“You may be sure he hopes to get more out of you than even your prodigal five hundred lire. He proposes to work upon your—what shall I call it?—sensitiveness.”
Teresa was sitting upright, and her eyes were very bright.
“Is that the best you have yet found in human nature?” she said quietly.
“It is what I have most often found,” returned Wilbraham with a little surprise.
She glanced at him so strangely that he felt an odd desire to excuse himself, almost a new sensation, but before he could speak, Sylvia broke in with the appealing timidity which he recognised as a pleasant contrast to her sister’s impetuosity.
“I am sure you have done everything you could think of, Teresa, and so has Mr Wilbraham. I daresay it will all come right by-and-by, when Cesare understands that it was only a mistake. Everybody makes mistakes now and then, of course.”
It was these platitudes, announced as discoveries, which were apt to irritate Mrs Brodrick. But she owned that occasionally they had their uses. Wilbraham now turned to Sylvia with an air of interest, while Teresa’s face softened.
“Come,” she cried more gaily, “let us talk of something else. Talk of to-morrow. Thank goodness, that must always be a new subject. What shall we do, good people? Shall we drive to Ostia?”
Sylvia opened her eyes. She was opening her mouth as well, when her grandmother spoke.
“If you do, I think I’ll go with you.”