ran into the mouth, like wine, she would refuse to
stir from the drawing-room, saying that she was an old thing, and no fit
companion for a hearty girl.

"Miss Lavish has led your cousin astray. She hopes to find the true
Italy in the wet I believe."

"Miss Lavish is so original," murmured Lucy. This was a stock remark,
the supreme achievement of the Pension Bertolini in the way of
definition. Miss Lavish was so original. Mr. Beebe had his doubts, but
they would have been put down to clerical narrowness. For that, and for
other reasons, he held his peace.

"Is it true," continued Lucy in awe-struck tone, "that Miss Lavish is
writing a book?"

"They do say so."

"What is it about?"

"It will be a novel," replied Mr. Beebe, "dealing with modern Italy.
Let me refer you for an account to Miss Catharine Alan, who uses words
herself more admirably than any one I know."

"I wish Miss Lavish would tell me herself. We started such friends. But
I don't think she ought to have run away with Baedeker that morning in
Santa Croce. Charlotte was most annoyed at finding me practically alone,
and so I couldn't help being a little annoyed with Miss Lavish."

"The two ladies, at all events, have made it up."

He was interested in the sudden friendship between women so apparently
dissimilar as Miss Bartlett and Miss Lavish. They were always in each
other's company, with Lucy a slighted third. Miss Lavish he believed
he understood, but Miss Bartlett might reveal unknown depths of
strangeness, though not perhaps, of meaning. Was Italy deflecting
her from the path of prim chaperon, which he had assigned to her at
Tunbridge Wells? All his life he had loved to study maiden ladies;
they were his specialty, and his profession had provided him with ample
opportunities for the work. Girls like Lucy were charming to look at,
but Mr. Beebe was, from rather profound reasons, somewhat chilly in his
attitude towards the other sex, and preferred to be interested rather
than enthralled.

Lucy, for the third time, said that poor Charlotte would be sopped. The
Arno was rising in flood, washing away the traces of the little carts
upon the foreshore. But in the south-west there had appeared a dull haze
of yellow, which might mean better weather if it did not mean worse. She
opened the window to inspect, and a cold blast entered the room, drawing
a plaintive cry from Miss Catharine Alan, who entered at the same moment
by the door.

"Oh, dear Mis