"Then you don't believe in that sort of thing? He saw sickness and gold and love. We were in the desert. He saw gold."
"Hush," Michael said. "You must forget all that."
"It was odd, wasn't it? You know how I have urged you to go with me.
I never saw the man before, he has never seen you."
Again Michael said "Hush." Again Millicent paid no attention to him, beyond saying that it was funny that he would never allow her to talk of her love for him, when he had often told her all about his religion of love.
Again Michael said, "I refuse absolutely to be drawn into a discussion upon the subject. You are frivolous. You and I know quite well that yours is not love."
"Perhaps not your kind of love, with a big L. But call a rose by whatsoever name you will, it smells as sweet. I can't quote, but you know what I mean, and that true love without passion and passion without love are both worthless. Every fanatic has passion in his or her love. That is why they enjoy it—the scourging of the flesh, the self-denial—the body enjoys this form of self-torture for the object of its adoration. There," she said, "I will behave like the dear little innocent you first thought I was if you will come and see the Pyramids at sunset." The swift transition of her thoughts was typical of her personality.
Michael's train did not leave the station for Luxor until nine-thirty.
He had nothing to do.
"If you'll come," she said, "I'll not do or say one thing to hurt you.
I'll be my very nicest—and I can be nice and good now, can't I?"
"Then come," he said. "I've not been there since the 'Great Weeping.'"
He used the old man's picturesque term for the inundation of the Nile.
Millicent Mervill was no fool. She meant to keep to her word, and did. The evening's excursion proved a great success and restored Michael to a more normal state of mind.