It was indeed the divine one, looking in the picturesque costume he was wearing more handsome and romantic than ever. A sombrero was slouched with easy negligence over his broad white brow, and a long cloak dropped gracefully from his shoulders. He had all the air of a man who, conscious of his personal charms, is determined to make the best use of them.
The look of pleasure that mantled Daphne's face had so disturbing an effect on my spirits that it was as much as I could do to treat the artist with ordinary civility.
"Angelo," cried my uncle after the first greetings were over, "I'm delighted to see you! But tell us how you came to be here, for I thought that outside of Switzerland few beside myself knew of the existence of this secluded valley."
"Rivoli the Beautiful is my native place," replied Angelo. Why had not Fate fixed his nativity at the sixth cataract of the Nile?
"I thought you were an Italian," I remarked frigidly.
"My parents were both Italians," replied the artist, "but I was born in that cottage;" and he pointed far down the valley to a tenement on which Daphne gazed with interest, while I, staring in a different direction, tried to catch a glimpse of a steel-blue lake through a veil of floating mist. "I have no parents nor any relations left. My old nurse still lives; and I make a point of visiting Rivoli each year to breathe the mountain air, and to see that the old dame does not want."
"A very pious and proper proceeding on your part," I remarked.
This was meant for sarcasm, but it did not seem to disturb the artist in the least. The look of disapproval on Daphne's face did not tend to tranquillise my mind.
"I arrived here only last night," Angelo continued, "and, hearing that a lady and two Englishmen had taken up their residence at the Châlet Varina, I guessed at once from the description who they were. I determined to call in the morning to present my compliments to Miss Leslie and her father"—he omitted me from his congratulations—"and to ask her to accept these flowers."