so stupid that they are bored unless there is a man to entertain them. That is the origin of the legend of the sensual woman—they are as rare as black swans, or disciplined, educated women. Jenny moved Francesca’s portrait on to the easel. The white blouse and the green skirt looked hard and ugly. It would have to be toned down. The face was well drawn, the position good. This episode with Gram was really nothing to be serious about. It was time she became reasonable. She must do away with those silly notions that she was afraid of every man she met—as with Gunnar in the beginning—afraid of falling in love with him, and almost more of his falling in love with her: a thing she was so unused to that it bewildered her. Why could one not be friends with a man? If not, the world would be all a muddle. She and Gunnar were friends—a solid, comfortable friendship. There was much about Gram that would make a friendship between them quite natural. They had had much the same experiences. He was so young and so full of confidence in her; she liked his “Is it not?” and “Don’t you think?” He had talked yesterday about being in love with her—he thought at least he was, he said. She smiled to herself. A man would not speak to her as he had done if he had really fallen in love with a woman and wanted to win her. “He is a dear boy; that’s what he is.” Today he had not broached the subject. She liked him when he said that if he had been really fond of the girl he would have wished her happiness with the other man. X Jenny and Helge were running hand in hand down Via Magnanapoli. The street was merely a staircase, leading to the Trajan Forum. On the last step he drew her to him and kissed her. “Are you mad? You mustn’t kiss people in the street here.” And they both laughed. One evening they had been spoken to by two policemen on the Lateran piazza for walking up and down under the pines along the old wall kissing each other. The last sunrays brushed the bronze figures on top of the pillar and burned on the walls and on the tree-tops in the gardens. The piazza lay in the shade, with its old, rickety houses round the excavated forum below the street level. * * * * * Jenny and Helge leaned over the railing and tried to count the fat, lazy cats which had taken their abode among the stumps of pillars on the grass-covered plot. They seemed to revive a little as the twilight began to fall. A big red one which had been lying on the pedestal of the Trajan pillar stretched himself, sharpened his claws on the masonry, jumped down on to the grass, and ran away. “I make it twenty-three,” said Helge. “I counted twenty-five.” She turned round and dismissed a post card seller, who was recommending his wares in fragments of every possible language.