"Oh, yes!" he admitted, humbly. "She is very good. I should never have thought it. She is every inch a princess and duchess. It's splendid. But the ten millions: gone, an illusion!... But tell me: how well you're looking! Each time I see you, you've grown lovelier and lovelier. Do you know that you're a very lovely woman? You must be very happy, I'm certain! You're an exceptional woman, I always said so. I don't understand you.... May I speak frankly? Are we good friends, you and I? I don't understand. I think what you have done such a terrible thing. I have never heard of anything like it in our world."
"I don't live in your world, prince."
"Very well, but all the same your world must have much the same ideas about it. And the calmness, the pride, the happiness with which you do, just quietly, as you please! I think it perfectly awful. I stand aghast at it.... And yet ... it's a pity. People in my world are very easy-going. But that sort of thing is not allowed!"
"Prince, once more, I have no world. My world is my own sphere."
"I don't understand that. Tell me, how am I to tell Urania? For I should think it delightful if you would come and stay at San Stefano. Oh, do come, do: come to keep us company! I entreat you. Be charitable, do a good work.... But first tell me, how shall I tell Urania?"
She laughed:
"What?"
"What they told me in the Via dei Serpenti, that your address was now Signor Van der Staal's studio, Via del Babuino."
Laughing, she looked at him almost pityingly:
"It is too difficult for you to tell her," she replied, a little condescendingly. "I will myself write to Urania and explain my conduct."