The orders were put away, the party sat round the fire in the comfortable library, the men sipping more creme de menthe, since nothing else offered, and the couple of hours in front promising the tedium of small–talk of tedious people who had really nothing to say and no particular originality in saying it.

Aaron, however, had reckoned without his host. Sir William sat upright in his chair, with all the determination of a frail old man who insists on being level with the young. The new guest sat in a lower chair, smoking, that curious glimmer on his face which made him so attractive, and which only meant that he was looking on the whole scene from the outside, as it were, from beyond a fence. Sir William came almost directly to the attack.

“And so, Mr. Sisson, you have no definite purpose in coming to Italy?”

“No, none,” said Aaron. “I wanted to join Lilly.”

“But when you had joined him—?”

“Oh, nothing—stay here a time, in this country, if I could earn my keep.”

“Ah!—earn your keep? So you hope to earn your keep here? May I ask how?”

“By my flute.”

“Italy is a poor country.”

“I don’t want much.”

“You have a family to provide for.”

“They are provided for—for a couple of years.”

“Oh, indeed! Is that so?”

The old man got out of Aaron the detailed account of his circumstances —how he had left so much money to be paid over to his wife, and had received only a small amount for himself.

“I see you are like Lilly—you trust to Providence,” said Sir William.

“Providence or fate,” said Aaron.

“Lilly calls it Providence,” said Sir William. “For my own part, I always advise Providence plus a banking account. I have every belief in Providence, plus a banking account. Providence and no banking account I have observed to be almost invariably fatal. Lilly and I have argued it. He believes in casting his bread upon the waters. I sincerely hope he won’t have to cast himself after his bread, one of these days. Providence with a banking account. Believe in Providence once you have secured enough to live on. I should consider it disastrous to believe in Providence BEFORE. One can never be SURE of Providence.”

“What can you be sure of, then?” said Aaron.

“Well, in moderation, I can believe in a little hard cash, and in my own ability to earn a little hard cash.”

“Perhaps Lilly believes in his own ability, too.”

“No. Not so. Because he will never directly work to earn money. He works—and works quite well, I am told: but only as the spirit moves him, and never with any eye to the market. Now I call that TEMPTING Providence, myself. The spirit may move him in quite an opposite direction to the market—then where is Lilly? I have put it to him more than once.”

“The spirit generally does move him dead against the market,” said Aaron. “But he manages to scrape along.”