"Some degenerate son of honest English stock, I suppose," nodded Helen. "Yet, he had the simplicity of the Cavalier verse-makers in his gracious heart.... Well, for his sake——"
She laid a June rose on the weather-ravaged dial. "God rest him, anyway!" she added lightly. "There's a devil in every one of us."
"Not in you, darling," cooed Stephanie, enlacing her waist. "If there ever was, he's dead."
"I wonder." ... She glanced deliberately at Cleland, then smiled:
"There was a bully romance I read in extreme youth, in which an old swashbuckler was always exclaiming: 'Courage! The devil is dead!' And since I have realized that I, also, harboured a devil, the memory of that cheery war-cry always puts me on my mettle to slay him.... It's a good fight, Jim," she added, serenely. "But a really good fight is never finished, you know. And it's better to end the story with, 'so they lived to fight happily ever after,' than to announce that the problem is solved, the romance ended for eternity."
In the pink dusk she picked her way over the dewy grass toward the porch, saying carelessly that her ancient bones resented dampness.
Stephanie, resting against the sun-dial, inhaled the sweetness of the iris and spoke of it.
"The flowers are lilac-grey, like your eyes," he said. "The scent expresses you to me—faintly sweet—a young, fresh, delicate odour—you—in terms of perfume."
"Such a poet! ... But you know one never should touch the petals of an iris.... The indiscreet imprint remains."
"Have I left any imprint?"