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 understood it perfectly; she could not pretend that she did not. If she were not careful she would give her country away: in the privacy of her own room she had coloured up to her hair at the thought. She had a lurid vision in which the chance seemed to be greater that Sir Rufus Chasemore would bring her over to his side than that she should make him like anything he had begun by disliking; so that she resisted, with the conviction that the complications which might arise from allowing a prejudiced English man to possess himself, as he evidently desired to do, of her affections, would be much greater than a sensitive girl with other loyalties to observe might be able to manage. A moment after she had said to her companion that she did not recommend him to come to Venice she added that of course he was free to do as he liked: only why should he come if he was sure the place was so uncomfortable? To this Sir Rufus replied that it signified little how uncomfortable it was if she should be there and that there was nothing he would not put up with for the sake of a few days more of her society.

'Oh, if it's for that you are coming,' the girl replied, laughing and feeling nervous—feeling that something was in the air which she had wished precisely to keep out of it—'Oh, if it's for that you are coming you had very much better not take the trouble. You would have very little of my society. While my brother is with us all my time will be given up to him.'

'Confound your brother!' Sir Rufus exclaimed. Then he went on: 'You told me yourself he wouldn't be with you long. After he's gone you will be free again and you will still be in Venice,