She fills youth with a great horror and with a great fear.

He dare not kiss her any more.

And then, perhaps, at last he prays, "Deliver me from this bondage!" And he thinks that he knows his mistress.

But, happy or sad, does he ever quite know her?
Is she not always a mystery, this life, a sphinx who jealously guards a great secret?
His evening with the two boys, for so the doctor called them in his thoughts, had set him musing thus definitely.

Was there not a wonder and a secret in their dual life of friendship?
For is not the potent influence of one soul over another one of the marvels of time?
The doctor loved Valentine as a human saint loves another saint.