"
"What is it about?"
"It will be a novel," replied Mr. Beebe, "dealing with modern
Italy. Let me refer you for an account to Miss Catharine Alan,
who uses words herself more admirably than any one I know."
"I wish Miss Lavish would tell me herself. We started such
friends. But I don't think she ought to have run away with
Baedeker that morning in Santa Croce. Charlotte was most annoyed
at finding me practically alone, and so I couldn't help being a
little annoyed with Miss Lavish."
"The two ladies, at all events, have made it up."
He was interested in the sudden friendship between women so
apparently dissimilar as Miss Bartlett and Miss Lavish. They were
always in each other's company, with Lucy a slighted third. Miss
Lavish he believed he understood, but Miss Bartlett might reveal
unknown depths of strangeness, though not perhaps, of meaning.
Was Italy deflecting her from the path of prim chaperon, which he
had assigned to her at Tunbridge Wells? All his life he had loved
to study maiden ladies; they were his specialty, and his
profession had provided him with ample opportunities for the
work.
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