She told herself that she was foolish to hope for him so soon. Of course he could not follow at once. He could not leave New York. He had work to be done. She must not begin to hope until the week-end at least.

But though she talked to herself so wisely, she hoped with every breath she drew. She was accustomed to Italian precipitancy—and nothing in Barry Elder suggested delay. If he came, he would come while his memory of her was fresh.

It would be either here or York Harbor. Either herself or that girl with the blue eyes. If he really wanted to see her at all, if he had any memory of their dance, any interest in the newness of her, then he would come soon.And so through Maria Angelina's days ran a fever of expectancy.

At first it ran high. The honk of a motor horn, the reverberation of wheels upon the bridge, the slam of a door and the flurry of steps in the hall set up that instant, tumultuous commotion.

At any moment, she felt, Barry Elder might arrive. Every morning her pulses confessed that he might come that day; every night her courage insisted that the next morning would bring him.

And as the days passed the expectancy increased. It grew acute. It grew painful. The feeling, at every arrival, that he might be there gave her a tight pinch of suspense, a hammering racket of pulse-beats—succeeded by an empty, sickening, sliding-down-to-nothingness sensation when she realized that he was not there, when her despair proclaimed that he would never be there—and then, stoutly, she told herself that he would come the next time.

They were days of dreams for her—dreams of the restaurant, of color, light and music, of that tall, slim figure ... dreams of the dance, of the gay, half-teasing voice, the bright eyes, the direct smile. ... Every word he had uttered became precious, infinitely significant.

"A rivederci, Signorina. ... Don't forget me."

She had not forgotten him. Like the wax he had named she had guarded his image. Through all the swiftly developing experiences of those strange days she retained that first vivid impression.

She saw him in every group. She pictured him in every excursion. Above Johnny Byrd's light, straight hair she saw those close-cropped brown curls. ... She held long conversations with him. She confided her impressions. She read him Italian poems.

But still he did not come.

And sharply she went from hope to despair. She told herself that he would never come.

She did not believe herself. Beneath a set little pretense of indifference she listened intently for the sound of arrivals; her heart turned over at an approaching car.

But she did not admit it. She said that she was through with hope. She said that she did not care whether he came or not. She said she did not want him to come.

He was with Leila Grey, of course.

Well—she was with Johnny Byrd.

She was with him every day, for with that amazing American freedom, Bobby Martin came down to see Ruth every day and the four young people with other couples from the Lodge were always involved in some game, some drive, some expedition.

But it was not accident nor a lazy concurrence with propinquity that kept Johnny Byrd at Maria Angelina's side.

Openly he announced himself as tied hand and foot. His admiration was as vivid as his red roadster. It was as unabashed and clamant as his motor horn. He reveled in her. He monopolized her. In his own words, he lapped her up.

With amazing simplicity Maria Angelina accepted this miracle. It was only a second-rate miracle to her, for it was not the desire of her heart, and she was uneasy about it. She did not want to be involved with Johnny Byrd if Barry Elder should arrive. ... Of course, if she had never met Barry Elder. ...

Johnny Byrd was a very nice, merry boy. And he was rich ... independent. ... If one has never tasted Asti Spumante, then one can easily be pleased with Chianti.

Her secret dream was the young girl's protection against over-eagerness.

To her young hostess this indifference came as an enormous relief.

"She's all right," Ruth reported to her mother, upon an afternoon that Maria Angelina had taken herself downstairs to the piano and to a prospective call from Johnny Byrd while Ruth herself, in riding togs, awaited Bob Martin and his horses."She isn't jumping down Johnny's throat at all," the girl went on. "I was afraid, that first day, when she asked such nutty questions. ... But she seems to take it all for granted. That ought to hold Johnny for a while—long enough so he won't get tired and throw her down for somebody else before he goes."

"You think, then, there isn't a chance of——?"

Mrs. Blair left the hypothesis in midair, convicted of ancient sentiment by the frank amusement of her young daughter's look.

"No, my dear, there isn't a chance of," Ruth so competently informed her that Mrs. Blair, in revolt, was moved to murmur, "After all, Ruth, people do fall in love and get married in this world."

"Oh, yes."

Patiently Ruth gave this thought her consideration and in fair-mindedness turned her scrutiny upon past days to evoke some sign that should contradict her own conclusions.

"She's got something—it's something different from the rest of us—but it would take more than that to do for Johnny Byrd."

Definitely, Ruth shook her head.

"You don't suppose she's beginning to think——?" hazarded Mrs. Blair.

Better than her daughter, she envisaged the circumstances which might have led, in her Cousin Lucy's mind, to this young girl's visit. Lucy, herself, had been taken abroad in those early days by a competent aunt. Now Lucy, in the turn of the tide, was sending her daughter to America.

Jane Blair would have liked to play fairy godmother, to make a benevolent gesture, to scatter largess. ...

But she was not going to have it said that she was a fortune hunter. She was not going to alarm Johnny Byrd and implicate Bob Martin and disturb the delicate balance between him and Ruth.

Lucy's daughter must take her chances. This wasn't Europe.

"Well, I've said enough to her," Ruth stated briskly, in answer to her mother's supposition. "I don't know how much she believes. ... You know Ri-Ri is seething with Old World sentiment and she may be such a little nut as to think—but she doesn't act as if she really cared about it. It isn't just a pose. ... Do you imagine," said Ruth, suddenly lapsing into a little Old World sentiment herself, "that she's gone on some one in Italy and they sent her over to forget him? That might account——"

"Lucy's letter didn't sound like it. She was very emphatic about Maria Angelina's knowing nothing of the world or young men. I rather gathered," Mrs. Blair made out, "that the family had a plain daughter to marry off and wanted the pretty one in ambush for a while—they take care of those things, you know."

"And I suppose if she copped a millionaire in the ambush they wouldn't howl bloody murder," said the girl, with admirable intuition.

"Oh, well——" She yawned and looked out of the window. "She's probably having the time of her life. ... I'm grateful she turned out such a little peach. ... When she goes back and marries some fat spaghetti it will give her something to moon about to remember how she and Johnny Byrd used to sit out and strum to the stars—— There he is now."

"Bob?" said Mrs. Blair absently, her mind occupied by her young daughter's large sophistication.

"Johnny," said Ruth.

She leaned half out the window as the red roadster shot thunderously across the rustic bridge and brought up sharply on the driveway below. With a shouted greeting she brought the driver's red-blonde head to attention.

"Hullo—where's the Bob?"

Johnny grinned. "Trying to ride one horse and lead another. Sweet mount he's bringing you, Ruth. Didn't like the way I passed him. Bet you he throws you."

"Bet you he doesn't."

"You lose. ... Where's the little Wop?""You mean Maria Angelina Santonini?"

"Gosh, is that all? Well, you scoot across to her room and tell Maria Angelina Santonini that she has a perfectly good date with me."

"She powdered her nose and went down stairs an hour ago," Ruth sang down, just as a small figure emerged from the music room upon the veranda and approached the rail.

"The little Wop is here, Signor," said Maria Angelina lightly.

Unabashed Johnny Byrd beamed at her. It was a perfectly good sensation, each time, to see her. One grew to suspect, between times, that anything so enchanting didn't really exist—and then, suddenly, there she was, like a conjurer's trick, every lovely young line of her.

Johnny knew girls. He knew them, he would have informed you, backwards and forwards. And he liked girls—devilish cunning games, with the same old trumps up their sleeves—when they wore 'em—but this girl was just puzzlingly different enough to evoke a curiously haunting wonder.

Was it the difference in environment? Or in herself? He couldn't quite make her out.

He seemed to be groping for some clew, some familiar sign that would resolve all the unfamiliarities to old acquaintance.

Meanwhile he continued to smile cheerily at the young person he had so rudely designated as a little Wop and gestured to the seat beside him.

"Hop in," he admonished. "Let us be off before that horse comes and steps on me. That's a dear girl."

But Maria Angelina shook her dark head.

"I told you, no, Signor, I could not go. In my country one does not ride with young men."

"But you are in my country now. And in my country one jolly well rides with young men."

"In your country—but for a time, yes." Unconvinced Maria Angelina stood by her rail, like the boy upon the burning deck."But your aunt—cousin, I mean—would let you," he argued. "I'll shout up now and see——"

Unrelentingly, "It is not my cousin, but my mother who would object," she informed him.

"Holy Saint Cecilia! You're worse than boarding school. Come on, Maria Angelina—I'll promise not to kiss you."

That was one of Johnny's best lines. It always had a deal of effect—one way or another. It startled Maria Angelina. Her eyes opened as if he had set off a rocket—and something very bright and light, like the impish reflections of that rocket, danced a moment in her look.

"I will write that promise to my mother and see if it persuades her," she informed him.

"Oh, all right, all right."

With the sigh of the defeated Johnny Byrd turned off the gas and climbed out of his car.

"Just for that the promise is off," he announced. "Do you think your mother would mind letting you sit in the same room with me and teach me that song you promised?""She would mind very much in Italy." Over her shoulder Maria cast a laughing look at him as she stepped back into the music room. "There I would never be alone like this."

Incredulously Johnny stared past her into the music room. Through the windows upon the other side came the voices of bridge players upon the veranda without. Through those same windows were visible the bridge players' heads. Other windows opened upon the veranda in the front of the Lodge from which they had just come. An arch of doorway gave upon the wide hall where a guest was shuffling the mail.

"Alone!" ejaculated Johnny.

"My mother allows this when my sister Lucia and her fiancÉ, Paolo Tosti, are together," said Maria Angelina. "I am in the next room with a book. And that is very advanced. It is because Mamma is American."

"I'll say it's advanced," Johnny muttered. "You mean—you mean your sister and that—that toasted one she's engaged to have never really seen each other——?"

"Oh, they have seen each other——"

"The poor fish," said Johnny heavily. He glanced with increasing curiosity at the young girl by his side. ... After all, this jeune fille thing might be true. ...

"Well, I'm glad your mother was American," he declared, beginning to strum upon the piano and inviting her to a seat beside him.

But Maria Angelina remained looking through her music.

"Then I am only half a Wop," said she. She added, bright mischief between her long lashes, "What is it then—a Wop?"

Johnny Byrd, striking random chords, looked up at her.

"What is it?" he repeated. "I'll say that depends. ... Sometimes it's dark and greasy and throws bombs. ... Sometimes it's bad and glad and sings Carmen. ... And sometimes it's—it's——"

Deliberately he stared at the small braid-bound head, the shadowy dark of the eyes, the scarlet curve of the small mouth.

"Sometimes it's just the prettiest, youngest——"

"I am not so young," said Maria Angelina indignantly.

"Lordy, you're a babe in arms."

"I am not." Her defiance was furious. It had a twinge of terror—terror lest they treat her everlastingly as child.

"I am eighteen. I am but a year and three months younger than Ruth."

"She's a kid," grinned Johnny.

"The Signor Bob Martin does not think so!"

"The Signor Bob Martin is nuts on that particular kid. And he's a kid himself."

"And do you think that you are——?"

"Sure. We're all kids together. Why not? I like it," declared young Byrd.

But Maria Angelina was not appeased. She had half glimpsed that indefinite irresponsibility of these strangers which treated youth as a toy, an experiment. ...

"And is the Signorina Leila Grey," said she suddenly, "is she, also, a kid?"

Roundly Johnny opened his eyes. His face presented a curious stolidity of look, as if a protection against some unforeseen attack. At the same time it was streaked with humor.

"Now where," said he, "did you get that?"

"Is she," the girl persisted, "is she also a kid?"

"The Signorina Leila Grey? No," conceded Johnny, "the Signorina Leila Grey was born with her wisdom teeth cut. ... At that she hasn't found so much to chew on," he murmured cheerily.

The girl's eyes were bright with divinations. "You mean that she did not—did not find your friend Bob something to chew upon?"

Johnny's laugh was a guffaw. It rang startlingly in that quiet room. "You're there, Ri-Ri—absolutely there," he vowed. "But where, I wonder——" He broke off. His look held both surmise and a shrewd suspicion."I—guessed," said Maria Angelina hastily. "And I saw her the first evening in New York. ... She is very beautiful."

"She's a wonder," he admitted heartily. "Yes—and I'll say Bob nearly fell for her. If she'd been expert enough she could have gathered him in. He just dodged in time—and now he's busy forgetting he ever knew her."

"Perhaps," slowly puzzled out Maria Angelina, "perhaps the reason that she was not—not expert, as you say—was because her attention was just a little—wandering."

Johnny yawned. "Often happens." He struck a few chords. "Where's that little song of yours—the one you were going to teach me? I could do something with that at the next show at the club."

"If you will let me sit down, Signor——"

"I'm not crabbing the bench."

"But I wish the place in the center."

"What you 'fraid of, Ri-Ri?" Obligingly Johnny moved over. "Why, you have me tied hand and foot. I'm afraid to move a muscle for fear you'll tell me it isn't done—in Italy."

But Ri-Ri gave this an absent smile. For long, now, she had been leading up to this talk and she felt herself upon the brink of revelations. ... Perhaps this Johnny Byrd knew where Barry Elder was. Perhaps they were friends. ...

"In New York," she told him, "that Leila Grey was at the restaurant with a young man—with the Signor Barry Elder."

"Huh? Barry Elder?"

"Are you,"—she was proud of the splendid indifference of her voice,—"are you a friend of his?"

Uninterestedly, "Oh, I know Barry," Johnny told her. "Bright boy—Barry. Awful high-brow, though. Wrote a play or something. Not a darn bed in it. Oh, well," said Johnny hastily, with a glance at the girl's young face, "I say, how does this go? Ta tump ti tum ti tump tump—what do those words of yours mean?""Perhaps this Barry Elder," said Ri-Ri with averted eyes, her hands fluttering the pages, "perhaps he is the one that Leila Grey's attention was upon. Did you not hear that?"

"Who? Barry?"

"Has he not," said the girl desperately, "become recently more desirable to her—more rich, perhaps——"

"That play didn't make him anything, that's sure," the young man meditated. "But seems to me I did hear—something about an uncle shuffling off and leaving him a few thous. ... Maybe he left enough to buy Leila a supper."

"Here are the English words." Maria Angelina spread the music open before them. "Mrs. Blair was joking with him," she reverted, "because he was not going to that York Harbor this summer where this Leila Grey was. But perhaps he has gone, after all?"

"Search me," said Johnny negligently. "I'm not his keeper."

"But you would know if he is coming to the dance at the Martins—that dance next week——?"

"He isn't coming to the house party, he's not invited. He and Bob aren't anything chummy at all. Barry trains in an older crowd. ... Seems to me," said Johnny, turning to look at her out of bright blue eyes, "you're awf'ly interested in this Barry Elder thing. Did you say you met him in New York?"

"I met him—yes," said Maria Angelina, in a steady little voice, beginning suddenly to play. "And I thought it was so romantic—about him and this Leila Grey. She was so beautiful and he had been so brave in the war. And so I wondered——"

"Well, don't you wonder about who's coming to that dance. That dance is mine," said Johnny definitely. "I want you to look your darndest—put it all over those flappers. Show them what you got," admonished Johnny with the simple directness in such vogue."And now come on, Ri-Ri—let's get into this together.

Come on, Maria Angelina!"

And Maria Angelina, her face lifted, her eyes strangely bright, sang, while Johnny Byrd stared fixedly down at her, angrily, defiantly, sang to that unseen young man—back in the shadows——

And then she told herself that she would forget him very well indeed.