We scrambled up into the
heart of the ruin and sat for an hour in one of the crumbling old courts.
Something in the solemn stillness of the place unloosed my tongue; and
while she sat on an ivied stone, on the edge of the plunging wall, I
stood there and made a speech. She listened to me, looking at me,
breaking off little bits of stone and letting them drop down into the
valley. At last she got up and nodded at me two or three times silently,
with a smile, as if she were applauding me for a solo on the violin. 'You
are in love,' she said. 'It's a perfect case!' And for some time she
said nothing more. But before we left the place she told me that she
owed me an answer to my speech. She thanked me heartily, but she was
afraid that if she took me at my word she would be taking advantage of my
inexperience. I had known few women; I was too easily pleased; I thought
her better than she really was. She had great faults; I must know her
longer and find them out; I must compare her with other women--women
younger, simpler, more innocent, more ignorant; and then if I still did
her the honour to think well of her, she would listen to me again. I
told her that I was not afraid of preferring any woman in the world to
her, and then she repeated, 'Happy man, happy man! you are in love, you
are in love!'"
I called upon Madame Blumenthal a couple of days later, in some agitation
of thought.
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