“Are you going to make a stay in Genoa?” she asked after a pause.
“A few days,” said Cosmo, in an irresolute tone, because he did not know what answer was expected to this inquiry, the first which had nothing to do with Yorkshire. His interest in the rest of Italy was, he perceived, very small. But by the association of ideas he thought suddenly of the passing hours. He raised his eyes to a faintly engraved brass disc with black hands hung on the wall above one of the two doors at that end of the room which he was facing. The black hands pointed to eleven, but what prevented his eyes from returning at once to the delighted contemplation of the Countess of Montevesso was the fact that the door below the clock seemed to have moved slightly.
“I intend to see something of Italy,” he said. “My time really is my own, I have nothing special to do. It seems to me that the principal object of my journey has been attained now. I don’t think my father would be surprised to hear that I had turned back after leaving Genoa.”
The Countess looking up at this, their eyes remained fastened together for a time and Cosmo thought: “What on earth am I saying?” He watched her lips move to form the words which quite frightened him.
“Did Sir Charles give you a message for me?”
He thought he had brought this on himself. It was a painful moment. It lasted long enough to give the Countess the time to assume an expression of indifference, startling after the low tone of her question.
“No,” said Cosmo truthfully. “I have only a message for your father.” He waited a moment. “But I will tell you one of the last things Henrietta told me. She told me that when you were married my father could think of nothing for days but you.”
He did not venture to look at her; then added impulsively, “My father loved you dearly. We children could see it very well. Ad—”
“Why don’t you finish my name?” her seductive voice asked.
Cosmo coloured. “Well, you know, I never heard you really called by any other name. It came naturally since I suppose you must be—Adèle.”
Madame de Montevesso, who had been hanging on his lips, was surprised by Cosmo raising his eyes to stare intensely into the part of the room behind her back. Just as he was making his apology he had noticed the door under the clock swing open without any sound at all; and there entered quite noiselessly, too, and with something ambiguous in the very motion, a young girl (nothing could have been more unexpected) in a sort of deshabille of a white skirt and a long pink jacket of some very thin stuff which had a silky shimmer. She made a few steps and stopped. She was rather short, her hair was intensely black and drawn tightly away from her forehead. Cosmo felt sure (though he couldn’t see) that it was done in one long plait at the back. Her face was a short oval, her chin blunt, her nose a little too big and her black eyes perfectly round. Cosmo had the time to notice all this because astonishment prevented him from looking away. The girl advanced slowly if with perfect assurance, and stared unwinkingly at Cosmo, who in the extremity of his embarrassment got up from his chair. The young girl then stopped short and for a moment the three persons in the room preserved an absolute immobility. Then the Countess glanced over her shoulder leisurely and addressed Cosmo.
“This is Clelia, a niece of my husband.” Cosmo made a deep bow to the possessor of the round black eyes. “I didn’t know of her existence till about a fortnight ago,” added Madame de Montevesso carelessly. The round-eyed girl still staring hard made a curtsey to Cosmo. “My husband,” went on Adèle, “has also two old aunts living here. I have never seen them. This house is very big.”
Cosmo resumed his seat and there was a moment of silence. The girl sat down in the chair before the writing table sideways, folded her arms on its back, and rested her chin on her hands. Her round eyes examined Cosmo with a sort of animal frankness. He thought suddenly that it was time to bring his visit to an end. He would have risen at once but for the Countess de Montevesso beginning to speak to him, still in English. She seemed to have guessed what was passing through his mind.
“Don’t go yet for a moment,” she said, in a perfectly unconcerned voice, then paused. “We were talking about your father.”
“As to him,” said Cosmo, “I have nothing more to say. I have told you all the truth as far as I am certain of it.”
She inclined her head slowly and in the same level voice:
“The Court is here and most of the foreign ambassadors. We are waiting here for the arrival of the Queen of Sardinia, who may or may not come within the next month or so. This is considered a good
