His eyes softened and gleamed at the _naivete_ of the words.
"I am glad you think so. Then my heroine had, in my fancy, a mind and
soul that suited her face--pure, original, half sad, wholly sweet, full
of poetry."
She smiled as though charmed with the picture.
"Then I grew to be a youth, and then to be a man," he continued. "I
looked everywhere for my ideal among all the fair women I knew. I looked
in courts and palaces, I looked in country houses, but I could not find
her. I looked at home and abroad, I looked at all times and all seasons,
but I could not find her."
He saw a shadow come over the sweet, pure face as though she felt sorry
for him.
"So time passed, and I began to think that I should never find my ideal,
that I must give her up, when one day, quite unexpectedly, I saw her."
There was a gleam of sympathy in the blue eyes.
"I found her at last," he continued. "It was one bright June morning;
she was sitting out among the roses, ten thousand times fairer and
sweeter than they."
She looked at him with a startled glance; not the faintest idea had
occurred to her that he was speaking of her.
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