Page:The Princess Casamassima (London and New York, Macmillan & Co., 1886), Volume 3.djvu/252

 'Yes, but perhaps it won't be for long.'

'I don't care for that; I will wait. I hope you don't object to my company,' she went on, smiling.

'It is good, it is good,' Schinkel responded, through his smoke.

'Then I will send away my cab.' She returned to the vehicle and paid the driver, who said, 'Thank you, my lady,' with expression, and drove off.

'You gave him too much,' observed Schinkel, when she came back.

'Oh, he looked like a nice man. I am sure he deserved it.'

'It is very expensive,' Schinkel went on, sociably.

'Yes, and I have no money, but it's done. Was there no one else in the house while the woman was away?' the Princess asked.

'No, the people are out; she only has single men. I asked her that. She has a daughter, but the daughter has gone to see her cousin. The mother went only a hundred yards, round the corner there, to buy a pennyworth of milk. She locked this door, and put the key in her pocket; she stayed at the grocer's, where she got the milk, to have a little conversation with a friend she met there. You know ladies always stop like that—nicht wahr? It was half an hour later that I came. She told me that he was at home, and I went up to his room. I got no sound, as I have told you. I came down and spoke to her again, and she told me what I say.'

'Then you determined to wait, as I have done,' said the Princess.

'Oh, yes, I want to see him.'