LITMIR.BIZ

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      "They are evidently nobodies, from a social point of view," Lady Felicia remarked, with the pride of a long line of Disbrowes in the turn of her head towards the open window, as if dismissing a subject too unimportant for her consideration; "but I dare say the man's wealth gives him a kind of position in Rome, and even in London."

      Vera told her that Signor Provana wished to call upon her, but would not venture to do so till she had been so kind as to call upon his daughter. This was soothing.

      "I see he has not lived in London for nothing!" she said. "I will call on Miss Provana this afternoon. You must help to dress me. Lidcott has no taste."

      On this Vera was bold enough to say she had accepted an invitation to take tea with the invalid, without waiting to consult Grannie.

      "You did quite right. Great indulgence must be given to a sick child. In that case I will defer my visit till tea-time, and we will go together. I want to be friendly, rather than ceremonious."

      Vera was delighted to find Grannie unusually accommodating, and that none of those unreasonable objections and unforeseen scruples to which Grannie was subject were to interfere with her pleasure in Giulia's society.

      Pleasure? Must it not be pleasure too closely allied with pain, now that she knew the girl she was so ready to love had the fatal sign of early death upon her beauty? But at Vera's age it is natural to hope—even in the face of doom.

      "She may improve in this place. Her health may take a sudden turn for the better. God may spare her, after all, for the poor father's sake. At least I know what I have to do—to try with all my might to make her happy."

      A footman in a sober but handsome livery was hovering in the corridor when lady Felicia arrived, supported by Vera's arm, and by a cane with a long tortoiseshell crook like the Baroness Bernstein's, an amount of support which was rather a matter of state than of necessity.

      Lady Felicia had put on her favourite velvet gown and point-lace collar for the occasion. She had always two or three velvet gowns in her wardrobe, and declared that Genoa velvet was the only wear for high-bred poverty—as it looked expensive and never wore out.

      The footman flung open the tall door of Signor Canincio's best salon, and announced the ladies.

      The Provana salon was startling in its afternoon glory. The three long windows were open to the sunshine, which in most people's rooms would have been excluded at this hour. The balcony was full of choice flowers in turquoise and celadon vases from Vallauris. The luxury of satin pillows overflowing sofas and arm-chairs, the Dresden cups and saucers, and silver urn and tea-tray, the three dogs running about with their ribbons and bells, the gaudy cockatoo screaming on his perch, Giulia's blue silk tea-gown, and Miss Thompson's mauve cashmere, all lighted to splendour by the glory of the western sky, made a confusion of colour that almost blinded Lady Felicia.

      Provana received her with grave courtesy, and led her to his daughter's sofa. She bent over Giulia with an affectionate greeting, and then, sinking into the arm-chair to which Provana led her, begged somewhat piteously that the sunshine might be moderated a little, a request that Provana hastened to obey, closing the heavy Venetian shutters with his own hands.

      "Giulia and I are too fond of our sun-bath," he said, "and we are apt to forget that everybody does not like being dazzled."

      "I came to San Marco for the sun, and it is seldom that I get enough; but your salon is just a little dazzling." "And your dogs are more than a little intrusive," Lady Felicia would have liked to add, the spaniels having taken a fancy to her tortoiseshell cane and velvet skirt. One had jumped upon her lap, and the other two were disputing possession of her cane. Serviceable Miss Thompson was quick to the rescue, carried off the dogs, and restored the cane to its place by the visitor's chair, while Provana brought an olive-wood table to Lady Felicia's elbow, and stood ready to bring her tea-cup.

      "I hope you are pleased with San Marco," said Grannie, not soaring above the normal conversation in the hotel.

      "We think it quite delightful so far," Provana replied, and Vera noticed that he never expressed an opinion without including his daughter. It was always "We," or "Giulia and I," and there was generally a glance in Giulia's direction which emphasised the reference to her.

      "I love—love—love the place already," cried Giulia, who had beckoned Vera to her sofa, and was holding her hand. "Most of all because I have found this sweet friend here. You will let us be friends, won't you, cara Grannie?"

      "Carissima mia!" murmured her father reprovingly.

      "Please don't let us be ceremonious in this desert island of a place," said Lady Felicia, with a graciousness that was new to Vera. "I like to be called Grannie, and I can be Grannie to the Signorina as well as to this girl of my own flesh and blood. You can hardly doubt, Signor Provana, that it is pleasant for me to find that my poor Vera has now a sweet girl friend in this hotel, where we have lived three months and hardly made an acquaintance, much less a friend."

      "But it has been your own fault, Grannie!" interposed Vera, who was essentially truthful. "People really tried to be kind to us when we were strangers."

      "If you mean that some of the people were odiously pushing and officious, I cannot contradict you!" replied the descendant of the Disbrowes, with ineffable scorn.

      But Grannie was not scornful in her demeanour towards the Roman financier. To him, and to Giulia, she was Grannie in her most urbane and sympathetic mood. She was charmed to find him so much of an Englishman.

      "My mother was English to the core of her heart. She was the daughter of a colonial merchant, whose offices were in Mincing Lane, and his home in Lavender Sweep. I am told there is no such thing as Lavender Sweep now," Provana went on regretfully, "but when I was a boy, my grandfather's garden was in the country, and there were gardens all about it."

      "And fields of lavender," said Giulia. "Oh, do say that there were fields of lavender!"

      "No, the lavender fields had gone far away into Kent. Only the name was left; and now there are streets of shabby houses, and shops, and not a vestige of garden."

      Encouraged by Lady Felicia's urbanity, Signor Provana went on to tell her that he was plebeian on both sides, and that all there was of nobility about him belonged to Giulia.

      "My wife came of one of the noblest families in Italy," he said, "and when we want to tease Giulia, we call her Contessina, a title to which she has a right, but which always makes her angry."

      "I don't want to be better than my father!" Giulia cried eagerly. "If he is not a noble, he comes of a line of good and gifted men. My grandfather's name is revered in Rome, and his charitable works remain behind him, to show that if he was one of the cleverest Roman citizens, he had a heart as fine as his brain. That is the noblest kind of nobility—non è vero, Grannie?"

      Grannie smiled assent, and entertained a poor opinion of Giulia's intellect. A shallow creature, spoilt by overmuch indulgence, and inclined to presume. The two girls were sitting in the sun by an open window, a long way off. They had their own table, and Miss Thompson waited upon them with assiduity. Grannie had been warned that there was to be no doleful talk, no thinly-disguised pity for the consumptive girl. All was to be as bright as the room full of flowers and the untempered sunshine.

      Provana told Lady Felicia that he had ordered a landau from Genoa, which had arrived that afternoon.

      "The horses are strong, and used to hill work, and there is an extra pair for difficult roads," he said. "Giulia and I mean to see everything interesting that can be seen between breakfast and sundown. Of course we must be indoors before sunset. Everybody must in this treacherous climate. I hope Miss Davis may be allowed to go with us sometimes, indeed often!"

      "Always, Padre mio, always!" cried Giulia from her distant sofa. She had begun to listen when her father talked of the carriage. "Vera is to come with us always. You will let her come, won't you, cara Grannie?"

      "Please don't ask her," Vera said dutifully. "That would be deserting Grannie. She likes

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