I.

The Lamp

Darkness enveloped us. I led her under a street-lamp of wrought iron from which hung suspended a round white moon which shone upon her unreal beauty. She turned her hurt eyes away from the hard light, and rested them upon an electric sign overhead which, flashing in and out, read:

“Don’t tell your age. Murine your eyes.”

Sign, if you are a lie, you must be broken. But if you tell the truth, you may increase the ecstasy of our manufactured passion.