“You wouldn’t accept it from me?”
“No,” he repeated in the same way.
She exhaled a long breath that was like a guarded sigh. “But you’ve touched an idea that HAS been mine. It’s what I’ve wanted.” Then she added: “It was what I hoped.”
He put down his box—this had drawn his eyes. He made nothing, clearly, of the little man’s attention. “It’s what you brought me out for?”
“Well, that’s, at any rate,” she returned, “my own affair. But it won’t do?”
“It won’t do, cara mia.”
“It’s impossible?”
“It’s impossible.” And he took up one of the brooches.
She had another pause, while the shopman only waited. “If I were to accept from you one of these charming little ornaments as you suggest, what should I do with it?”
He was perhaps at last a little irritated; he even—as if HE might understand—looked vaguely across at their host. “Wear it, per Bacco!”