greedy profile of the adventurer. Wyant,
in musing on the Italian portrait-medals of the fifteenth century, had
often fancied that only in that period of fierce individualism could
types so paradoxical have been produced; yet the subtle craftsmen who
committed them to the bronze had never drawn a face more strangely
stamped with contradictory passions than that of Doctor Lombard.

"I am glad to see you," he said to Wyant, extending a hand which seemed
a mere framework held together by knotted veins. "We lead a quiet life
here and receive few visitors, but any friend of Professor Clyde's is
welcome." Then, with a gesture which included the two women, he added
dryly: "My wife and daughter often talk of Professor Clyde."

"Oh yes--he used to make me such nice toast; they don't understand toast
in Italy," said Mrs. Lombard in a high plaintive voice.

It would have been difficult, from Doctor Lombard's manner and
appearance to guess his nationality; but his wife was so inconsciently
and ineradicably English that even the silhouette of her cap seemed a
protest against Continental laxities. She was a stout fair woman, with
pale cheeks netted with red lines. A brooch with a miniature portrait
sustained a bogwood watch-chain upon her bosom, and at her elbow lay a
heap of knitting and an old copy of The Queen.

The young girl, who had remained standing, was a slim replica of her
mother, with an apple-cheeked face and opaque blue eyes. Her small head
was prodigally laden with braids of dull fair hair, and she might have
had a kind of transient prettiness but for the sullen droop of her round
mouth. It was hard to say whether her expression implied ill-temper or
apathy; but Wyant was struck by the contrast between the fierce vitality
of the doctor's age and the inanimateness of his daughter's youth.

Seating himself in the chair which his host advanced, the young man
tried to open the conversation by addressing to Mrs. Lombard some random
remark on the beauties of Siena. The lady murmured a resigned assent,
and Doctor Lombard interposed with a smile: "My dear sir, my wife
considers Siena a most salubrious spot, and is favorably impressed by
the cheapness of the marketing; but she deplores the total absence of
muffins and cannel coal, and cannot resign herself to the Italian method
of dusting furniture."

"But they don't, you know--they don't dust it!" Mrs. Lombard protested,
without showing any resentment of her husband's mann