“You shall go when you like,” he said eagerly.
Mrs Leyton, who was very warmly on Mr Penington’s side, looked at her husband and smiled. She had noticed something different in Phillis’s manner that night, a more passive acquiescence, perhaps, from which she augured well. Really liking her, she would have been glad that the Roman winter should end in this satisfactory fashion, and was prepared even to go through the catacombs, if Mr Penington proposed it, though she hated anything underground. Mr Penington had learnt exactly the things which Phillis liked.
“I have come round to your thinking about Titian’s picture in the Borghese,” he said to her in a low voice, when the others were talking; “I think it is the best thing in all the gallery.”
“In all Rome, I think,” said Phillis brightening. “I care for it so much that it quite hints me to hear people abuse it.”
“Are you talking of the Sacred and Profane Love?” asked Mrs Leyton, chiming in. “Mr Ibbetson could not make out which was which, don’t you remember? I can’t say it spoke very well for his artistic feeling.”
Somehow or other this little speech had a different effect from what was intended: it hurt Phillis, and though Mr Penington did not know much about Jack’s position with her, he was watching her and saw that she was vexed. He said quietly—
“That is not a very uncommon mistake at first sight, indeed, you may find it immortalised in print. But at every fresh visit the marvellous beauty comes out. Very likely the name is altogether imaginary. Vanity and Modesty would do as well for it as for Da Vinci’s picture in the Sciarra. You must come and see that one day, soon, Miss Grey; I can get an order.”
“You can get everything, I believe,” said Phillis with a smile.
He said quickly, so that only she could hear—
“I like you to say so—I shall take it as an omen;” and he then turned away, and talked for the rest of the evening to Mrs Leyton. Phillis leaned back in a kind of dream, thinking that friendship was pleasant and soothing, and wishing that others would be content with it. But they would not. And if—if only she could make up her mind to marry him, not only could she save him—this was what she thought—from the pangs of disappointment, but her own unrest might perhaps be hushed into—contentment.