passing before me, when I heard some one call my name. I turned
round, and saw Lord Murchison. We had not met since we had been at
college together, nearly ten years before, so I was delighted to
come across him again, and we shook hands warmly. At Oxford we had
been great friends. I had liked him immensely, he was so handsome,
so high-spirited, and so honourable. We used to say of him that he
would be the best of fellows, if he did not always speak the truth,
but I think we really admired him all the more for his frankness. I
found him a good deal changed. He looked anxious and puzzled, and
seemed to be in doubt about something. I felt it could not be
modern scepticism, for Murchison was the stoutest of Tories, and
believed in the Pentateuch as firmly as he believed in the House of
Peers; so I concluded that it was a woman, and asked him if he was
married yet.

'I don't understand women well enough,' he answered.

'My dear Gerald,' I said, 'women are meant to be loved, not to be
understood.'

'I cannot love where I cannot trust,' he replied.

'I believe you have a mystery in your life, Gerald,' I exclaimed;
'tell me about it.'

'Let us go for a drive,' he answered, 'it is too crowded here. No,
not a yellow carriage, any other colour--there, that dark green one
will do'; and in a few moments we were trotting down the boulevard
in the direction of the Madeleine.