For during the long months abroad many traps had been laid for him, and it bred a shrewd distrust of girls, based on more than vanity.
Now as he strolled slowly along toward his club through the Mayfair streets his thoughts ran back to Cydonia.
He walked past the Cadells' door. The blinds were down, the shutters fixed. Obedient to the decree of fashion they had moved on with the social tide.
But a feeling of thankfulness possessed him. He knew well that he had escaped a life with a woman who would have bored him, chained to the "obvious orthodox"!
And he wondered...
Was there a way of love that could survive monotony? Could he ever rely on himself to recognize the "one woman"?
Had his "double heart" been the cause of the indecision that beset him?—these swift passions that burned out like straw. Would he ever know the sacred flame?
And suddenly the gypsy's words rose up into his mind.
"Between two fires you shall burn and burn." ... He felt a thrill of superstition.
She had foretold his "golden crown," the fortune "coming over-seas" ... What was it she had prophesied later? He knit his brows, searching his memory.