“Your sincere and devoted friend,
“Sam Deane.”
I liked that letter.
“Beata,” I said, “aren’t they lovely?”
“Si, si, Signorina!” said Beata, and she nodded and nodded, and her eyes shone just as if the violets were hers. And then I went to stand before the glass, and place them the way girls do, and I was so excited that I stuck the violet pin right through my corset into my stomach, but nothing mattered! I was just awfully happy! I didn’t know that violets would make you feel that way, but these did. And Mr. Hemmingway thought they were beautiful, and tried very hard to recall the first year he ever “sent a lady a posy” (but he couldn’t remember because he couldn’t remember which year he had bought a tan and white striped waistcoat in the Strand or Ludgate Circus, of course he couldn’t remember where, and the waistcoat buying prefaced the posy giving) and Miss Meek said that some man had more sense than most of the jolly idiots, and Miss Bannister asked me who sent them, and let me answer without telling me it was one of her deaf days, which showed that every one felt kind and interested.
And so dinner passed, and after dinner I sat with Leslie a little while and helped her get in bed; and then brushed my hair while Viola sat in my room and told about how Leslie’s grandfather had started to make his fortune in pickles—and she seemed to be glad of it, I couldn’t see why—and then she squeezed my hand, and said that she was sorry that she had been so fearfully busy during the first two weeks, and that we must see lots of each other now—I suppose because she had fought with Leslie, I know I hadn’t changed any in that short time—and then she left and so ended that day.
Saturday was clear and everything was washed and clean by the rain that had fallen so steadily and long. All the roofs were a brighter red and the gray and tan houses lightened and the sunlight was dazzling, and even the song of Florence—which is made by the many, many church and monastery bells that mix, and tangle, and float across the city to make pretty, skippy tunes—even this song seemed freshened by all the scrubbing that the city had undergone.
I got up quite early and went to my window to look out. Gino was whistling as he swept around his back door, and talking to his parrot that he had brought out with the stand to which it was chained. . . . And I looked above him at the big window through which I had so often watched my artist, and I realized that Mr. Wake would tell me about him that day. . . . And then Beata came to call out her gentle, “Buon giorno, Signorina! Acqua calda!”
And I answered, and took in the tall, steaming, brass pitcher and began to bathe and dress.
I practised a lot in the morning, and brushed my best suit, which I thought ought to back my violets, and then came lunch, and then getting into outdoor duds; and at last the Pension bell jangled as it swung to and fro in answer to a touch from downstairs, and I knew that Mr. Wake had come. I went out to the head of the stairs, as soon as I heard the bell ring, and called, “Is it you, Mr. Wake?” And, when I was answered as I wanted to be, I hurried down.
It was very good to see him, and I stood in the doorway with him for several minutes as I told him about the twins, (he was sure they weren’t very sick) and of Miss Sheila’s promising to write me regularly about how things went on, and of Leslie’s bad cold. And then I asked about my friend, Sam Deane.