Page:The Princess Casamassima (London and New York, Macmillan & Co., 1886), Volume 3.djvu/73

 smile. 'Ah, I hope you haven't come to ask me to give him up!'

'On the contrary—on the contrary!' the old man rejoined, lifting his hand expressively, and with his head on one side, as if he were holding his violin.

'How do you mean, on the contrary?' the Princess demanded, after he had seated himself and she had sunk into her former place. As if that might sound contradictious, she went on: 'Surely he hasn't any fear that I shall cease to be a good friend to him?'

'I don't know what he fears; I don't know what he hopes,' said Mr. Vetch, looking at her now with a face in which she could see there was something more tonic than old-fashioned politeness. 'It will be difficult to tell you, but at least I must try. Properly speaking, I suppose, it's no business of mine, as I am not a blood-relation to the boy; but I have known him since he was an urchin, and I can't help saying that I thank you for your great kindness to him.'

'All the same, I don't think you like it,' the Princess remarked. 'To me it oughtn't to be difficult to say anything.'

'He has told me very little about you; he doesn't know I have taken this step,' the fiddler said, turning his eyes about the room, and letting them rest on Madame Grandoni.

'Why do you call it a "step"?' the Princess asked. 'That's what people say when they have to do something disagreeable.'

'I call very seldom on ladies. It's a long time since I have been in the house of a person like the Princess