l away at their
country houses, there were plenty of others who had returned to town.
Club life had begun again, too. But most of all, at this time, Lionel
was disposed to enjoy that quiet and gentle companionship with Nina,
which was so simple and frank and unreserved. He could talk to her
freely, on all subjects save one--and that he was trying to put away
from himself in these altered circumstances. He and she had a community
of interests; there was never any lack of conversation--whether he were
down in Sloane Street, drinking tea and trying over new music with her,
or walking in with Miss Girond and her to the theatre through the now
almost leafless Green Park. Sometimes, when she was grown petulant and
fractious, he had to scold her into good-humor; sometimes she had
seriously to remonstrate with him; but it was all given and taken in
good part. He was never embarrassed or anxious in her society; he was
happy and content and careless, as she appeared to be also. He did not
trouble to invent any excuse for calling upon her; he went down to
Sloane Street just whenever he had a spare half-hour or hour; and if the
morning was bright, or even passable (for it was November now, and even
a tolerable sort of day was welcome), and if Miss Girond did not wish to
go out or had some other engagement, Nina and he would set off for a
stroll by themselves, up into Kensington Gardens, it might be, or along
Piccadilly, or through the busy crowds of Oxford Street; while they
looked at the shops and the passers-by, and talked about the theatre and
the people in it or about old days in Naples. There was no harm; and
they thought no harm. Sometimes he could hear her hum to herself a
fragment of one of the old familiar canzoni--"Antoniella Antonia!" or
"Voca, voca ncas' a mano"--so light-hearted was she; and occasionally
they said a word to each other in Neapolitanese--but this was seldom,
for Nina considered the practice to be most reprehensible. What she had
chiefly to take him to task for, however, was his incurable and
inordinate extravagance--wherever she was concerned especially.

"Leo, you think it is a compliment?" she said to him, earnestly. "No,
not at all? I am sorry. Why should you buy for me this, that, whatever
strikes your eye, and no matter the price? I have everything I desire.
Why to me?--why, if you must give, why not to your cousin you tell me
of, who is so kind to the sick children in boarding them in the country?