Nora, however, wished to understand.

“I can’t imagine why you should read The Times,” she said with emphasis, as Connie pushed her tray away, and looked for her cigarettes.  “What have you to do with politics?”

“Why, The Times is all about people I know!” said Connie, opening amused eyes.  “Look there!” And she pointed to the newspaper lying open amid the general litter of her morning’s post, and to a paragraph among the foreign telegrams describing the excitement in Rome over a change of Ministry.  “Fall of the Italian Cabinet.  The King sends for the Marchese Bardinelli.”

“And there’s a letter from Elisa Bardinelli, telling me all about it!” She tossed some closely-written sheets to Nora, who took them up doubtfully.

“It is in Italian!” she said, as though she resented the fact.

“Well, of course!  Did you think it would be in Russian?  You really ought to learn Italian, Nora.  Shall I teach you?”

“Well—­it might be useful for my Literature,” said Nora slowly.  “There are all those fellows Chaucer borrowed from—­and then Shakespeare.  I wouldn’t mind.”

“Thank you!” said Connie, laughing.  “And then look at the French news.  That’s thrilling!  Sir Wilfrid’s going to throw up the Embassy and retire.  I stayed with them a night in Paris on my way through—­and they never breathed.  But I thought something was up.  Sir Wilfrid’s a queer temper.  I expect he’s had a row with the Foreign Office.  They were years in Rome, and of course we knew them awfully well.  Mamma adored her!”

And leaning back with her hands behind her head, Connie’s sparkling look subsided for a moment into a dreamy sweetness.

“I suppose you think Oxford a duck-pond after all that!” said Nora pugnaciously.

Constance laughed.

“Why, it’s new.  It’s experience.  It’s all to the good.”

“Oh, you needn’t suppose I am apologising for Oxford!” cried Nora.  “I think, of course, it’s the most interesting place in the world.  It’s ideas that matter, and ideas come from the universities!” And the child-student of seventeen drew herself up proudly, as though she bore the honour of all academie on her sturdy shoulders.

Constance went into a fit of laughter.

“And I think they come from the people who do things, and not only from the people who read and write about them when they’re done.  But goodness—­what does it matter where they come from?  Go away, Nora, and let me dress!”

“There are several things I want to know,” said Nora deliberately, not budging.  “Where did you get to know Mr. Falloden?”

The colour ran up inconveniently in Connie’s cheeks.

“I told you,” she said impatiently.  “No!—­I suppose you weren’t there.  I met him on the Riviera.  He came out for the Christmas holidays.  He was in the villa next to us, and we saw him every day.”

“How you must have hated him!” said Nora, with energy, her hands round her knees, her dark brows frowning.