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401 THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY. 401 " I came up on purpose to have a look at it." She went into the Tribune, and he slowly accompanied her. " I suppose I have seen it, but I didn't know it was yours. I don't remember pictures especially that sort." She had pointed out her favourite work ; and he asked her if it was about Correggio that she wished to talk with him. " ^"o," said Henrietta, "it's about something less harmonious !" They had the small, brilliant room, a splendid cabinet of trea- sures, to themselves ; there was only a custode hovering about, the Medicean Venus. " I want you to do me a favour," Miss Stackpole went on. Caspar Goodwood frowned a little, but he expressed no em- barrassment at the sense of not looking eager. His face was that of a much older man than our earlier friend. " I'm sure it's something I shan't like," he said, rather loud. " No, I don't think you will like it. If you did, it would be no favour." "Well, let us hear it," he said, in the tone of a man quite conscious of his own reasonableness. "You may say there is no particular reason why you should do me a favour. Indeed, I only know of one : the fact that if you would let me I would gladly do you one." Her soft, exact tone, in which there was no attempt at effect, had an extreme sincerity ; and her companion, though he presented rather a hard surface, could not help being touched by it. When he was touched he rarely showed it, however, by the usual signs ; he neither blushed, nor looked away, nor looked conscious. He only fixed his attention more directly ; he seemed to consider with added firmness. Henrietta went on therefore disinterest- edly, without the sense of an advantage. " I may say now, indeed it seems a good time that if I have ever annoyed you (and I think sometimes that I have), it is because I knew that I was willing to suffer annoyance for you. I have troubled you doubtless. But I would take trouble for you." Goodwood hesitated. " You are taking trouble now." " Yes, I am, some. I want you to consider whether it is better on the whole that you should go to Rome." " I thought you were going to say that ! " Goodwood ex- claimed, rather artlessly. " You have considered it, then 1 " " Of course I have, very carefully. I have looked all round it. Otherwise I shouldn't have come as far as this. That's what I stayed in Pa'ris two months for; I was thinking it over." D D