“You are wrong. I was afraid!” And he stared at her pallidly.
“Afraid?” she repeated, puzzled.
He leaned nearer, confidential, sad:
“Shall I tell you a precious secret, Dulcie? I am a coward. I am a slave of fear. I am afraid of beauty! Isn’t that a very strange thing to say? Can you understand the subtlety of that indefinable psychology? Fear is an emotion. Fear of the beautiful is still a subtler emotion. Fear, itself, is beautiful beyond words. Beauty is Fear. Fear is Beauty. Do you follow me, Dulcie?”
“No,” said the girl, bewildered.
Esmé sighed:
“Some day you will follow me. It is my destiny to be followed, pursued, haunted by loveliness impotently seeking to express itself to me, while I, fearing it, dare only to express my fear with brush and pencil!... When shall I paint you?” he added with sad benevolence.
“What?”
“When shall I try to interpret upon canvas my subtle fear of you?” And, as the girl remained mute: “When,” he explained languidly, “shall I appoint an hour for you to sit to me?”