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"Stephen, how late is it?" I asked Wiazeski.

"It will soon be midnight. Our friends are not coming, it would seem. Are you in a hurry to get home?"

"I never am; I have got a latch-key, and so wake nobody when I come in. But are you not yourself sometimes engaged of an evening?"

He shook his head, his teeth shining good-humouredly in a friendly smile.

"You know perfectly well that there is not an assignation I would not set aside to spend an evening with you. To me, friendship is a boon far rarer and far more precious than love."

"I do not hold with you at all. I have enough of the cold consideration granted me by the world."

Stephen smiled again.

"There is no help for it, Janka," he said. "Men of our times are too weakly to love an all-around woman: the very thought of one gives them an unpleasant shock. The day for types of women so extremely complex as you are has now gone by; at present women are preferred who display some very distinct and