"You do not care to know the result of my experiment--whether it has been a failure or a success?" he said. "You told me the result of yours." "I did not mean to tell you. It was forced from me by your misunderstanding." "Misunderstandings, because so slight that one cannot attack them, are horrible things. Let there be none between us now." "There is none." "I do not know." He leaned back in his chair and looked up at the soft darkness of the Italian night. "I have one more favor to ask," he said, presently. "You have granted me many; grant me this. At what hour do you go to-morrow?" "In the afternoon." "Give me a little time with you in the Boboli Garden in the morning." "You are an accomplished workman, Mr. Morgan; you want to finish with a polish; you do not like to leave rough ends. Be content; I will accept the intention as carried out, and suppose that all the last words have been beautifully and shiningly spoken. That will do quite as well." "Put any construction upon it you please," he answered. "But consent." But it was with great difficulty that he obtained that consent. "There is really nothing you can say that I care to hear," she declared, at last. "The king is dead! My time is ended, evidently! But, as there _is_ something you can say which _I_ care to hear, I again urge you to consent." Miss Stowe rose, and passed through the long window into the lighted empty room, decked as usual with many flowers; here she stood, looking at him, as he entered also. "I have tried my best to prevent it," she said. "You have." "And you still insist?" "I do." "Very well; I consent. But you will not forget that I tried," she said. "Good-night." The next morning at ten, as he entered the old amphitheatre, he saw her; she was sitting on one of the upper stone seats, under a statue of Diana. "I would rather go to our old place," he said, as he came up; "the seat under the tree, you know." "I like this better." "As you prefer, of course. It will be more royal, more in state; but, to be in accordance with it, you should have been clothed in something majestic, instead of that soft, yielding hue." "That is hardly necessary," she answered. "By which you mean, I suppose, that your face is not yielding. And indeed it is not." She was dressed in cream color from head to foot; she held open, poised on one shoulder, a large, heavily fringed, cream-colored parasol. Above this soft drapery and under this soft shade the darkness of her hair and eyes was doubly apparent. He took a seat beside her, removed his hat, and let the breeze play over his head and face; it was a warm summer morning, and they were in the shadow. "I believe I was to tell you the result of my experiment," he said, after a while, breaking the silence which she did not break. "You wished it; I did not ask it."