to want English lessons.

On Monday she decided that she must leave the Aquila Verde if she
could find anyone to take her for four, or even three lire a day. She
went to Cook's office in the Via Tornabuoni; it was crowded with
Americans come for their mails, and she had to wait ten minutes before
one of the young men behind the counter could attend to her.

"What can I do for you?"

"Can you recommend me to a very cheap _pension_?"

She noticed a faint alteration in his manner, as though he had lost
interest in what she was saying, but when he had looked at her again
he answered pleasantly, "There is Vinella's in the Piazza
Indipendenza, six francs, and there is another in the Via dei Bardi, I
think; but I will ask. Excuse me."

He went to speak to another clerk at the cashier's desk. They both
stared across at her, and she fancied she heard the words, pretty,
cheap enough, poor.

"There is a place in the Via Decima kept by a Frau Heylmann. I think
it might suit you, and I will write the address down. It is really not
bad and I can recommend it as I am staying there myself," he added
ingenuously. He seemed really anxious to help now, and Olive thanked
him.

As she went out she met Prince Tor di Rocca coming in. Their eyes met
momentarily and he bowed. It seemed strange to her afterwards when she
thought of it, but she fancied he would have spoken if she had given
him an opportunity. Did he want to explain, to tell more lies? She had
thought him too strong to care what women thought of him once they had
served him and been cast aside. True, she was not precisely one of
these.

The Via Decima proved to be one of the wide new streets near the Porta
San Gallo. No. 38 was a pretentious house, a tenement building trying
to look like a palace, and it was plastered over with dingy yellow
stucco. Olive went through the hall into a courtyard hung with drying
linen, and climbed up an outside iron staircase to the fifth floor.
There was a brass plate on the Frau's door, and Canova's Graces in
terra cotta smirked in niches on either side. The large pale woman who
answered the bell wore a grey flannel dressing-gown that was almost
buttonless, and her light hair was screwed into an absurdly small knot
on the nape of her neck.

"You want to be taken _en pension_? Come in."

She led the way into a bare and chilly dining-room; the long table was
covered with black American cloth that reminded Olive of beetles, but
everythin