"'Like it' is a proposition so general. Perhaps I am burning
to tell someone what I think of it in detail."

She smiled into his eyes, a trifle oddly.

"If you are, then I know someone who is burning to hear you,"
he avowed.

"Well, then, I think--I think . . . " she began, on a note of
deliberation. "But I 'm afraid, just now, it would take too
long to formulate my thought. Perhaps I'll try another day."

She gave him a derisory little nod--and in a minute was well up
the lawn, towards the castle.

Peter glared after her, his fists clenched, teeth set.

"You fiend!" he muttered. Then, turning savagely upon himself,
"You duffer!"

Nevertheless, that evening, he said to Marietta, "The plot
thickens. We've advanced a step. We've reached what the
vulgar call a psychological moment. She's seen my Portrait of
a Lady. But as yet, if you can believe me, she doesn't dream
who painted it; and she has n't recognised the subject. As if
one were to face one's image in the glass, and take it for
another's! 3--I 'll--I 'll double your wages--if you will
induce events to hurry up."

However, as he spoke English, Marietta was in no position to