sarcasm?" I whispered.

"No, it's pure delight," said Mr. Barrymore. "They've done the best
day's work of the season, and they don't mind our knowing it--now it's
over."

"Human nature is strange," I reflected.

"Especially in antiquarians," he replied.

But we arrived at the hotel feeling weak, and were thankful for tea.

XXII

A CHAPTER BEYOND THE MOTOR ZONE

We all felt when we had said good-bye to Venice that we had a definite
object in view, and there was to be no more pleasant dawdling. It was ho
for Schloss Hrvoya! Aunt Kathryn had suddenly discovered that she was
impatient to see the ancient root from which blossomed her cherished
title, and nothing must delay her by the way.

I should have wondered at her change of mood, and at the Prince's new
enthusiasm for the Dalmatian trip--which, until our arrival in Venice,
he'd tried to discourage--but Beechy explained frankly as usual. It
seemed that Count Corramini (said by Prince Dalmar-Kalm to possess vast
funds of legal knowledge) had intimated that the Countess Dalmar-Kalm
was not rightfully a Countess until every penny was paid for the estate
carrying the title. That same day, without waiting to be asked, she had
given the Prince a cheque for the remaining half of the money. Now if
she finds scarce one stone left upon another at Schloss Hrvoya, she
can't cry off her bargain, so it's easy to understand why the Prince is
no longer anxious. Exactly why he should seem so eager to get us to our
destination is more of a puzzle; but perhaps, as Beechy thinks, it's
because he hopes to influence Aunt Kathryn to rebuild. And certainly he
has influenced her in some way, for she could hardly wait to leave
Venice at the last.

We went as we had come, by water, for we wouldn't condescend to the
railway; and at the landing-place for Mestre our grey automobile stood
waiting for us, so well-cared for and polished that it might just have
come from the makers, instead of having charged at full tilt "up the
airy mountains and down the rushy glens" of half Europe.

It was goddess-like to be in the car again, yet I regretted Venice as
I've regretted no other place I ever saw. Even when there, it seemed too
beautiful to be real, but when we lost sight of its fair towers and
domes, in bowling northward along a level road, I grew sadly convinced
that Venice was a fairy dream.

We saw nothing to console us for what we had lost (though the scenery
had a soft and mela