"I was with my father, after I left school to go out there. It was delightful being with him—we are alone together in the world, he and I—but there was none of the society I like best. One never heard of a picture—never of a book, except bad ones."
"Never of a picture? Why, wasn't all life a picture?"
Miss Fancourt looked over the delightful place where they sat. "Nothing to compare with this. I adore England!" she exclaimed.
"Ah, of course I don't deny that we must do something with it yet."
"It hasn't been touched, really," said the girl.
"Did Henry St. George say that?"
There was a small and, as he felt it, venial intention of irony in his question; which, however, the girl took very simply, not noticing the insinuation. "Yes, he says it has not been touched—not touched comparatively," she answered, eagerly. "He's so interesting about it. To listen to him makes one want so to do something."
"It would make me want to," said Paul Overt, feeling strongly, on the instant, the suggestion of what she said and of the emotion with which she said it, and what an incentive, on St. George's lips, such a speech might be.
"Oh, you—as if you hadn't! I should like so to hear you talk together," the girl added, ardently.
"That's very genial of you; but he would have it all his own way. I'm prostrate before him."
Marian Fancourt looked earnest for a moment. "Do you think then he's so perfect?"
"Far from it. Some of his later books seem to me awfully queer."
"Yes, yes—he knows that."
Paul Overt stared. "That they seem to me awfully queer?"
