severe blow on the chest, which brought a little blood to my lips, and
for the time I suffered. Had it not been for the faintness under which I
was laboring I could not have failed to identify you. But you are
generous enough to forgive this oversight I am convinced."

"Oh, surely! it was most natural under the circumstances. I have a habit
of fixing faces at a glance that is rather uncommon, I believe. I never
forget any one I have seen even for a moment, or where I have seen them,
or even a name I have heard."

"A royal gift truly, one of the secrets of popularity, I believe. It is
not so with me usually, though when my eye once drinks in a face" (and
he looked steadily at mine while he spoke those words slowly, as if
wrapped in contemplation), "it never departs again. 'A thing of beauty
is a joy forever,' you know, Miss Monfort." He sighed slightly.

"Yes, that line has passed into an axiom, the only sensible one, I
believe, by-the-by, that Keats ever wrote," I laughed.

"Oh, you do Keats injustice. Have you studied him, Miss Monfort?"

"Studied poetry? What an idea! No, but I have tried to read him, and
failed. I think he had a very crude, chaotic mind indeed; I like more
clearness."

"Clearness and shallowness most often go together," he observed. "When
you see the pebbles at the bottom of a stream, most likely its waters
are not deep."

"Yet, you can stir up mud with a long pole in the pool more readily than