It was years since Elgar and the Bradshaws had met.  As a boy he had often visited their house, but from the time of his leaving home at sixteen to go to a boarding-school, his acquaintance with them, as with all his other Manchester friends, practically ceased.  They had often heard of him—­too often, in their opinion.  Aware of his arrival at Naples, they had expressed no wish to see him.  Still, now that he met them in this unexpected way, they could not but assume friendliness.  Jacob, not on the whole intolerant, was willing enough to take “the lad” on his present merits; Reuben had the guise and manners of a gentleman, and perhaps was grown out of his reprobate habits.  Mr. Bradshaw and his wife could not but notice Cecily’s agitation at the meeting; they exchanged wondering glances, and presently found an opportunity for a few words apart.  What was going on?  How had these two young folks become so intimate?  Well, it was no business of theirs.  Lucky that Mrs. Baske was one of the company.

And why should Cecily disguise that now only was her enjoyment of the day begun—­that only now had the sunshine its familiar brightness, the ancient walls and ways their true enchantment?  She did not at once become more talkative, but the shadow had passed utterly from her face, and there was no more listlessness in her movements.

“I have stopped here on my way to join Mallard,” was all Reuben said, in explanation of his presence.

All kept together.  Mr. Bradshaw resumed his interest in antiquities, but did not speak so freely about them as before.

“Your brother knows a good deal more about these things than I do, Mrs. Baske,” he remarked.  “He shall give us the benefit of his Latin.”

Miriam resolutely kept her eyes alike from Reuben and from Cecily.  Hitherto her attention to the ruins had been intermittent, but occasionally she had forgotten herself so far as to look and ponder; now she saw nothing.  Her mind was gravely troubled; she wished only that the day were over.

As for Elgar, he seemed to the Bradshaws singularly quiet, modest, inoffensive.  If he ventured a suggestion or a remark, it was in a subdued voice and with the most pleasant manner possible.  He walked for a time with Mrs. Bradshaw, and accommodated himself with much tact to her way of regarding foreign things, whether ancient or modern.  In a short time all went smoothly again.

Not since they shook hands had Elgar and Cecily encountered each other’s glance.  They looked at each other often, very often, but only when the look could not be returned; they exchanged not a syllable.  Yet both knew that at some approaching moment, for them the supreme moment of this day, their eyes must meet.  Not yet; not casually, and whilst others regarded them.  The old ruins would be kind.

It was in the house of Meleager.  They had walked among the coloured columns, and had visited the inner chamber, where upon the wall is painted the Judgment of Paris.  Mr. Bradshaw passed out through the narrow door. way, and his voice was dulled; Miriam passed with him, and, close after her, Mrs. Bradshaw.  Reuben seemed to draw aside for Cecily, but she saw his hand extended towards her—­it held a spray of maidenhair that he had just gathered.  She took it, or would have taken it, but her hand was closed in his.