“Oh, no,” said Miss Frances. “Don't you remember what your favorite Bryant says about bringing the 'faded fancies of an elder world' into these 'virgin solitudes'?”
“Faded fancies!” cried Arnold. “Do you call that a faded fancy? It is as fresh and graceful as youth itself, and as natural. I should have thought of it myself, if there had been no fountain of Trevi.”
“Do you think so?” smiled the girl. “Then imagination, it would seem, is not entirely confined to homesick women.”
“Come, fill the cup, Miss Frances! Nicky is almost here.”
The girl held her hands beneath the trickle again, until they were brimming with the clear sweet water.
“Drink first,” said Arnold.
“I'm not sure that I want to return,” she replied, smiling, with her eyes on the space of sky between the treetops.
“Nonsense,—you must be morbid. Drink, drink!”
“Drink yourself; the water is all running away!”
He bent his head, and took a vigorous sip of the water, holding his hands beneath hers, inclosing the small cup in the larger one. The small cup trembled a little. He was laughing and wiping his mustache, when Nicky appeared; and Miss Frances, suddenly brightening and recovering her freedom of movement, exclaimed, “Why, Nicky! You have been forever! We must go at once, Mr. Arnold; so good-by! I hope”—