“For you?” asked Lydia, doubtfully. “Yes. And I can easily keep him till you get back. If you're here by four--” “The train,” said Lydia, “arrives at three.” “How did you know?” asked her aunt, keenly. Lydia's eyelids fell even lower than their wont. “I looked it out in that railroad guide in the parlor.” Her aunt kissed her. “And you've thought the whole thing out, dear, haven't you? I'm glad to see you so happy about it.” “Yes,” said the girl, with a fluttering breath, “I have thought it out, and _I believe him_. I--” She tried to say something more, but could not. Mrs. Erwin rang the bell, and sent for her husband. “He knows about it, Lydia,” she said. “He's just as much interested as we are, dear, but you needn't be worried. He's a perfect post for not showing a thing if you don't want him to. He's really quite superhuman, in that,--equal to a woman. You can talk Americanisms with him. If we sat here staring at each other till four o'clock,--he _must_ go to his hotel before he comes here; and I say four at the earliest; and it's much more likely to be five or six, or perhaps evening,--I should die!” Mr. Erwin's rowing was the wonder of all Venice. There was every reason why he should fall overboard at each stroke, as he stood to propel the boat in the gondolier fashion, except that he never yet had done so. It was sometimes his fortune to be caught on the shallows by the falling tide; but on that day he safely explored the lagoons, and returned promptly at four o'clock to the palace. His wife was standing on the balcony, looking out for them, and she smiled radiantly down into Lydia's anxiously lifted face. But when she met the girl at the head of the staircase in the great hall, she embraced her, and said, with the same gay smile, “He hasn't come yet, dear, and of course he won't come till after dinner. If I hadn't been as silly as you are, Lydia, I never should have let you expect him sooner. He'll want to go to his hotel: and no matter how impatient he is, he'll want to dress, and be a little ceremonious about his call. You know we're strangers to him, whatever _you_ are.” “Yes,” said Lydia, mechanically. She was going to sit down, as she was; of her own motion she would not have stirred from the place till he came, or it was certain he would not come; but her aunt would not permit the despair into which she saw her sinking. She laughed resolutely, and said, “I think we must give up the little sentimentality of meeting him in that dress, now. Go and change it, Lydia. Put on your silk,--or wait: let me go with you. I want to try some little effects with your complexion. We've experimented with the simple and familiar, and now we'll see what can be done in the way of the magnificent and unexpected. I'm going to astonish the young man with a Venetian beauty; you know you look Italian, Lydia.” “Yes, he said so,” answered Lydia. “Did he? That shows he has an eye, and he'll appreciate what we are going to do.”