ILY got up from her simple luncheon with the agreeable knowledge that she was free to do exactly what she liked for the next three hours.
Aunt Cosy had a way of continually asking her what she was going to do next, which was annoying to a girl who had always planned out her day very much as she thought best. Now she remembered that Uncle Tom had ordered a number of picture papers to be sent out from England each week, and that the first big batch had arrived this morning.
Gathering the heavy, rolled-up parcels together, she went out of doors, and sat down in one of the comfortable wicker chairs which had been her first gift to the Count and Countess.
How still, how beautiful, how exquisitely peaceful was the scene round, above, and below, the terrace of La Solitude! No wonder she was beginning to feel marvellously better....
She had been reading for rather over an hour when there broke across the intense, brooding quietude of the early afternoon the hoot of a motor. She glanced at her wrist watch. It was only one o'clock—Beppo's train would not be in for a long time. But Captain Stuart had said something—when they had bidden each other good-bye yesterday—about their meeting again to-day. Perhaps he had come up to make some suggestion about tennis or golf? If so, how fortunate it was that Aunt Cosy was out!
Lily stood up and stepped down on to the lawn, quite unconscious of the eager, welcoming, happy look on her face.
All at once there emerged from the path leading up through the orange grove a tall, dark young man, wearing white flannels and a straw hat. For a moment she felt a shock of deep disappointment, for it was not Captain Stuart—a moment later she told herself that it was, it must be, Beppo Polda!
Lily Fairfield made a delightful picture as she stood on the grass below the terrace, a delicate yet vivid colour coming and going in her cheeks, her lovely, fair hair uncovered, for she had not troubled to put on a hat. Thus, even apart from a very special reason he had for feeling interested in her—and he had such a very special reason—Count Beppo Polda felt extremely attracted to the pretty stranger.
He took off his smart straw hat with a graceful gesture, and, speaking in remarkably good English, though with a strong foreign accent, he exclaimed: “Have I the honour to greet Miss Fairfield?”
He held out his hand and fixed on her a pair of brilliant penetrating eyes.
As he came close up to her, Lily felt a most curious sensation creep over her, a mingling—if it be not a contradiction in terms—of attraction and repulsion. Of attraction, because, though she was not the kind of girl to set much store by looks, Count Beppo was so extraordinarily handsome: of repulsion, because he was so very like his mother! Lily though hardly conscious that it was so, was beginning strongly to dislike, as well as fear, the woman whom she called “Aunt Cosy,” and that, though she often tried to feel grateful for the Countess's undoubted, if often fussy, kindness to her.
Count Beppo had all his mother's good points; her tall, upright figure, her clear-cut features, and her one-time thick, curling hair. From his plain, short father, he had inherited that indefinable look of race which generally, though not always by any means, implies in its possessor a long pedigree. He also possessed what is, in most countries a rare gift—that is, a most beautiful speaking voice. Just now he was in the pink of physical condition, very unlike the still war-weary young Frenchmen Lily sometimes saw walking about Monte Carlo, or playing on the wind-swept golf course.
Taking the hand the girl held out to him, the young man respectfully lifted it to his lips. Now this was the first time Lily's hand had ever been kissed by a man, and she thought it a pretty, if rather a singular, custom.
They stood talking together for a few moments while Count Beppo explained in his full, caressing voice how he had always longed to meet Miss Fairfield, ever since his mother had told him of her many delightful qualities, when he was still a boy, years ago, after the Countess had paid her memorable visit to England!
Lily felt just a little embarrassed, as well as rather thrilled. She had never met anyone in the least like this young man before! Then she bethought herself of the Count and Countess. And how about Count Beppo's luggage? He had nothing in his hand but a Malacca cane set with one large, pale-green turquoise. Held by a young Englishman, the cane would have looked foppish, and a trifle absurd: but, somehow, it seemed in perfect harmony with the rest of Count Beppo's smart, rather dandified appearance.