“Yes; the captain thinks in about eight days, if we have good weather.”
“Shall you be sorry?”
“Oh, I like the sea very well.”
“But the new life you are coming to,—doesn't that alarm you sometimes?”
“Yes, it does,” she admitted, with a kind of reluctance.
“So much that you would like to turn back from it?”
“Oh, no!” she answered quickly. Of course not, Staniford thought; nothing could be worse than going back to South Bradfield. “I keep thinking about it,” she added. “You say Venice is such a very strange place. Is it any use my having seen Messina?”
“Oh, all Italian cities have something in common.”
“I presume,” she went on, “that after I get there everything will become natural. But I don't like to look forward. It—scares me. I can't form any idea of it.”
“You needn't be afraid,” said Staniford. “It's only more beautiful than anything you can imagine.”