returning to the hotel, Brian found that his chances for that
day were over for all the afternoon Erica had to receive a constant
succession of visitors who, as she said, turned her father for the time
being into the "British lion." In the evening, too, when they walked in
the Cascine, they were no longer alone. Raeburn went with then, and as
they paced along the broad avenue with the Arno gleaming through the
fresh green of the trees, talking of the discussions of the past week,
he inadvertently touched the note of pain in an otherwise cloudless day.

"The work is practically over now," he said. "But I think I must take
a day or two to see a little of Florence. I must be at Salsburg to
meet Hasenbalg by Wednesday week. Can you be ready to leave here on
Wednesday, Eric?"

"Oh, yes, father," she said without hesitation or comment but with
something in her voice which told Brian that she, too, felt a pang of
regret at the thought that their days in that city of golden dreams were
so soon to be ended.

The Monday morning, however, proved so perfect a day that it dispelled
the shadow that had fallen on them. Raeburn wished to go to Fiesole, and
early in the morning Brian, having secured a carriage and settled the
terms with the crafty-looking Italian driver, they set off together.
The sunny streets looked sunnier than ever; the Tornabuoni was as
usual lively and bustling; the flower market at the base of the Palazza
Strozzi was gay with pinks and carnations and early roses. They drove
out of the city, passed innumerable villas, out into the open country
where the only blot upon the fair landscape was a funeral train, the
coffin borne by those gruesome beings, the Brothers of the Misericordia,
with their black robes and black face cloths pierced only with holes for
the eyes.

"Is it necessary to make death so repulsive?" said Raeburn. "Our own
black hearses are bad enough, but upon my word, I should be sorry to be
carried to my grave by such grim beings!"

He took off his hat, however, as they passed, and that not merely out of
deference to the custom of the country but because of the deep reverence
with which he invariably regarded the dead a reverence which in his own
country was marked by the involuntary softening of his voice when he
alluded to the death of others, the token of a nature which, though
strangely twisted, was in truth deeply reverential.

Then began the long ascent, the road, as usual, being lined wit