Then, having finished his cigarette, and lighted a cigar, he said: "I have a sonnet to write to the eyebrow of a lady--no, Caroline: you do not know her--and I must have perfect solitude, by the side of still water, in the moonlight.

So I am going down to the long pool; and I must on no account be interrupted.

So long." And he went quickly through the long window.
He spoke quickly and went quickly, before the duchess could suggest that he should wait a while.

She felt unequal to a tete-a-tete with her husband, and nervously she half rose.
"Oh, don't you rush away too," said the duke somewhat plaintively.
She sank back into her chair.
The duke looked at her for a while in silence with eyes full of an admiration at once gratifying and discomfiting; then he said: "I say, Caroline, can you remember what it was we first quarrelled about ?" The duchess knitted her brow in the effort to recall it, and said: "No, I can't.

Oh, yes! You grumbled at the way my hair was done." Then she added in a tone of triumph, "And I've done it exactly the same ever since; it's done like it now!" "Something must have upset me, for it looks perfectly ripping," said the duke with warm conviction.
The duchess felt herself blushing under his admiring eyes, and disliked herself very much for doing so.
She rose hastily and said: "I think I'll go into the garden." This time the duke let her go.