'Yes.'
The monosyllable was dropped. Alma walked with her eyes on the ground, trailing her sunshade.
'I didn't think she had much taste for travel. But you know her so much better than I do.'
'She is enjoying herself,' said Alma.
'No need for you to go so far. Down yonder'—he nodded southward—'I was thinking, the other day, of the different kinds of pleasure one gets from scenery in different parts of the world. I have seen the tropics; they left me very much where I was, intellectually. It's the human associations of natural beauty that count. You have no desire to go to the islands of the Pacific?'
'I can't say that I have.'
'Of course not. The springs of art are in the old world. Among the vines and the olives one hears a voice. I must really try to give you some idea of my little place at Riva.'
He began a playful description—long, but never tedious; alluring, yet without enthusiasm—a dreamy suggestion of refined delights and luxuries.
'I have another place in the Pyrenees, to suit another mood; and not long ago I was sorely tempted by the offer of a house not far from Antioch, in the valley of the Orontes—a house built by an Englishman. Charming place, and so entirely off the beaten track. Isn't there a fascination in the thought of living near Antioch? Well away from bores and philistines. No Mrs. Grundy with her clinking tea-cups. I dare say the house is still to be had.—Oh, do tell me something about your friend, Fraulein Steinfeld. Is she in earnest? Will she do anything?'
His eloquence was at an end. Thenceforward he talked of common things in unemotional language; and when Alma parted from him, it was with a sense of being tired and disappointed.