inted to some diplomatic position over here?"

"There are none in our service. You wouldn't want me to sink myself in
some absurd social functions, which are called by that name, merely to
become the envy and hatred of a few rich republicans, like your friends
who haunt foreign courts?"

"That's not a pretty speech--but I suppose I invited THAT too. Don't
apologize. I'd rather see you flare out like that than pay
compliments. Yet I fancy you're a diplomatist, for all that."

"You did me the honor to believe I was one once, when I was simply the
most palpable ass and bungler living," said Paul bitterly.

She was still sweetly silent, apparently preoccupied in smoothing out
the mane of her walking horse. "Did I?" she said softly. He drew
close beside her.

"How different the vegetation is here from what it is with us!" she
said with nervous quickness, directing his attention to the grass road
beneath them, without lifting her eyes. "I don't mean what is
cultivated,--for I suppose it takes centuries to make the lawns they
have in England,--but even here the blades of grass seem to press
closer together, as if they were crowded or overpopulated, like the
country; and this forest, which has been always wild and was a hunting
park, has a blase look, as if it was already tired of the unchanging
traditions and monotony around it. I think over there Nature affects
and influences us: here, I fancy, it is itself affected by the people."

"I think a good deal of Nature comes over from America for that
purpose," he said dryly.

"And I think you are breaking your promise--besides being a goose!" she
retorted smartly. Nevertheless, for some occult reason they both
seemed relieved by this exquisite witticism, and trotted on amicably
together. When Paul lifted his eyes to hers he could see that they
were suffused with a tender mischief, as of a reproving yet secretly
admiring sister, and her strangely delicate complexion had taken on
itself that faint Alpine glow that was more of an illumination than a
color. "There," she said gayly, pointing with her whip as the wood
opened upon a glade through which the parted trees showed a long blue
curvature of distant hills, "you see that white thing lying like a
snowdrift on the hills?"

"Or the family washing on a hedge."

"As you please. Well, that is the villa."

"And you were very happy there?" said Paul, watching her girlishly
animated face.

"Yes; and as you don't a