My master--but I am not at liberty to tell you who has taught me the little I know." "Well, whoever he is I should be glad to have lessons from him." "But you'll never get them." "Why ?" "Because." "A woman's ultimatum." "As good as a man's!" she bridled prettily; "and sometimes better--at the foils for example.

Vous--comprenez, n'est ce pas ?" He laughed heartily.
"Yes, your point reaches me," he said, "but sperat et in saeva victus gladiatur arena, as the old Latin poet wisely remarks." The quotation was meant to tease her.
"Yes, Montaigne translated that or something in his book," she commented with prompt erudition.

"I understand it." Beverley looked amazed.
"What do you know about Montaigne ?" he demanded with a blunt brevity amounting to something like gruffness.
"Sh', Monsieur, not too loud," she softly protested, looking around to see that neither Madame Roussillon nor Jean had followed them into the main room.

"It is not permitted that I read that old book; but they do not hide it from me, because they think I can't make out its dreadful spelling." She smiled so that her cheeks drew their dimples deep into the delicately tinted pink-and-brown, where wind and sun and wholesome exercise had set the seal of absolute health, and took from a niche in the logs of the wall a stained and dog-eared volume.

He looked, and it was, indeed, the old saint and sinner, Montaigne.
Involuntarily he ran his eyes over the girl from head to foot, comparing her show of knowledge with the outward badges of abject rusticity, and even wildness, with which she was covered.
"Well," he said, "you are a mystery." "You think it surprising that I can read a book! Frankly I can't understand half of this one.