"WHAT shall we do this afternoon, uncle?"
"Whatever you please, my dear. I am at your service entirely."
Juliet's eyes brightened. She leaned nearer to her uncle as he sat in his easy-chair, and laid her hand with a pretty caressing movement on his shoulder. Such spontaneous expressions of affection, which she gave with the grace and freedom of a child, were delightful to him. His niece was spending the day with him at the comfortable chambers in Bloomsbury in which he had established himself when he returned to town in the autumn. He lived there very quietly, spending much of his time amongst the books in the British Museum; but it was an understood thing between them that when Juliet came to see him he must devote himself to her entertainment, and he thoroughly enjoyed the hours he spent with her in sight-seeing and other forms of diversion.
"Oh, uncle, there is such a lovely concert at the Crystal Palace this afternoon. Adelina Patti is to sing. Oh, I should so like to hear her!"
"Have you never heard her sing?"
"Never. I have never heard anyone. I never go anywhere," said Juliet plaintively. "Hannah and Salome always think it wrong to take any pleasure and I cannot go to places by myself."
"Poor child! You are hardly used," said her uncle, with a merry twinkle in his eyes; "but now let me hear more about this concert. How would it do if I were to take you?"
"Oh, uncle! Will you really? How lovely! There is nothing I should like so much. Oh, it is good of you. And afterwards the fountains will be illuminated, and there will be splendid fireworks. Oh, I shall enjoy it!"
"But, my dear, if we stayed to see the fireworks, you would not get home till very late, and your mother would be alarmed," said her uncle.
"Oh, of course, I must send her a telegram," was Juliet's prompt reply. "And there is a little room, half-way up the stairs, which Mrs. Carroll lets sometimes. She showed it to me the last time I was here. The best plan would be for me to sleep there to-night. You would not care to take me home so late."