he cushions had shut her eyes.

The daughter of the Droitwiches desired to go to sleep.

It was not for him, by remaining, to prevent her.

Chapter 16

And so the second week began, and all was harmony. The arrival
of Mr. Wilkins, instead of, as three of the party had feared and the
fourth had only been protected from fearing by her burning faith in the
effect on him of San Salvatore, disturbing such harmony as there was,
increased it. He fitted in. He was determined to please, and he did
please. He was most amiable to his wife--not only in public, which she
was used to, but in private, when he certainly wouldn't have been if he
hadn't wanted to. He did want to. He was so much obliged to her, so
much pleased with her, for making him acquainted with Lady Caroline,
that he felt really fond of her. Also proud; for there must be, he
reflected, a good deal more in her than he had supposed, for Lady
Caroline to have become so intimate with her and so affectionate. And
the more he treated her as though she were really very nice, the more
Lotty expanded and became really very nice, and the more he, affected
in his turn, became really very nice himself; so that they went round
and round, not in a vicious but in a highly virtuous circle.

Positively, for him, Mellersh petted her. There was at no time
much pet in Mellersh, because he was by nature a cool man; yet such was
the influence on him of, as Lotty supposed, San Salvatore, that in this
second week he sometimes pinched both her ears, one after the other,
instead of only one; and Lotty, marveling at such rapidly developing
affectionateness, wondered what he would do, should he continue at this
rate, in the third week, when her supply of ears would have come to an
end.

He was particularly nice about the washstand, and genuinely
desirous of not taking up too much of the space in the small bedroom.
Quick to respond, Lotty was even more desirous not to be in his way;
and the room became the scene of many an affectionate combat de
generosite, each of which left them more pleased with each other than
ever. He did not again have a bath in the bathroom, though it was
mended and ready for him, but got up and went down every morning to the
sea, and in spite of the cool nights making the water cold early had
his dip as a man should, and came up to breakfast rubbing his hands and
feeling, as he told Mrs. Fisher, prepared for anything.

Lotty's belief in the irr