distance."

"And she preserves the distance," Griggs remarked. "You are not drinking
fair. My glass is empty."

Dalrymple finished his and refilled both.

"I have been here some time," he observed, half apologetically. "But as
I was saying--or rather, as you were saying--Donna Francesca preserves
the distance. These Italians do that admirably. They know the difference
between intimacy and familiarity."

"That is a nice distinction," said Griggs. "I will use it in my next
letter. No. Donna Francesca could never be familiar with any one. They
learn it when they are young, I suppose, and it becomes a
race-characteristic."

"What?" asked Dalrymple, abruptly.

"A certain graceful loftiness," answered the younger man.

The Scotchman's wrinkled eyelids contracted, and he was silent for a few
moments.

"A certain graceful loftiness," he repeated slowly. "Yes, perhaps so. A
certain graceful loftiness."

"You seem struck by the expression," said Griggs.

"I am. Drink, man, drink!" added Dalrymple, suddenly, in a different
tone. "There's no time to be lost if we mean to drink enough to hurt us
before those beggars go to bed."

"Never fear. They will be up all night. Not that it is a reason for
wasting time, as you say."

He drank his glass and watched Dalrymple as the latter did likewise,
with that deliberate intention which few but Scotchmen can maintain on
such occasions. The wine might have been poured into a quicksand, for
any effect it had as yet produced.

"Those race-characteristics of families are very curious," continued
Griggs, thoughtfully.

"Are they?" Dalrymple looked at him suspiciously.

"Very. Especially voices. They run in families, like resemblance of
features."

"So they do," answered the other, thoughtfully. "So they do."

He had of late years got into the habit of often repeating such short
phrases, in an absent-minded way.

"Yes," said Griggs. "I noticed Donna Francesca's voice, the first time I
ever heard it. It is one of those voices which must be inherited. I am
sure that all her family have spoken as she does. It reminds me of
something--of some one--"

Dalrymple raised his eyes suddenly again, as though he were irritated.

"I say," he began, interrupting his companion. "Do you feel anything?
Anything queer in your head?"

"No. Why?"

"You are talking rather disconnectedly, that is all."

"Am I? It did not strike me that I was incoherent. Probably one half of
me was asleep