"You care for him no longer, then?"
"Is it possible I could care for a man who has treated me as he has done? For I still believe that it was his duty to have remained with his uncle, and if—if he had cared for me at all he would have done so."
"But perhaps," said Claire, "he perceived that passionate desire of yours for wealth, and thought that it would not be well for you to have it gratified. I can imagine that."
"You imagine, then, exactly what he was good enough to say," replied Marion, dryly. "But I suppose you know enough of me to be also able to imagine that I was not very grateful for such a form of regard. He talked like a moralist, but he certainly did not feel like a lover, and so I let him go. I am not sorry for that."
"Then," said Claire, after a short pause of reflection, "I cannot see any reason why you should avoid meeting him. There may be a little awkwardness at first; but, if you have really no feeling for him, that will pass away."
"I should prefer to avoid such a meeting, if possible," answered Marion; "but if not possible, I will endure. Only, if you can, give me warning when it is likely to occur."
"That, unfortunately, is what I can hardly do," said Claire, in a tone of regret. "Our friends have established a habit of dropping in, without formality, almost any evening; and so we never know who is coming, or when."
"In that case there is, of course, nothing to be done. I can only promise that, whenever the occasion occurs, I will try to be equal to it."
"I have no doubt of that," answered Claire.
But she looked concerned as she went away, and it was evident to Mrs. Kerr that she was more than usually thoughtful that evening. As she had said, their friends in Rome found it pleasant to drop informally into their pretty salon. Artists predominated among these friends; so it was not strange that she watched the door, thinking that Brian Earle might come, and conscious of a wish that he would; for Marion, pleading fatigue, declined to appear on this first evening after her arrival; and Claire said to herself that if Earle did come, it would give her an opportunity to tell him what meeting lay before him, and he could then avoid it if he chose to do so. When, as the evening passed on, it became at length clear that he was not coming—and there was no reason beside her own desire for expecting him,—Claire thought, with a sigh, that events must take their course, since it was plainly out of her power to direct them.