‘And you don’t speak Italian?’
He shook his head.
‘Only English and’—he glanced at the book in her hand—‘French indifferently well.’
‘I saw some one the other day who spoke Magyar—that is a beautiful language.’
‘Yes?’ he returned with polite indifference. ‘I don’t remember ever to have heard it.’
She laughed and glanced about. Her eyes lighted on the arbour hung with grape-vines and wistaria, where, far at the other end, Gustavo’s figure was visible lounging in the yellow stucco doorway. The sight appeared to recall an errand to her mind. She glanced down at a pink wicker-basket which hung on her arm, and gathered up her skirts with a movement of departure.
The young man hastily picked up the conversation.
‘It is a jolly old garden,’ he affirmed. ‘And there’s something pathetic about its appearing on souvenir post cards as a mere adjunct to a blue and yellow hotel.’
She nodded sympathetically.
‘Built for romance and abandoned to tourists—German tourists at that!’