Mallard kept silence for a space; then said: 

“Let us speak of what we have been avoiding.  How has that marriage turned out?”

“I have told you all I know.  There’s no reason to suppose that things are anything but well.”

“I don’t like her coming abroad alone; I have no faith in that plea of work.  I suspect things are not well.”

“A cynic—­which I am not—­would suggest that a wish had something to do with the thought.”

“He would be cynically wrong,” replied Mallard, with calmness.

“Why shouldn’t she come abroad alone?  There’s nothing alarming in the fact that they no longer need to see each other every hour.  And one takes for granted that they, at all events, are not bourgeois; their life won’t be arranged exactly like that of Mr. and Mrs. Jones the greengrocers.”

“No,” said the other, musingly.

“In what direction do you imagine that Cecily will progress?  Possibly she has become acquainted with disillusion.”

“Possibly?”

“Well, take it for certain.  Isn’t that an inevitable step in her education?  Things may still be well enough, philosophically speaking.  She has her life to live—­we know it will be to the end a modern life. Servetur ad imum—­and so on; that’s what one would wish, I suppose?  We have no longer to take thought for her.”

“But we are allowed to wish the best.”

“What is the best?” said Spenee, sustaining his tone of impartial speculation.  “Are you quite sure that Mr. and Mrs. Jones are not too much in your mind?”

“Whatever modern happiness may mean, I am inclined to think that modern unhappiness is not unlike that of old-fashioned people.”

“My dear fellow, you are a halter between two opinions.  You can’t make up your mind in which direction to look.  You are a sort of Janus, with anxiety on both faces.”

“There’s a good deal of truth in that,” admitted the artist, with a growl.

“Get on with your painting, and whatever else of practical you have in mind.  Leave philosophy to men of large leisure and placid pulses, like myself.  Accept the inevitable.”

“I do so.”

“But not with modern detachment,” said Spence, smiling.

“Be hanged with your modernity!  I believe myself distinctly the more modern of the two.”

“Not with regard to women.  When you marry, you will be a rigid autocrat, and make no pretence about it.  You don’t think of women as independent beings, who must save or lose themselves on their own responsibility.  You are not willing to trust them alone.”

“Well, perhaps you are right.”

“Of course I am.  Come and dine at the hotel.  I think Seaborne will be there.”

“No, thank you.”

Mallard had waited but a few minutes in the court of the Palazzo Borghese next morning, when Miriam joined him.  There was some constraint on both sides.  Miriam looked as if she did not wish yesterday’s conversation to be revived in their manner of meeting.  Her “Good-morning, Mr. Mallard,” had as little reference as possible to the fact of this being an appointment.  The artist was in quite another mood than that of yesterday; his smile was formal, and he seemed indisposed for conversation.