‘I see it is useless to say anything more to you,’ replied Mrs. Charrington, disguising her vexation at having thus overshot her mark, as she now plainly perceived she had done. ‘I have relieved my mind, at any rate, and discharged what I felt to be an imperative duty. It hasn’t been pleasant, and I am aware that it is the kind of thing one never gets any thanks for. I have no objection to talk about something else, as you have taken the bit between your teeth.’ They did not return to the subject. Mrs. Charrington exerted herself to play the amiable hostess, Minna was the complaisant guest; but she felt all the time that Mrs. Charrington was disapproving, deeply disapproving, and the intercourse was constrained and unsatisfactory. When Minna went away, ‘Remember,’ said her friend, ‘I decline to call upon you at that house. I shall look you up at the studio now and then, but I don’t countenance Casa Dietrich.’ ‘How pleasant it would be if we could crush out all pain and wrong and wickedness by simply saying we did not countenance them!’ was Minna’s retort, in a tone not devoid of bitterness. ‘Good-night,’ she added, and went out and down the stairs. She breathed a long sigh as she got into a little carriage, and gave the address of Casa Dietrich. ‘She will never understand and never approve,’ she said to herself. ‘And it will be the same with everyone I know. They will call me mad and a simpleton. Well, they will just have to call me so. What would it matter if Fulvia were happy? How I wish she was my daughter! I wish I had a daughter.’ CHAPTER XI. On the following morning, just as Minna was preparing to go out to her studio, there came a tap on the door, followed by the entrance of Fulvia. ‘I am so sorry, signora,’ said she. ‘Mamma has sent me to say that I shall not be able to go with you to-day. We are to go out, she and I, and Signor Marchmont. We shall be out all day, and we shall be busy for several days.’ She spoke listlessly and mechanically, without a trace of spirit or animation. ‘Oh, I am sorry. What makes you so busy?’ ‘My trousseau,’ replied Fulvia coldly. ‘Your trousseau? Why--has there--is anything settled?’ ‘I am to be married in the middle of April--in a month from now. And it seems I am to be dressed up for it, like our Blessed Lady for a _festa_.’ She looked drearily round the room; her face was pale, her lips looked drawn and dry. She went up to the cage where the canaries now flourished exceedingly in the comfort of Minna’s room, and on the good food which she gave them, and mechanically brushed some grains of seed from the cloth into her hand, dropped them into the fender before the stove, and stood there as if not knowing what to do next.