And Paul would stand, smiling too, a conquering young figure with green Marienbad hat tilted with ever so tiny a shade of jauntiness, the object of frankly admiring and curious glances from a lone woman or two on the veranda, until the gondola was brought up to the wave-washed steps, and the hotel porter had fixed the bridge of plank.

Then, with Giacomo supporting his elbow, he would board the black craft and would creep under the tenda and sink on the low seat by her side with a sense of daring and delicious intimacy, and the gondola would glide away into fairyland.
"Let us be real tourists and do Venice thoroughly," she had said.

"I have never seen it properly." "But you've been here many times before." "Yes.

But--" She hesitated.
"Eh bien ?" "Je ne peux pas le dire.

Il faut deviner." "Will you forgive me if I guess right?
Our great Shakespeare says: 'Love lends a precious seeing to the eye.'" "That--that's very pretty," said the Princess in French.