Such a “case” is a delightful thing to speculate upon. At the Priory, it could only be discussed in secret conclave; and though no doubt the experienced persons chiefly concerned were quite conscious of the subject which occupied their friends’ thoughts, there was no further reference made to it between them, and everything went on as it had always done. The night before their return to town, Markham, in the solitude of the house, from which all the guests had just departed, called Frances outside to bear him company while he smoked his cigarette. He was walking up and down on the lawn in the grey stillness of a cloudy warm evening, when there was no light to speak of anywhere, and yet a good deal to be seen through the wavering greyness of sky and sea. A few stars, very mild and indistinct, looked out at the edges of the clouds here and there; the great water-line widened and cleared towards the horizon; and in the far distance, where a deeper greyness showed the mainland, the gleam of a lighthouse surprised the dark by slow continual revolutions. There was no moon: something softer, more seductive than even the moon, was in this absence of light. “Well--now they’re gone, what do you think of them, Fan? They’re very good specimens of the English country-house party--all kinds: the respectable family, the sturdy old fogy, the rich young man without health, and the muscular young man without money.” There had been, it is needless to say, various other members of the party, who, being quite unimportant to this history, need not be mentioned here. “What do you think of them, little un? You have your own way of seeing things.” “I--like them all well enough, Markham,” without enthusiasm Frances replied. “That is comprehensive at least. So do I, my dear. It would not have occurred to me to say it; but it is just the right thing to say. They pull you to pieces almost before your face; but they are not ill-natured. They tell all sorts of stories about each other----” “No, Markham; I don’t think that is just.” “----Without meaning any harm,” he went on. “Fan, in countries where conversation is cultivated, perhaps people don’t talk scandal--I only say perhaps--but here we are forced to take to it for want of anything else to say. What did your Giovannis and Giacomos talk of in your village out yonder?” Markham pointed towards the clear blue-grey line of the horizon, beyond which lay America, if anything; but he meant distance, and that was enough. “They talked--about the olives, how they were looking, and if it was going to be a bad or an indifferent year.” “And then?”