Laura’s shoulders indicated the faintest of shrugs. Anywhere. Mama liked New York as well as most places, but personally Laura thought that the rooms in the hotels there were always too hot. They went to London a good deal. Delightful--she smiled at me politely--but one missed the sunshine. Her point of view, inevitably, was one of great sophistication. It did not, to my mind, detract from her charm, which had never been of a direct, childlike kind, but rather of a description so subtle that amongst the many it might easily pass for mere oddity. “I hope we shall meet again,” she said to me, when a certain nervous movement in the group of mama’s admirers had culminated in the detachment of a tall, fair youth, who was coming now towards Laura herself. “I am afraid that I leave here to-morrow. My pupil and I are on our way to rejoin her parents in Italy.” “We may be gone ourselves to-morrow. I meant for later on--any time, anywhere.” She smiled charmingly, but her unchildlike eyes remained serious and rather weary. I heard the fair youth say something to her, with a burst of meaningless laughter. She did not laugh in return, but her clear, well-bred little voice was raised to a sympathetic tone of interest. “Mama likes an olive in hers, always, but for me I prefer a sweet Martini--with _two_ cherries, if you please.” * * * * * I saw Laura twice again before leaving Lucerne, but we did not speak to one another. The first time, at seven o’clock the evening of that same day, was in one of the gigantic hotel corridors, on the first floor, where I was waiting for the lift that was to take me to the fifth. The hotel hairdresser, in a white coat, with an immense head of curled and discoloured yellow hair, stood before a shut bedroom door. It flew open suddenly, and then closed sharply behind Laura di san Marzano. “Vous voila donc! Eh bien, il est trop tard.” Her voice was ice, her face scornful and unbelieving as she listened to the man’s torrent of excuses for his tardiness. “Assez,” said Laura. “Madame est fort mécontente. Elle ne veut plus de vous.” “Mademoiselle----” “C’est inutile. Madame se passera de vous.” And as the hairdresser turned away, grumbling and disconcerted, she added superbly: “J’arrangerai la chose. Soyez exacte demain. Mais pour ce soir, c’est moi qui coifferai madame.” Much later in the evening, when I had long ago despatched my pupil to the bedroom opening out of mine, I returned for a moment to the hot and strident lounge in order to make certain enquiries at the office.