"But surely," she said, "you cannot be so foolish--you, a man now--to
think that the fancy you took to a pretty face, for it could have been
nothing more, was of any importance."
"Such fancies make or mar the lives of men."
"Of unprincipled fools, yes--of men who care for appearance more than
sympathy. But you are not such a man! It is not as if we had been
friends; it is not as if we had ever spoken. It is wicked to call such a
foolish fancy by the name of love; it is desecration."
While she was speaking, her words revealed to Caius, with swift
analysis, a distinction that he had not made before. He knew now that
before he came to this island, before he had gone through the three
months of toil and suffering with Josephine Le Maitre, it would truly
have been foolish to think of his sentiment concerning her as more than
a tender ideal. Now, that which had surprised him into a strength of
love almost too great to be in keeping with his character, was the unity
of two beings whom he had believed to be distinct--the playmate and the
saint.
"Whether the liking we take to a beautiful face be base or noble
depends, madame, upon the face; and no man could see yours without being
a better man for the sight. But think: when I saw the face that had been
enshrined for years in my memory yesterday, was it the face of a woman
whom I did not know--with whom I had never spoken?" He was not looking
at her as he spoke.
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