Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 1 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/346

 with his mistress. Rowland vented his confusion in dealing a rap with his stick at the animal's unmelodious muzzle, and rapidly quitted the house. He saw Mrs. Light's carriage waiting at the door, and heard afterwards that Christina had gone home to dinner.

A couple of days later he went for a fortnight to Florence. He had twenty minds to leave Italy altogether, and at Florence he could at least more freely decide upon his future movements. He felt deeply, incureably disgusted. Reflective benevolence stood prudently aside for the time, touching the source of his irritation with no softening side-lights. It was the middle of March, however, and by the middle of March, in Florence, the spring is already warm and deep. He had an infinite taste for the place and the season, but as he strolled by the Arno and paused here and there in the great galleries they failed to bring balm to his ache. He was sore at heart, and as the days went by the soreness rather deepened than healed. He had a complaint against fortune and, good-natured as he was, his good-nature itself now took up the quarrel. He had tried to be wise, he had tried to be kind, he had engaged in an estimable enterprise; but his wisdom, his kindness, his labour, had all been thrown back in his face. He was intensely disappointed, and his disappointment for a while burned hot. The sense of wasted time, of wasted hope and faith, kept him constant company. There were times when the beautiful things about him only exasperated his pain. He went to the Pitti Palace, and Raphael's 312