“No woman—yet. That doesn’t insure the future.”
“No; but I haven’t any fears.”
“That’s what I used to say, once upon a time.”
“And——?”
“I’ve grown older and wiser. But that’s a story too stupid and too common to be worth telling. You—you’re capable of sacrificing everything for a woman, for the woman; and, after all, it’s the only thing worth making sacrifices for. Venus is the only goddess worth worshipers.”
“You romantic old cynic!”
“Cynic! I wonder how that ever came to be a term of reproach? A cynic’s simply a man who has learned that impulses should be restrained by reason. Most men find that wisdom when their impulses have ceased to be temptations. Good Lord! George, I came up here to lounge, and you mislead me into talking art and philosophy. The least compensation you can offer me is—lunch. I’m hungry.”
Mortimer went off after luncheon, and Maddison was once more free to study the problem that faced him. Mortimer’s belief that he could ever be induced to throw all else aside for the love of a woman had amused him and instilled into him a spirit of dare-deviltry, of intense desire to make hot love to Marian, for whom his longing grew keener and keener—just to prove that he could play with fire without burning his fingers.
Wonder at her not coming to him was now being supplanted by anxiety lest some accident should have befallen her.
If he walked down to Kennington he would not be there until after three o’clock, not too early an hour for a call in so unfashionable a neighborhood.