Yours as long as you desire it,
Lucio Rimanez.
I laughed over this letter and showed it to my wife, who did not laugh. She read it through with a closeness of attention that somewhat surprised me, and when she laid it down there was a strange look of pain in her eyes.
"How he despises us all!" she said slowly. "What scorn underlies his words! Do you not recognise it ?''
"He was always a cynic," I replied indifferently. "I never expect him to be anything else."
"He seems to know some of the ways of the women who are coming here," she went on in the same musing accents. "It is as if he read their thoughts, and perceived their intentions at a distance."
Her brows knitted frowningly, and she seemed for some time absorbed in gloomy meditation. But I did not pursue the subject,—I was too i
