�I am sorry not to see my aunts again,� Mrs. Lombard said resignedly; �but Sybilla thinks it best that we should not go this year.�
�Next year, perhaps,� murmured Miss Lombard, in a voice which seemed to suggest that they had a great waste of time to fill.
She had returned to her seat, and sat bending over her work. Her hair enveloped her head in the same thick braids, but the rose color of her cheeks had turned to blotches of dull red, like some pigment which has darkened in drying.
�And Professor Clyde—is he well?� Mrs. Lombard asked affably; continuing, as her daughter raised a startled eye: �Surely, Sybilla, Mr. Wyant was the gentleman who was sent by Professor Clyde to see the Leonardo?�
Miss Lombard was silent, but Wyant hastened to assure the elder lady of his friend�s well-being.
�Ah—perhaps, then, he will come back some day to Siena,� she said, sighing. Wyant declared that it was more than likely; and there ensued a pause, which he presently broke by saying to Miss Lombard: �And you still have the picture?�
She raised her eyes and looked at him. �Should you like to see it?� she asked.
On his assenting, she rose, and extracting the same key from the same secret drawer, unlocked the door beneath the tapestry. They walked down the passage in silence, and she stood aside with a grave gesture, making Wyant pass before her into the room. Then she crossed over and drew the curtain back from the picture.
The light of the early afternoon poured full on it: its surface appeared to ripple and heave with a fluid splendor. The colors had lost none of their warmth, the outlines none of their pure precision; it seemed to Wyant like some magical flower which had burst suddenly from the mould of darkness and oblivion.
He turned to Miss Lombard with a movement of comprehension.