“I love to hear you say so,” she confessed.

“Out there,” he continued, “the whole show was hideous from beginning to end, a ghastly, terrible drama, played out amongst all the accompaniments which make hell out of earth.  And yet the thing gripped.  The tragedy of Ypres came and I escaped from the hospital.”

“You were not fit to go.  They all said that.”

“I couldn’t help it,” he answered.  “The guns were there, calling, and one forgot.  I’ve been back to England three times since then, and each time one thought was foremost in my mind—­’shall I meet Sister Josephine?’”

“But you never even made enquiries,” she reminded him.  “At my hospital I made it a strict rule that our names in civil life were never mentioned or divulged, but afterwards you could have found out.”

He touched her left hand very lightly, lingered for a moment on her fourth finger.

“It was the ring,” he said.  “I knew that you were married, and somehow, knowing that, I desired to know no more.  I suppose that sounds rather like a cry from Noah’s Ark, but I couldn’t help it.  I just felt like that.”

“And now you probably know a good deal about me,” she remarked, with a rather sad smile.  “I have been married nine years.  I gather that you know my husband by name and repute.”

“Your husband is associated with a man whom I have always considered my enemy,” he said.

“My husband’s friends are not my friends,” she rejoined, a little bitterly, “nor does he take me into his confidence as regards his business exploits.”

“Then what does it matter?” he asked.  “I should never have sought you out, for the reason I have given you, but since we have met you will not refuse me your friendship?  You will let me come and see you?”

She laughed softly.

“I shall be very unhappy if you do not.  Come to-morrow afternoon to tea at five o’clock.  There will be no one else there, and we can talk of those times on the beach at Etaples.  You were rather a pessimist in those days.”

“It seems ages ago,” he replied.  “To-day, at any rate, I feel differently.  I knew when I glanced at Lady Amesbury’s card this morning that something was going to happen.  I went to that stupid garden party all agog for adventure.”

“Am I the adventure?” she asked lightly.

He made no immediate answer, turning his head, however, and studying her with a queer, impersonal deliberation.  She was wearing a smoke-coloured muslin gown and a black hat with gracefully arranged feathers.  For a moment the weariness had passed from her face and she was a very beautiful woman.  Her features were delicately shaped, her eyes rather deep-set.  She had a long, graceful neck, and resting upon her throat, fastened by a thin platinum chain, was a single sapphire.  There was about her just that same delicate femininity, that exquisite aroma of womanliness and tender sexuality which had impressed him so much upon their first meeting.  She was more wonderful even than his dreams, this rather tired woman of fashion whose coming had been so surprising.  He would have answered her question lightly but he found it impossible.  A great part of his success in life had been due to his inspiration.  He knew perfectly well that she was to be the adventure of his life.