After dinner, at the Cardinal's invitation, the Duchessa went
to the piano, and played Bach and Scarlatti. Her face, in the
soft candlelight, as she discoursed that "luminous, lucid"
music, Peter thought . . . But what do lovers always think of
their ladies' faces, when they look up from their pianos, in
soft candlelight?

Mrs. O'Donovan Florence, taking her departure, said to the
Cardinal, "I owe your Eminence the two proudest days of my
life. The first was when I read in the paper that you had
received the hat, and I was able to boast to all my
acquaintances that I had been in the convent with your niece by
marriage. And the second is now, when I can boast forevermore
hereafter that I've enjoyed the honour of making my courtesy to
you."

"So," said Peter, as he walked home through the dew and the
starlight of the park, amid the phantom perfumes of the night,
"so the Cardinal does n't approve of mixed marriages and, of
course, his niece does n't, either. But what can it matter to
me? For alas and alas--as he truly said--it's hardly a
question of actuality."

And he lit a cigarette.




XX