by a
succession of lively companions, to have always "something going on,"
that delight of youth, and a continual incense of admiration rising
around her enough to have turned a less steady head, filled Bice's cup
with happiness. But perhaps the most penetrating pleasure of all was
that of having carried out the Contessa's expectations and fulfilled her
hopes. Had not Madame di Forno-Populo been satisfied with the beauty of
her charge, none of these expenses would have been incurred, and this
life of many delights would never have been; so that the soothing and
exhilarating consciousness of having indeed deserved and earned her
present well-being was in Bice's mind. The future, too, opened before
her a horizon of boundless hope. To have everything she now had and
more, along with that one element of happiness which had always been
wanting, the certainty that it would last, was the happy prospect within
her grasp. Her head was so steady, and the practical sense of the
advantage so great, that the excitement and pleasure did not intoxicate
her; but everything was delightful, novel, breathing confidence and
hope. The guests at the table, where she now took her place, equal in
importance to the Contessa herself, all flattered and did their best to
please her. They amused her, either because they were clever or because
they were ridiculous--Bice, with youthful cynicism, did not much mind
which it was. When they went to the opera, a similar crowd would flutter
in and out of the box, and appear afterwards to share the gay little
supper and declare that no _prime-donne_ on the stage could equal the
two lovely blending voices of the Contessa and her ward. To sit late
talking, laughing, singing, surrounded by all this worship, and to wake
up again to a dozen plans and the same routine of pleasure next day,
what heart of seventeen (and she was not quite seventeen) could resist
it? One thing, however, Bice missed amid all this. It was the long
gallery at the Hall, the nursery in Park Lane, little Tom crowing upon
her shoulder, digging his hands into her hair, and Lucy looking on--many
things, yet one. She missed this, and laughed at herself, and said she
was a fool--but missed it all the same. Lucy had come, as in duty bound,
and paid her call. She had been very grave--not like herself. And Sir
Tom was very grave; looking at her she could not tell how; no longer
with his old easy good humour, with a look of criticism and anxiety--an