RODERICK HUDSON
"The daughter 's simply a breathing goddess," Roderick instantly returned.
"Just so. She 's all the more dangerous."
"Dangerous? What will she do to me? She doesn't bite, I imagine."
"It remains to be seen. There are two kinds of women — you ought to know by this time — the safe and the unsafe. Besides, there 's more than one way of biting — and I thought you had been bitten."
"My dear man," smiled Roderick very boldly, "with you to plaster me up —!" But he broke off — only to fall gaily a-whistling: a demonstration addressed apparently to the advent, as he had said, of his fortune.
In calling this young lady and her mamma queer people Rowland had perhaps too crudely betrayed his now alert sense for possible complications. They were so marked a variation from the monotonous troop of his compatriots that he felt much curiosity as to the sources of the change, especially since he doubted greatly whether on the whole it elevated the type. During the next week he saw the two ladies driving daily in a well-appointed landau, with the Cavaliere and the poodle in the front seat. From Mrs. Light he received a gracious salute, tempered by her native majesty; but the young girl, looking straight before her, seemed profoundly indifferent to observers. Her extraordinary beauty, however, had already made observers numerous and given the haunters of the Pincian plenty to talk about. The echoes of their commentary reached Rowland's ears; but he had little taste for raw rumour and preferred it responsibly
160
