"I think she is as well guarded as a girl can be; but, as I said before, education is no substitute for experience. Don't think me captious, however. I sympathize entirely with the course you have taken. If I had a daughter, I should like her to be brought up on the same principles." "Cecily is very mature for her age," continued Mrs. Lessingham, with evident pleasure in stating and restating her grounds of confidence. "She feels strongly, but never apart from judgment. Now and then she astonishes me with her discernment of character; clearness of thought seems almost to anticipate in her the experience on which you lay such stress. Have you noticed her with Mr. Mallard? How differently many girls would behave! But Cecily understands him so well; she knows he thinks of her as a child, and nothing could be more simply natural than her friendship for him. I suppose Mr. Mallard is one of the artists who never marry?" "I don't know him well enough to decide that," answered Eleanor, with a curious smile. It was in the evening of this day, when the Spences and Miriam were sitting together after dinner, that a servant announced a visit of Reuben Elgar, adding that he was in his sister's room. Miriam went to join him. "You can spare me a minute or two?" he asked cheerily, as she entered. "Certainly. You are just back from Pompeii?" "From Castellamare--from Sorrento the indescribable--from Amalfi the unimaginable--from Salerno! Leave Naples without seeing those places, and hold yourself for ever the most wretched of mortals! Old Mallard forced me to go with him, and I am in his debt to eternity!" This exalted manner of speech was little to Miriam's taste, especially from her brother. Sobriety was what she desired in him. It seemed a small advantage that his extravagance should exhibit itself in this way rather than in worse; the danger was still there. "Sit down, and talk more quietly. You say Mr. Mallard _forced_ you to go?" "I was coming back to Naples from Pompeii. By-the-bye, I went up Vesuvius, and descended shoeless. The guides ought to have metal boots on hire. I was coming back, but Mallard clutched me by the coat-collar. Even now I've come sorely against his will. I left him at Amalfi. I'm going to settle my affairs here to-morrow, and join him again. He's persuaded me to try and work at Amalfi." "How long do you think of staying there?" "It all depends. Perhaps I shan't be able to do anything, after all." "But surely that depends on yourself." "Not a bit! If I were a carpenter or bricklayer, one might say so--in a sense. But such work as I am going to do is a question of mood, influences, caprices--" Miriam reflected. "Mr. Mallard was unwilling to let you return here?" "Naturally. He knows my uncertainty. But I have promised him; I shall keep my word." "He is working himself?"