"No; its only merit is that it takes us up quickly," replied his mother, as they reached the waiting car. "All try if you can to get seats with back to the hill, so that you will command the view of this beautiful valley as we rise."
The city did indeed look foreign as they entered its wall, left the cable-car, and, in a hotel omnibus, rattled through the streets, so narrow that it is barely possible for two carriages to pass each other.
"Is everybody old here, do you suppose?" slyly whispered Bettina to Barbara, as they were taken in charge by a very old woman, who led the way to the rooms already engaged for the party. "I should be afraid to come here all alone; everything is so strange.
"Oh! but how pleasant," she added, brightly, as they were shown into a sweet, clean room, whose windows opened upon a small garden filled with rose-bushes, and whose two little beds were snowy white. "How delightful to be here a little later, when these roses will be in bloom!"
The brown withered face of the old chambermaid beamed upon the two young girls, and showed her satisfaction at their evident delight, and when she found that they could understand and speak a little of her own language, her heart was indeed won, and she bustled about seeking whatever she could do to add to their comfort, just for the pleasure of being near them.
"It must be a delightful place to visit," said Barbara, when finally they were alone, "but I should not like to have to live here for any length of time, I know; so gray, so old, so desolate it all seemed on our way through the streets," and a slight shiver ran through her at the remembrance.
Soon they went to the Cathedral; admired its façade, decorated with mosaics in softly brilliant colors until it looked like a great opal, shining against the deep blue sky; entered it and saw Fra Angelico's grand Christ, and calm, holy saints and angels; and, close to them (the most striking contrast presented in art), Luca Signorelli's wild, struggling, muscular figures.
They went into the photograph store on the corner for photographs, and to the little antique shop opposite, where they bought quaint Etruscan ornaments to take away as souvenirs,—and then gave themselves to exploring the city; after which they all confessed to having fallen somewhat under the spell of its charm.
The next afternoon found them on their way, around Lake Trasimeno, to Perugia.
Little had been said about this city, for their conversation had been engaged with those they had left behind. Malcom, only, had been looking up its history in his guide-book, and was interested to see the place that had been bold enough to set itself up even against Rome, and so had earned the title "audacious" inscribed on its citadel by one of the Popes.