lake, with its coloured sails, its incongruous puffing
steamboats; down the valley, away to the rosy peaks of Monte
Sfiorito, and the deep blue sky behind them. She plucked a spray
of jessamine, and brushed the cool white blossoms across her
cheek, and inhaled their fairy fragrance.

"An obscure scribbler of fiction," she mused. "Ah, well, one
is an obscure reader of fiction oneself. We must send to
London for Mr. Felix Mildmay Wildmay's works."




VIII


On Monday evening, at the end of dinner, as she set the fruit
before him, "The Signorino will take coffee?" old Marietta
asked.

Peter frowned at the fruit, figs and peaches--

"Figs imperial purple, and blushing peaches"--

ranged alternately, with fine precision, in a circle, round a
central heap of translucent yellow grapes.

"Is this the produce of my own vine and fig-tree?" he demanded.

"Yes, Signorino; and also peach-tree," replied Marietta.