"_I_ refer." He had lifted the lid of his little box and he looked into it hard.

"Do you mean by that then that you would be free-- ?" "'Free'-- ?" "To offer me something ?" This gave her a longer pause, and when she spoke again she might have seemed, oddly, to be addressing the dealer.

"Would you allow me-- ?" "No," said the Prince into his little box.
"You wouldn't accept it from me ?" "No," he repeated in the same way.
She exhaled a long breath that was like a guarded sigh.

"But you've touched an idea that HAS been mine.

It's what I've wanted." Then she added: "It was what I hoped." He put down his box--this had drawn his eyes.