"I should be very ungrateful if I did not," said Margaret.
All this had occurred on the first day of her arrival; since then the studio had been furnished and she had been made to feel as if she were part and parcel of the Rivani family. Just before Margaret's arrival, the prince had been called away by his duties to the Italian Court, and the three ladies were left alone, so that Margaret had as yet had no opportunity of thanking him for his kindness, of which she was reminded every time she entered the luxurious studio he had furnished for her.
Margaret's lines had indeed fallen in pleasant places, and if the possession of good and true friends and the comforts of a luxury brought to the highest state of perfection, could have brought happiness, she should have been happy. But the sadness which wrapped her as in a veil through which she smiled, and sometimes laughed, never left her, and she spent hours in her studio, with the brush lying untouched, and her dark eyes fixed dreamily upon the hills which rose before her windows. She could not prevent her thoughts from traveling back towards the past, that past with which she had done forever, and often in the gloaming of the late summer evenings she would see Blair's face rise before her, and hear his voice as she had heard it during those few happy weeks when she had believed him to be her lover and husband.
There was only one way of escape from these thoughts, this flitting back of her heart which brought her so keen an anguish, and that was in work.
She had come to the villa on the understanding that she should give lessons in painting to the princess, but Florence soon showed the futility of such an arrangement.
"Dear, you will never make me an artist," she said; "never, do what you will! I can learn to paint a barn, or a village pump, so that I needn't write 'this is a barn,' or 'this is a pump,' underneath them, but that is all. Don't waste your valuable time upon an impracticable—isn't that a splendid English word?—subject, but do your own work. I'll bring you my dreadful daubs, and you shall tell me where I am wrong, but you sha'n't work and drudge like an ordinary drawing-mistress. I daren't let you, for the last words Ferdy said were, 'Don't abuse Miss Leslie's good nature, and bore her! Remember that she is an artist, and she's something to the world that you must not rob it of!' and Ferdy said wisely."
"I think he spoke too generously, and thought only of the stranger within his gates," said Margaret.
"But mamma thinks the same," said the princess. "She has set her heart upon your painting a great picture while you are at the villa. You know that mamma and Ferdy are devoted to art; I think that either of them would rather be an artist—a true artist—than Ruler of Italy, and if you want to do them an honor, why paint a grand picture, exhibit it at the Salon, and date it from the Villa Capri."
Life at the villa, Margaret found, was one of routine—pleasant, easy routine—but still carefully measured out and planned.
At eight the great bell in the campanile rang for rising; at nine the household gathered in the hall for prayers; at half-past breakfast was served. At one o'clock the luncheon bell rang, and at seven the major domo, in his solemn suit of black, stood at the drawing-room door to announce dinner.