Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 1 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/246

 and took him by the hand and set him on his feet in Rome?"

"Is that the popular legend?" Rowland asked.

"Oh, you need n't be modest. There was no great merit in it; there would have been none at least on my part in the same conditions. Great geniuses are not so common, and if I had discovered one in the wilderness I should have brought him out in the market-place to see how he would behave. It would be excessively amusing. You must find it so to watch Mr. Hudson, eh? Tell me this: do you think he 's going to be a real swell, a big celebrity, have his life written, make his fortune, and immortalise—as the real ones do, you know—the people he has done busts of and the women he has loved?"

"Well, that 's a large order," said Rowland. "I don't prophesy, but I 've good hopes."

Christina was silent. She stretched out her bare arm and looked at it a moment absently, turning it so as to see—or almost to see—the dimple in her elbow. This was apparently a frequent gesture with her; Rowland had already observed it. It was as coolly and naturally done as if she had been alone before her toilet-table. "So he 's one of the glories-to-be!" she suddenly resumed. "Don't you think I ought to be extremely flattered to have one of the glories-to-be perpetually hanging about? He 's the first such young lion I ever saw, but I should have known he was not a common mortal. There 's some thing strange about him. To begin with he has no manners. You may say that it's not for me to blame him, since I 've none myself. That 's very true, but 212