"My heart went out to your daughter the moment I saw her," Vera said, with a sob. "I was interested in her beforehand, from what Dr. Wilmot told us--but she is so amiable, so beautiful. One look made me love her. I will do all I can--all--all--but it is so little!" "No, it is a great deal. Your youth, your sweetness, make you the companion she longs for. She has friends of her own age in Rome, but they are girls just entering Society, self-absorbed, frivolous, caring for nothing but gaiety. I doubt if they have ever added to her happiness. She wanted an English friend; and if you will be that friend, she will give you love for love. Forgive me for detaining you so long. I will call upon Lady Felicia this afternoon, if she will allow me--or perhaps I had better wait until she has been so good as to call upon my daughter. I know that English ladies are particular about details!" Vera dared not say that Grannie was not particular, since she had heard her discuss some trivial lapse of etiquette, involving depreciation of her own dignity, for the space of an afternoon. Clever girls who live with grandmothers have to bear these things. Signor Provana carried her basket upstairs for her, and only left her on the second-floor landing, with a thoroughly British shake-hands. He was the most English foreigner Vera had ever met. She had to give Grannie a minute account of all that had happened, and Grannie was particularly amiable, and warmly interested in Miss Provana's charm, and Mr. Provana's pathetic affection for his consumptive daughter. "They are evidently nobodies, from a social point of view," Lady Felicia remarked, with the pride of a long line of Disbrowes in the turn of her head towards the open window, as if dismissing a subject too unimportant for her consideration; "but I dare say the man's wealth gives him a kind of position in Rome, and even in London." Vera told her that Signor Provana wished to call upon her, but would not venture to do so till she had been so kind as to call upon his daughter. This was soothing. "I see he has not lived in London for nothing!" she said. "I will call on Miss Provana this afternoon. You must help to dress me. Lidcott has no taste." On this Vera was bold enough to say she had accepted an invitation to take tea with the invalid, without waiting to consult Grannie. "You did quite right. Great indulgence must be given to a sick child. In that case I will defer my visit till tea-time, and we will go together. I want to be friendly, rather than ceremonious." Vera was delighted to find Grannie unusually accommodating, and that none of those unreasonable objections and unforeseen scruples to which Grannie was subject were to interfere with her pleasure in Giulia's society.