it out in truth as she might have brought a
huge confession, something she admitted herself shy about and that
would seem to show her as frivolous; it had rolled over her that what
she wanted of Europe was "people," so far as they were to be had, and
that if her friend really wished to know, the vision of this same
equivocal quantity was what had haunted her during their previous days,
in museums and churches, and what was again spoiling for her the pure
taste of scenery. She was all for scenery--yes; but she wanted it human
and personal, and all she could say was that there would be in
London--wouldn't there? more of that kind than anywhere else. She came
back to her idea that if it wasn't for long--if nothing should happen
to be so for _her_--why, the particular thing she spoke of would
probably have most to give her in the time, would probably be less than
anything else a waste of her remainder. She produced this last
consideration indeed with such gaiety that Mrs. Stringham was not again
disconcerted by it, was in fact quite ready--if talk of early dying was
in order--to match it from her own future. Good, then; they would, eat
and drink because of what might happen to-morrow; and they would direct
their course from that moment with a view to such eating and drinking.
They ate and drank that night, in truth, as if in the spirit of this
decision; whereby the air, before they separated, felt itself the
clearer.

It had cleared perhaps to a view only too extensive--extensive, that
is, in proportion to the signs of life presented. The idea of "people"
was not so entertained on Milly's part as to connect itself with
particular persons, and the fact remained for each of the ladies that
they would, completely unknown, disembark at Dover amid the completely
unknowing. They had no relation already formed; this plea Mrs.
Stringham put forward to see what it would produce. It produced nothing
at first but the observation on the girl's side that what she had in
mind was no thought of society nor of scraping acquaintance; nothing
was further from her than to desire the opportunities represented for
the compatriot in general by a trunkful of "letters." It wasn't a
question, in short, of the people the compatriot was after; it was the
human, the English picture itself, as they might see it in their own
way--the world imagined always in what one had read and dreamed. Mrs.
Stringham did every justice to this world, but when later o