Page:In a winter city, by Ouida.djvu/242

Rh they think it is by Il Moretto. The face and dress are Venetian, they say; but you care nothing about all that, do you?"

"Nothing," said Madame Mila, with a yawn. "I suppose if it take your fancy you'll be buying the whole church with it in, if you can't get it any other way. I wish I'd your money, I wouldn't waste it on old pictures, that only make a room dark; and the kind of light they want is horribly unbecoming to people."

"I promise you I shall not hang an altar-piece in a room," said the Lady Hilda. "I leave that for the heretics and the bourgeoisie. Good-bye, my dear."

"Who's going with you?" cried Madame Mila, after her: Lady Hilda hesitated a moment.

"Nina is, and the French artist who has discovered the Moretto, andM. della Rocca."

Madame Mila laughed, and took up a little mirror to see if all the colour on her face were quite right. One horrible never-to-be-forgotten day—one eyebrow had been higher than the other.

Lady Hilda, descending the hôtel staircase,