"Ah, that's what it is!" said Mrs. Thayer approvingly. "That is what one enjoys. But my husband is one of the other sort. We divide Italy between us. He looks at the marbles, and I eat the pomegranates. Do you like pomegranates?—No? I delight in them, and in everything else fresh and new and sweet and acid. But what I want to know, Mr. St. Leger, is—how come these old ruins to be so worth looking at? Hasn't the human race made progress? Can't we raise as good buildings now-a-days, and as good to see, as those old heathen did?"
"I suppose we can, when we copy their work exactly."
"But how is that? Christians ought to do better work than heathens. I do not understand it."
"No," said St. Leger, "I do not understand it."
"Old poetry—that's what they study so much at Oxford and Cambridge, and everywhere else;—and old pictures, and old statues. I think the world ought to grow wiser as it grows older. I believe it is prejudice. There's my husband crazy to go to Paesturn,—I'm glad he can't; the marshes or something are so unhealthy; but I'm going to arrange for you an expedition to the Punta—Punta di something—the toe of the boot, you know; it's delightful; you go on donkeys, and you have the most charming views, and what I know you like better than anything,—the most charming opportunities for flirtation."
"It will have to be Miss Thayer and I then," said Lawrence. "Miss Copley does not know how."
"Nonsense! Don't tell me. Every girl does. She has her own way, I suppose. Makes it more piquant—and piquing."
Lawrence looked over towards the innocent face, so innocent of anything false, he knew, or even of anything ambiguous; a face of pure womanly nature, childlike in its naturalness, although womanly in its gravity. Perhaps he drew a swift comparison between a man's chances with a face of that sort, and the counter advantages of Christina's more conventional beauty. Mr. Thayer had sat down beside Dolly and was drawing her into talk.
"You are fond of art, Miss Copley. I remember we met you first in the room of the dying gladiator, in the Capitoline Museum. But everybody has to go to see the dying gladiator and the rest."
"I suppose so," said Dolly.