"And who, in the end, but Fay herself had proved it to be a whim, when, some eight months after he had first declared his suit, Carlo had found himself accepted as whole-heartedly, Mrs. Richmond affirmed, as once he had been refused? Although, of course, Fay was of a very undemonstrative nature--which perhaps was just as well in a mate of this Italian gallant, who was himself quite demonstrative enough for one household! "But there was to be no hurry about the affair, Mrs. Richmond had decided from the first; and I could imagine her bustling that decision about her mind, as a sort of anodyne for she didn't quite know what. They had been engaged already six months, and she, watching her only child's happiness very, very carefully, had gained from her care not less than certainty about the felicity of Fay's choice. There was in Carlo no note that jarred, as there often is even in the best of men; besides, he could so perfectly accommodate one's every mood, and yet lose not a fraction of his dignity in such complaisance; for, having so absolutely thrown himself at Fay's feet, she hadn't really been able to help allowing him to stay there--'as who wouldn't?' Mrs. Richmond demanded comfortably. "No, there was to be no hurrying. Carlo had been persuaded by her determination--Mrs. Richmond rather stressed her influence here--and the marriage would not take place for another six months from then; for she preferred that Fay should have reached a decent one-and-twenty before setting out on the conquest of Italy. "'But she is an odd girl, with a terrible capacity for loyalty--I suppose that's the word,' she added. 'With more loyalty than a human being can comfortably hold, I sometimes imagine.' A note of self-deprecatory anxiety in her voice conflicted oddly in one's ears with the 'happy-ever-after' tone of her previous sentences; and to help her out of her ensuing silence, I ventured that surely it was just Fay's loyalty (if that was the word), which even a stranger could feel, that made her so unusually, well, attractive for her years. "'Of course, of course....' Mrs. Richmond assented heavily; then turned in her chair directly round on me. 'But, my dear man, don't you see that when it's carried to excess it can make a very treacherous quality? When, let's say, it becomes a leading principle in life for a girl who, after all, needs only a working amount of it, all sorts of troublesome things might happen--I mean, of course, that it's just conceivable as a theory in a foolish moment such as this.... Poor Howard! to be burdened by a mother with her child's virtues for lack of any real faults! It's a sweet thought, that way.