ave warned
her to expect--so visibly a gentleman; and then, with the even pink of
his complexion, his yellowish hair and beard, his alert, friendly, very
blue blue eyes--with his very blue blue flannels too, and his brick-red
knitted tie--he was so vivid and so unusual.

His appearance gave her a pause; and in the result she in her turn
almost apologized.

"This wretched book," she explained, pathetically bringing forward her
_piece justificative_, "said that it was open to the public."

The vivid young man hastened to put her in the right.

"It is--it _is_," he eagerly affirmed. "Only," he added, with a vaguely
rueful modulation, and always with that amiable abruptness, as a man
very much at his ease, while his blue eyes whimsically brightened, "only
the blessed public never comes--we're so off the beaten path. And I
suppose one mustn't expect a Scioccone"--his voice swelled on the word,
and he cast sidelong a scathing glance at his summoner--"to cope with
unprecedented situations. Will you allow me to help you out?"

"Ah," thought Lady Blanchemain, "Eton," his tone and accent now nicely
appraised by an experienced ear. "Eton--yes; and probably--h'm? Probably
Balliol," her experience led her further to surmise. But what--with her
insatiable curiosity about people, she had of course immediately begun
to wonder--what was an Eton and Balliol man doing, apparently in a
position of authority, at this remote Italian castle?

V

He helped her out, very gracefully, very gallantly; and under his
guidance she made the tour of the vast building: its greater court and
lesser court; its cloisters, with their faded frescoes, and their
marvellous outlook, northwards, upon the Alps; its immense rotunda,
springing to the open dome, where the sky was like an inset plaque of
turquoise; its "staircase of honour," guarded, in an ascending file, by
statues of men in armour; and then, on the _piano nobile_, its endless
chain of big, empty, silent, splendid state apartments, with their
pav

My Friend Prospero

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