“Come, come,” she said, “you do not love me.”

He protested.

“Ah!” she cried triumphantly, “how many sonnets would you give for me? If you were a usurer in gold instead of in rhyme, I would ask how many dollars. But it is unjust to pay in a coin that we value little. To a man starving in gold mines, a piece of bread weighs more than all the treasures of the earth. To you, I warrant your poems are the standard of appreciation. How many would you give for me? One, two, three?”

“More.”

“Because you think love would repay you with compound interest,” she observed merrily.

He laughed.

And when love turns to laughter the danger is passed for the moment.