The echoes of their commentary reached Rowland's ears; but he had little taste for random gossip, and desired a distinctly veracious informant.

He had found one in the person of Madame Grandoni, for whom Mrs.Light and her beautiful daughter were a pair of old friends.
"I have known the mamma for twenty years," said this judicious critic, "and if you ask any of the people who have been living here as long as I, you will find they remember her well.

I have held the beautiful Christina on my knee when she was a little wizened baby with a very red face and no promise of beauty but those magnificent eyes.

Ten years ago Mrs.Light disappeared, and has not since been seen in Rome, except for a few days last winter, when she passed through on her way to Naples.
Then it was you met the trio in the Ludovisi gardens.

When I first knew her she was the unmarried but very marriageable daughter of an old American painter of very bad landscapes, which people used to buy from charity and use for fire-boards.