With the third, with Mrs. Arbuthnot, he had up to this made least headway, for she was so very retiring and quiet.  But might not this very retiringness, this tendency to avoid the others and spend her time alone, indicate that she too was troubled?  If so, he was her man.  He would cultivate her.  He would follow her and sit with her, and encourage her to tell him about herself.  Arbuthnot, he understood from Lotty, was a British Museum official—­nothing specially important at present, but Mr. Wilkins regarded it as his business to know all sorts and kinds.  Besides, there was promotion.  Arbuthnot, promoted, might become very much worth while.

As for Lotty, she was charming.  She really had all the qualities he had credited her with during his courtship, and they had been, it appeared, merely in abeyance since.  His early impressions of her were now being endorsed by the affection and even admiration Lady Caroline showed for her.  Lady Caroline Dester was the last person, he was sure, to be mistaken on such a subject.  Her knowledge of the world, her constant association with only the best, must make her quite unerring.  Lotty was evidently, then, that which before marriage he had believed her to be—­she was valuable.  She certainly had been most valuable in introducing him to Lady Caroline and Mrs. Fisher.  A man in his profession could be immensely helped by a clever and attractive wife.  Why had she not been attractive sooner?  Why this sudden flowering?

Mr. Wilkins began too to believe there was something peculiar, as Lotty had almost at once informed him, in the atmosphere of San Salvatore.  It promoted expansion.  It brought out dormant qualities.  And feeling more and more pleased, and even charmed, by his wife, and very content with the progress he was making with the two others, and hopeful of progress to be made with the retiring third, Mr. Wilkins could not remember ever having had such an agreeable holiday.  The only thing that might perhaps be bettered was the way they would call him Mr. Wilkins.  Nobody said Mr. Mellersh-Wilkins.  Yet he had introduced himself to Lady Caroline—­he flinched a little on remembering the circumstances—­as Mellersh-Wilkins.

Still, this was a small matter, not enough to worry about.  He would be foolish if in such a place and such society he worried about anything.  He was not even worrying about what the holiday was costing, and had made up his mind to pay not only his own expenses but his wife’s as well, and surprise her at the end by presenting her with her nest-egg as intact as when she started; and just the knowledge that he was preparing a happy surprise for her made him feel warmer than ever towards her.

In fact Mr. Wilkins, who had begun by being consciously and according to plan on his best behaviour, remained on it unconsciously, and with no effort at all.