"What have we been talking about all to-night?" asks Eleanor, with a puzzled frown, and a smile which counteracts it. "So much was frivolous and foolish I cannot remember."
"Yet every word is hidden in some secret cell of your brain. Oh, that the secret cells could be opened and revealed to our nearest and dearest. What countless forgotten treasures might be restored."
"Or what ill-spoken words and evil quarrels revived," adds Eleanor wisely.
"Thus speaks a guilty conscience," he retorts. "I could sum up my life on a sheet of foolscap. 'Preface; apparent folly, covering intents and purposes. A boyhood of ambition, a manhood of misfortune.'"
"Misfortune!"
"Yes, since I grew to realise facts, to see men and women as they are, not as they appear! Sometimes the bare word 'reality' fills me with such loathing for this paltry world, with its pigmy minds and soulless bodies, that I can hardly control my contempt. I pull myself together, and pray for a new set of nerves, a stronger heart, and a better flow of healthy blood to the brain."
"What a pity that nerves cannot be purchased like false teeth," says Eleanor laughing.
"Nerves are the finest satire on our human organisation, and our bodies, each a theatre of perpetual activity, the most confusing mystery of all. I believe in a dual nature existing in men and women, but the difficulties which bar our progress to perfect knowledge of each other cannot be overcome."
"Things that can't be understood are invariably irritating," sighs Eleanor.
"Some day we will think it out together," he whispers, waving her fan gently. "We shall meet again, Mrs. Roche"—speaking confidently—"for have we not a mutual friend in Mrs. Mounteagle, whom I regret is not here to-night?"