'That is a wide subject. I cannot discuss it with you just now, because I want to speak to this child.—My dear, I am a neighbour of yours; I live on the coast which you see every day; will you come and stay a few hours with me? We would show you things which would amuse you.'
'Stay with you?'
The eyes of Damaris opened to their fullest, her face flushed scarlet; she was so amazed that she forgot her awe of the speaker.
'Why should you want me?' she said bluntly.
'When you are older you will know that people want many things without knowing why they want them. But I can give you very good reasons: Monsignor Melville has interested me in you, and I think it a pity anyone so gifted as you are by nature should never see anything better than your yard-dogs and—what is your fiancé's name?—Gros Louis? My poor child, how can you know what it is you do with yourself? You cannot tell what the world is like.'
'I am very happy,' said Damaris.
The world was a name of magic to her. How often had she not looked over the strip of sea which severed her from that dazzling shore where amethystine hills and ivory snows and silvery olive woods spoke of a world from which she was forever severed!
'I would come to you if I were ever alone,' she said after a pause.
'Well, come with us,' said her temptress smiling. 'It is three o'clock only now. We will take you with us for a while and send you back by twilight. Loris has told you who I am.'