Page:The Golden Bowl (Scribner, New York, 1909), Volume 1.djvu/144

THE GOLDEN BOWL Charlotte, frankly charmed with the cup, smiled back at him now. "A lost art?"

"Call it a lost art."

"But of what time then is the whole thing?"

"Well, say also of a lost time."

The girl considered. "Then if it's so precious how comes it to be cheap?"

The dealer once more hung fire, but by this time the Prince had lost patience. "I'll wait for you out in the air," he said to his companion, and though he spoke without irritation he pointed his remark by passing immediately into the street, where during the next minutes the others saw him, his back to the shop-window, philosophically enough hover and light a fresh cigarette. Charlotte even took a little her time; she was aware of his funny Italian taste for London street-life.

Her host meanwhile at any rate answered her question. "Ah I've had it a long time without selling it. I think I must have been keeping it, madam, for you."

"You've kept it for me because you've thought I mightn't see what's the matter with it?"

He only continued to face her—he only continued to appear to follow the play of her mind. "What is the matter with it?"

"Oh it's not for me to say; it's for you honestly to tell me. Of course I know something must be."

"But if it's something you can't find out isn't that as good as if it were nothing?"

"I probably should find out as soon as I had paid for it." 114