“I don’t think I am very wild,” said Hyacinth, smiling still. He thought the old woman patronising, but he forgave her.
“I don’t know how one speaks, in this country, to young men like you. Perhaps one is considered meddling, impertinent.”
“I like the way you speak,” Hyacinth interposed.
She stared, and then with a comical affectation of dignity, replied, “You are very good. I am glad it amuses you. You are evidently intelligent and clever,” she went on, “and if you are disappointed it will be a pity.”
“How do you mean, if I am disappointed?” Hyacinth looked more grave.
“Well, I dare say you expect great things, when you come into a house like this. You must tell me if I wound you. I am very old-fashioned, and I am not of this country. I speak as one speaks to young men, like you, in other places.”
“I am not so easily wounded!” Hyacinth exclaimed, with a flight of imagination. “To expect anything, one must know something, one must understand: isn’t it so? And I am here without knowing, without understanding. I have come only because a lady who seems to me very beautiful and very kind has done me the honour to send for me.”
Madame Grandoni examined him a moment, as if she were struck by his good looks, by something delicate that was stamped upon him everywhere. “I can see you are very clever, very intelligent; no, you are not like the young men I mean. All the more reason—” And she paused, giving a little sigh. “I want to warn you a little, and I don’t know how. If you were a young Roman, it would be different.”
“That’s where I live, properly, in Rome. If I hurt you, you can explain it that way. No, you are not like them.”
“You don’t hurt me—please believe that; you interest me very much,” said Hyacinth, to whom it did not occur that he himself might appear patronising. “Of what do you want to warn me?”
“Well—only to advise you a little. Do not give up anything.”
“Do not give up _yourself_. I say that to you in your interest. I think you have some little trade—I forget what; but whatever it may be, remember that to do it well is the best thing—it is better than paying visits, better even than a Princess!”
“Ah yes, I see what you mean!” Hyacinth exclaimed, exaggerating a little. “I am very fond of my trade, I assure you.”
