“She would have to modify them utterly,” said John.  “Six hundred a year is poverty even for a single man.  For a married couple it would be beggary.  She would have to live like the wife of a petty employe.  She would have to travel second class and stay at fourth-rate hotels.  She would have to turn her old dresses and trim her own bonnets.  She would have to do without a maid.  And all this means that she would have virtually to renounce her caste, to give up the society of her equals, who demand a certain scale of appearances, and to live among pariahs or to live in isolation.  Don’t you think a man would be a monster of selfishness to exact such sacrifices?”

“Oh, some men have excessively far-fetched and morbid notions of honour,” said she.

“Do you think the Princess, with all this brought to her attention, would ever dream of consenting?”

“Women in love are weak—­they will consent to almost anything,” said she, her dark eyes smiling for an instant into his.

Why didn’t he take her in his arms?  Hope deferred maketh the heart sick, but to defer the consummation of a joy assured (observes the Persian poet) giveth the heart a peculiar sweet excitement.

“Well,” said John.  “I’m glad to think she is weak; but I’ll never ask my wife to consent to anything so unpleasant.  A Princess and a future peeress, living on six hundred pounds a year!  It’s unheard of.”

She looked at him, puzzled, incredulous.

“Oh—?  Can you possibly mean—­that you will—­take back your condition?”

“Yes,” said he, humbly.  “Who am I to make conditions?”

“You will let her spend as much of her own money as she likes?” she wondered, wide-eyed.

“As a lover of thrift, I shall deprecate extravagance,” said John.  “But as a submissive husband, I shall let her do in all things as her fancy dictates.”

“Well,” marvelled she, “here is a surprise—­here is a volte-face indeed.”

And she looked at the city in the sky, and appeared to turn things over.

John was mysteriously chuckling.

“Haven’t you your opinion,” he asked, “of men who eat their words and put their scruples in their pockets?”

“I don’t understand,” said she, looking wild.  “There is, of course, some joke.”

“There is a joke, indeed,” said he; “the joke is that I’m ten times richer than I told you I was.”

She started back, and fixed him with a glance.

“Then all that about your being poor was only humbug?” There was reproach in her voice, I’m not sure there wasn’t disappointment.

“No,” said he, “it was the exact and literal truth.  But I have come into a modest competency over-night.”

“I don’t understand,” said she.

“My own part in the story is a sufficiently inglorious one,” said he.  “I’m the benefactee.  Lady Blanchemain and my uncle have put their heads together, and endowed me.  I feel rather small at letting them, but it enables me to look my affianced boldly in the money-eye.”