Freydis was clad in scarlet completely, and, as has been said, a golden
panther was talking to her when Dom Manuel came in. She at once
dismissed the beast, which smiled amicably at Dom Manuel, and then
arched high its back in the manner of all the cat tribe, and so
flattened out into a thin transparent goldness, and, flickering,
vanished upward as a flame leaves a lampwick.
"Well, well, you bade me come to you, dear friend, when I had need of
you," says Manuel, very cordially shaking hands, "and nobody's need
could be more great than mine."
"Different people have different needs," Freydis replied, rather
gravely, "but all passes in this world."
"Friendship, however, does not pass, I hope."
She answered slowly: "It is we who pass, so that the young Manuel whom I
loved in a summer that is gone, is nowadays as perished as that summer's
gay leaves. What, grizzled fighting-man, have you to do with that young
Manuel who had comeliness and youth and courage, but no human pity and
no constant love? and why should I be harboring his lighthearted
mischiefs against you? Ah, no, gray Manuel, you are quite certain no
woman would do that; and people say you are shrewd.
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