"It wasn't terrible at all," said Johnny.
"Then it was you?"
"Oh, yes; it was I."
"Then it was you who saved poor old Lord De Guest from the bull?"
"Go on, Mrs. Arabin. There is no end of the grand things I've done."
"You're quite a hero of romance."
He bit his lip as he told himself that he was not enough of a hero. "I don't know about that," said Johnny. "I think what a man ought to do in these days is to seem not to care what he eats and drinks, and to have his linen very well got up. Then he'll be a hero." But that was hard upon Lily.
"Is that what Miss Dale requires?" said Mrs. Arabin.
"I was not thinking about her particularly," said Johnny, lying.
They slept a night in Paris, as they had done also at Turin,—Mrs. Arabin not finding herself able to accomplish such marvels in the way of travelling as her companion had achieved—and then arrived in London in the evening. She was taken to a certain quiet clerical hotel at the top of Suffolk Street, much patronized by bishops and deans of the better sort, expecting to find a message there from her husband. And there was the message—just arrived. The dean had reached Florence three days after her departure; and as he would do the journey home in twenty-four hours less than she had taken, he would be there, at the hotel, on the day after to-morrow. "I suppose I may wait for him, Mr. Eames?" said Mrs. Arabin.