Aryenis helped you put it on,” said Paulos simply. “I won’t talk banalities about being glad. You both know that. Come here, Aryenis.”
She went obediently, but very shyly, and he kissed her twice. “You found much more than life in the gate, child. You found life, and what is more, the best thing in the world that sometimes—alas! only sometimes—goes with it.”
He turned to me.