THE LOVE OF MONSIEUR
him what he wished. Now he wondered at the singular distaste which grew at the very thought of the life that had been. With such a fortune and such a name there were no favors or honors he could not buy. He would know how to win his way again. But his spirit was listless at the thought. With the joy at his freedom from the cloud of his birth his pleasure ended. The estates, his titles and honors, dwelt so little in his mind that he marveled again at his change of disposition. He could go to London. But at what cost! Summon the goddesses of his past as he might, their essenced wiles and specious blandishing, distance gave them no added charm. He could only see this pale, proud woman, with a rare and imperturbable honesty which showed how justly she had worn the honors she relinquished, in a pure nobility which brought a flush to his cheek, giving up without a qualm or faltering the life and habits, the high condition, to which she had been born and in which she had been so carefully nurtured. Could he go back to London to leave this woman a wanderer, a servant, whose only hope even
224
