Mrs. Johnson began to be nice to him at once, in her cheery way.
"Know Venice?" and when Peter said, "Not yet," she told him, "Ah, you'll like it, I know. So pleasant as it is. Particlerly for young people. It gives me rheumatics, so much damp about. But my gel Rhoder is that fond of it. Spends all her spare time—not as she's got much, poor gel—in the gall'ries and that. Art, you know. She goes in for it, Rhoder does. I don't, now. I'm a stupid old thing, as they'll all tell you." She nodded cheerfully and inclusively at Mr. Vyvian and Rhoda and Miss Barnett. They did not notice. Vyvian, toying disgustedly with his burnt minestra, was saying in his contemptuous voice, "Of course, if you like that, you may as well like the Frari monuments at once and have done."
Rhoda was crimson; she had made another mistake. Miss Barnett, who disputed the office of mentor with Vyvian, whom she jealously disliked, broke in, in her cheery chirp, "I don't agree with you, Mr. Vyvian. I consider it a very fine example of Carpaccio's later style; I think you will find that some good critics are with me." She addressed Peter, ignoring the intervening solidity of Mrs. Johnson. "Do you support me, Mr. Margerison?"
"I've not seen it yet," Peter said rather timidly. "It sounds very nice."
Miss Barnett gave him a rather contemptuous look through her pince-nez and turned to Hilary.
"Lor!" whispered Mrs. Johnson to Peter. "They do get so excited about pictures. Just like that they go on all day, squabblin' and peckin' each other. Always at Rhoder they are too, tellin' her she must think this and mustn't think that, till the poor gel don't know if she's on her head or her heels. She don't like me to interfere, or it's all I can do sometimes not to put in my word and say, 'You stick to it, Rhoder my dear; you stand up to 'em and your mother'll back you.' But Rhoder don't like that. 'Mother,' she says, quite sharp, 'Mother, you don't know a thing about Art, and they do. You let be, and don't put me to shame before my friends.' That's what she'd like to say, anyhow, if she's too good a gel to say it. Rhoder's ashamed of my ignorance, that's what it is." This was a furtive whisper, for Peter's ear alone. Having thus unburdened herself Mrs. Johnson cleared her throat noisily and said very loud, "An' what do you think of St. Mark's?" That was a sensible and intelligent question, and she hoped Rhoda heard.
Peter said he thought it was very nice. That Rhoda certainly heard, and she looked at him with a curious expression, in which hope predominated. Was this brother of the Margerisons another fool, worse than her? Would he perhaps make her folly shine almost like wisdom by comparison? She exchanged a glance with Vyvian; it was extraordinarily sweet to be able to do that; so many glances had been exchanged àpropos of her remarks between Vyvian and Miss Barnett. But here was a young man who thought St. Mark's was very nice. "The dear Duomo!" Miss Barnett murmured, protecting it from Tourist Insolence.
Mrs. Johnson agreed enthusiastically with Peter.
"I call it just sweet. You should see it on a Sunday, Mr. Margerison—Mr. Peter, as I should say, shouldn't I?—all the flags flying, and the sun shining on the gilt front an' all, and the band playing in the square; an' inside half a dozen services all at once, and the incense floatin' everywhere. Not as I'm partial to incense; it makes me feel a bit squeamish—and Miss Gould there tells me it affects her similarly, don't it, Miss Gould? Incense, I say—don't it give you funny feelin's within? Seem to upset you, as it were?"
Miss Gould, disturbed in her intimate conversation with the curate, held up mittened hands in deprecating horror, either at the delicacy of the question called across the table with gentlemen present, or at the memory it called up in her of the funny feelings within.