"Well, we won't fight about her at this late day. Tell me where you have been, and where you are going, and how long you are to stay in Europe." Katy, glad to change the subject, complied, and the conversation diverged into comparison of plans and experiences. Lilly had been in Europe nearly a year, and had seen "almost everything," as she phrased it. She and her mother had spent the previous winter in Italy, had taken a run into Russia, "done" Switzerland and the Tyrol thoroughly, and France and Germany, and were soon going into Spain, and from there to Paris, to shop in preparation for their return home in the spring. "Of course we shall want quantities of things," she said. "No one will believe that we have been abroad unless we bring home a lot of clothes. The _lingerie_ and all that is ordered already; but the dresses must be made at the last moment, and we shall have a horrid time of it, I suppose. Worth has promised to make me two walking-suits and two ball-dresses, but he's very bad about keeping his word. Did you do much when you were in Paris, Katy?" "We went to the Louvre three times, and to Versailles and St. Cloud," said Katy, wilfully misunderstanding her. "Oh, I didn't mean that kind of stupid thing; I meant gowns. What did you buy?" "One tailor-made suit of dark blue cloth." "My! what moderation!" Shopping played a large part in Lilly's reminiscences. She recollected places, not from their situation or beauty or historical associations, or because of the works of art which they contained, but as the places where she bought this or that. "Oh, that dear Piazza di Spagna!" she would say; "that was where I found my rococo necklace, the loveliest thing you ever saw, Katy." Or, "Prague--oh yes, mother got the most enchanting old silver chatelaine there, with all kinds of things hanging to it,--needlecases and watches and scent-bottles, all solid, and so beautifully chased." Or again, "Berlin was horrid, we thought; but the amber is better and cheaper than anywhere else,--great strings of beads, of the largest size and that beautiful pale yellow, for a hundred francs. You must get yourself one, Katy." Poor Lilly! Europe to her was all "things." She had collected trunks full of objects to carry home, but of the other collections which do not go into trunks, she had little or none. Her mind was as empty, her heart as untouched as ever; the beauty and the glory and the pathos of art and history and Nature had been poured out in vain before her closed and indifferent eyes.