y pupil; and I must say it made me love you the better.
It is perhaps the secret which draws the love of others toward you,
without their knowing why, though it has caused life to jar on you
often, no doubt, and may again. You would not, perhaps, have fallen into
the mistake by which you hurt yourself and this dear child if you had
not been old-fashioned. Don't you see that?"

"I suppose it is old-fashioned to have an ideal," Vanno admitted,
laughing a little.

"Yes. And most old-fashioned of all, even I can see, are your ideas of
women. So it is well you have fallen in love with one who is not
modern."

"I know she is the Only Woman. But I grant that I may have picked up
some Eastern ideas of what a woman's life ought to be. I must get rid of
them, I suppose."

"You didn't 'pick those ideas up,' my son. They were in your blood. All
the same, you may get rid of a few--a very few--with advantage. And
safely too, because you are going to have an old-fashioned girl for your
wife."

"I'm going to have her very soon, I hope," Vanno added, in a different
tone.

Mary spoke not a word; and he did not press her then for an answer. But
when the sudden darkness of the southern evening had warned them that
it was time to go, he began in the same strain again, after they had
left the tunnelled streets of the rock-village. It was so dark that
Vanno had the excuse of saving Mary a stumble on the rough cobblestones,
as they went slowly down the mule path. He held her tightly, his arm
around her waist. She walked bareheaded, trailing her hat in her hand;
and the warm perfume of her hair came to him like the scent of some
hitherto unknown flower, sweeter than any other fragrance that the
evening dew distilled. "I want you to be my wife very soon," he said. "I
must have you. And if you're as old-fashioned as the cure thinks, you
won't say no to me when I tell you that. Shall he marry us?"

"Oh--that would mean it must be _dreadfully_ soon!"

"Is there a 'dreadfully?' But--there's one thing, dearest, that I almost
forgot. I must write to my father. Not that anything he could say would
make any difference now; only I want him to love you, and our marriage
to bring him happiness, not pain, even in the thought of it before he
sees you. My brother Angelo has married lately, and he didn't let our
father know till just before the thing was done. Perhaps it was not his
fault. I can't tell as to that: there must have been a strong reason