human and sympathetic. Though she had pronounced
herself to be starving, after all she was satisfied with very little.
Having finished, she leaned her elbows on the table, and gazed out of
the long window close by, at the rain which continued to fall in wicked
black streaks against a clearing, sunset sky. "It's like the stripes on
a tawny snake," she said, "or on a tiger's back. This isn't a proper
Riviera day. And the mountains of Italy have put powder on their
foreheads and noses. While it's rained down here, it's been snowing on
the heights. As my French maid used to say, 'I think the weather's in
train to rearrange itself.'"

"Never mind the weather," said Jim. "Tell me about the 'other part.'
You've excited my curiosity."

"I meant to. But talking of the weather draws people together, don't you
think? just as the thought of tea does in England and dear old
Scotland. Everybody everywhere having tea at the same time, you know,
and the same feelings and thoughts. It's different abroad or in America.
Tea's more like an accident than an institution."

"Never mind talking of tea, either."

"I'll talk about you, then."

"I want to talk about you--and what's going to become of you to-night."

"Only think, if I'd arrived to-morrow, I should have been too late!"

"Too late for what?"

"For the _other part_. You'd have been gone. But Fate's always kind to
me. It made me come just in time."

"Tell me, then--about that other part. Do you want my advice?"

"Not exactly advice."

She looked at him across the little table, through the twilight. A
sudden fire leaped up in his eyes, which usually looked coldly at life
as if he had resigned himself to let its best things pass him by.

"Peter! You don't mean--you can't mean----"

"Do you want me to mean it?--Do you want me----"

"Want you? I've wanted nothing else since before you were out of short
frocks, but----"

"Then why didn't you tell me so before I put them on? I was--oh, Jim, I
was _dying_ to hear it. I was afraid you didn't care in that way, that
you thought me a silly child always. That's why I went back to stay in
the convent, to try and find peace, and forget. But when I heard about
Mary and her love, I couldn't bear it there any longer. I hoped that
perhaps, after all--and when I came to-day and you looked at me, I knew
for certain. I felt so brave, and I made up my mind to propose, for I
was sure _you_ wouldn't. It's leap year, anyhow."

They were s