Miss T. Well, I believe I'll have a good look round the curiosity stores. There's ever such a cunning little shop back of the Clock Tower on the Pi-azza, where I saw some brocades that were just too sweet! So I'll take Poppa along bargain-hunting. Don't you come if you'd rather poke around your old churches and things!
Culch. I don't feel disposed to—er—"poke around" alone, so, if you will allow me to accompany you,——
Miss T. Oh, I'll allow you to escort me. It's handy having some one around to carry parcels. And Poppa's bound to drop the balance every time!
Culch. (to himself). That's all I am to her. A beast of burden! And a whole precious morning squandered on this confounded shopping—when I might have been—ah, well!
[Follows, under protest.
On the Grand Canal. 9 P.M. A brilliant moonlight night; a music-barge, hung with coloured lanterns, is moving slowly up towards the Rialto, surrounded and followed by a fleet of gondolas, amongst which is one containing the Trotters and Culchard. Culchard has just discovered—with an embarrassment not wholly devoid of a certain excitement—that they are drawing up to a gondola occupied by the Prendergasts and Podbury.
Mr. Trotter (meditatively). It's real romantic. That's the third deceased kitten I've seen to-night. They haven't only a two-foot tide in the Adriatic, and it stands to reason all the sewage——
Miss P. How absolutely magical those palaces look in the moonlight! Bob, how can you yawn like that?
Bob. I beg your pardon, Patia, really, but we've had rather a long day of it, you know!