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Page 4
Stella Rawson stopped for a second in front of an archaic Apollo
of no great merit--because it reminded her of the unknown; and she
wished with all her might something new and swift and rushing
might come into her humdrum life.
After luncheon, for which they returned to the hotel, she wearily
went over to the writing-table in the corner of the hall to answer
her lover's chaste effusion--and saw that the low armchair beside
the escritoire was tenanted by a pair of long legs with singularly
fine silk socks showing upon singularly fine ankles--and a pair of
strong slender hands held a newspaper in front of the rest of the
body, concealing it all and the face. It was the English TIMES,
which, as everybody knows, could hide Gargantua himself.
She began her letter--and not a rustle disturbed her peace.
"Dearest Eustace," she had written, "we have arrived in Rome--"
and then she stopped, and fixed her eyes blankly upon the column
of births, marriages, and deaths. She was staring at it with
sightless eyes, when the paper was slowly lowered and over its top
the blue orbs of the stranger looked into hers.
Her pretty color became the hue of a bright pink rose.
"Mademoiselle," a very deep voice said in English, "is not this
world full of bores and tiresome duties; have you the courage to
defy them all for a few minutes--and talk to me instead?"
"Monsieur!" Miss Rawson burst out, and half rose from her seat.
Then she sat down again--the unknown had not stirred a muscle.
"Good," he murmured. "One has to be courageous to do what is
unconventional, even if it is not wrong. I am not desirous of
hurting or insulting you--I felt we might have something to say to
each other--is it so--tell me, am I right?"
"I do not know," whispered Stella lamely. She was so taken aback
at the preposterous fact that a stranger should have addressed her
at all, even in a manner of indifference and respect, that she
knew not what to do.
"I observed you last night," he went on. "I am accustomed to judge
of character rapidly--it is a habit I have acquired during my
travels in foreign lands--when I cannot use the standard of my
own. You are weary of a number of things, and you do not know
anything at all about life, and you are hedged round with those
who will see that you never learn its meaning. Tell me--what do
you think of Rome--it contains things and aspects which afford
food for reflection, is it not so?"
"We have only been to the Vatican as yet," Stella answered
timidly--she was still much perturbed at the whole incident, but
now that she had begun she determined she might as well be hung
for a sheep as a lamb, and she was conscious that there was a
strong attraction in the mild blue eyes of the stranger. His
manner had a complete repose and absence of self-consciousness,
which usually is only to be found in the people of race--in any
nation.
"You were taken to the Sistine Chapel, of course," he went on,
"and to the loggia and Bramant's staircase? You saw some statues,
too, perhaps?"
"My uncle and aunt do not care much for sculpture," Miss Rawson
said, now regaining her composure, "but I like it--even better
than pictures."
The stranger kept his steady eyes fixed upon her face all the
time.
"I have a nymph in my house at home," he returned. "She came
originally from Rome; she is not Greek and she is very like you,
the same droop of head--I remarked it immediately--I am
superstitious--I suppose you would call what I mean by that word--
and I knew directly that some day you, too, would mean things to
me. That is why I spoke--do you feel it, too?"
Stella Rawson quivered. The incredible situation paralyzed her.
She--the Aunt Caroline's niece, and engaged to Eustace Medlicott,
the Bishop's junior chaplain, to be listening to a grotesque-
looking foreigner making subtle speeches of an insinuating
character, and, far from feeling scandalized and repulsed, to be
conscious that she was thrilled and interested--it was hardly to
be believed!
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