"I wish to sit here," she said, "and speak to Mr.
Mallet--alone." "At your pleasure, dear friend," said the prince.
The tone of each was measured, to Rowland's ear; but that of Christina was dry, and that of her husband was splendidly urbane.

Rowland remembered that the Cavaliere Giacosa had told him that Mrs.Light's candidate was thoroughly a prince, and our friend wondered how he relished a peremptory accent.

Casamassima was an Italian of the undemonstrative type, but Rowland nevertheless divined that, like other princes before him, he had made the acquaintance of the thing called compromise.

"Shall I come back ?" he asked with the same smile.
"In half an hour," said Christina.
In the clear outer light, Rowland's first impression of her was that she was more beautiful than ever.

And yet in three months she could hardly have changed; the change was in Rowland's own vision of her, which that last interview, on the eve of her marriage, had made unprecedentedly tender.
"How came you here ?" she asked.