Arabella had once told her of this lady’s story, and she felt that the time in Bordeaux when the beautiful Therese wore the red cap of Liberty and hung upon the arm of one who had swum in the blood of the aristocrats, must have been an experience worth having in life.  Her study of Madame Tallien went no further; it was the lurid revolutionary part in her career that she liked.

Mr. Hanbury-Green was very careful at first.  He was quite aware that he was only received with empressement because he was successful; he knew and appreciated the fact that Cecilia Cricklander only cared for members of a winning side.  He felt like that about people himself, and he respected her for the way she fought to secure a footing among the hated upper classes, and then trampled upon their necks.  There were no shades of her character which would have disgusted or dismayed him; even the knowledge that her erudition was merely parrot-talk, would only have appealed to his admiration as a further proof of her sagacity.

They went on to Venice the day after he arrived, with Arabella to make a chaperoning third, and for the first two days afterwards Cecilia kept him at arm’s length, but not waiting for his dinner!  Some instinct told her that in his home circle he would probably have been accustomed to worthy, punctual women, and, while she enjoyed tantalizing him, she knew that he had a nasty temper and could not be provoked too far.  No bonds of honor or chivalry would control his actions as they would those of John Derringham.  She was dealing with as lawless a being as herself, and it was very refreshing.  Mr. Hanbury-Green knew her one weak point—­she was intensely sensitive of the world’s opinion, as are all people who inwardly know they are shams.  She would have hated to be the center of a scandal, from the point of view that it would irreparably close doors to her; and her resentment of barriers and barrier-makers was always present.

This he would remember as his strong card—­the last to be played.—­If she continued being capricious until the moment of her fiance’s expected return, he would use all his cunning—­and it was no inconsiderable quantity—­and compromise her irrevocably, and so get her to surrender upon his terms.  For he had made up his mind, as he sped to Florence, that Cecilia Cricklander should return to England as his wife.

They had four days of the usual gay parties for every meal—­there happened to be a number of people passing through and staying at Venice—­and the early September weather was glorious and very hot.

Mrs. Cricklander delighted in a gondola.  There was something about it which set off her stately beauty, she felt, and she reveled in the admiration she provoked; and so did Mr. Hanbury-Green—­he prized that which the crowd applauded.  But time was passing, and nothing the least definite was settled yet, although he knew he had obtained a certain mastery over her.