De Fronsac flicked his cigarette ash. "You remind me," he said, "how
much I need a love affair; my sensibilities should be stimulated. To
continue to write with fervour I require to adore again."

"It is very easy to adore," observed Pitou.

"Not at forty," lamented the other; "especially to a man in Class A.
Don't forget, my young friend, that I have loved and been loved
persistently for twenty-three years. I cannot adore a repetition, and
it is impossible for me to discover a new type."

"All of which I understand," said Pitou, "excepting 'Class A.'"

"There are three kinds of men," explained the poet. "Class A are the
men to whom women inevitably surrender. Class B consists of those whom
they trust by instinct and confide in on the second day; these men
acquire an extensive knowledge of the sex--but they always fall short
of winning the women for themselves. Class C women think of merely as
'the others'--they do not count; eventually they marry, and try to
persuade their wives that they were devils of fellows when they were
young. However, such reflections will not assist me to finish my
causerie, for I wrote them all last week."

"Talking of women," remarked Pitou, "a little blonde has come to live
opposite our lodging. So far we have only bowed from our windows, but I
have christened her 'Lynette,' and Tricotrin has made a poem about her.
It is pathetic. The last verse--the others are not written yet--goes:

"'O window I watched in the days that are dead,
Are you watched by a lover to-day?