"Why not San Pietro?" said Aunt Clo.
"As a matter of fact, I've been there already," said the guest with great simplicity. "But by all means——"
"Amico," said Aunt Clo, with some severity in her voice, "you do not see San Pietro in one visit—nor yet in two, nor perhaps two hundred. Je vous donne rendezvous at the Bronze Door at eleven to-morrow morning. Va bene?"
Lily looked forward to the proposed excursion and hoped that the Marchese would be as agreeable as was his friend.
She learnt from Aunt Clo that the name of the latter was Nicholas Aubray, that she had met him first in Paris, several years ago, and had then personally demonstrated to him the beauties of the Louvre.
"Not altogether a Philistine," said Aunt Clo thoughtfully. "There are possibilities there, my Lily; undoubtedly, possibilities. Ce bon Nicholas! I wonder what he finds in common with Giulio della Torre!"
Lily wondered too, when she met the Marchese della Torre on the following morning. He looked much younger than did Mr. Aubray, was extremely good-looking in an elegant pink-and-bronze style, and was meticulously clad in a beautifully-cut grey suit, with a soft shirt, a pink tie, pink socks, and shining brown boots. Miss Stellenthorpe's acquaintance with him was slight, she had told her niece, but she addressed him as della Torre, in Continental fashion, and extended the back of her hand for him to kiss. The Marchese also kissed Lily's hand, and she fancied that she saw amusement lurking in Nicholas Aubray's long, lean face.
She had expected that Aunt Clo, as usual, would live up to her rôle of connaisseuse in Beauty, and would deliver eloquent and pungently-worded dissertations upon the more eclectic subjects for admiration that surrounded them.
But it speedily became astoundingly evident that Aunt Clo's erudition was out-matched. Lily and Mr. Aubray, obediently waiting to be told what they might admire, found themselves overlooked in the clash of conflicting authorities. The Marchese gracefully countered all Miss Stellenthorpe's artistic and historical allusions with others even more recondite, and appeared to have command of ejaculatory phrases in at least six languages to her three.
"Michelangelo—il maestro!" said Aunt Clo reverently, gazing up at the dome.