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name,’ she said in Italian, as if it needed to be translated.
‘Yes,’ the other went on. ‘he’s a German, and we’ve had
him many years.’
The young girl, who was not heeding the conversation,
had wandered away to the open door of the large room
and stood looking into the garden. ‘And you, my sister, are
French,’ said the gentleman.
‘Yes, sir,’ the visitor gently replied. ‘I speak to the pupils
in my own tongue. I know no other. But we have sisters of
other countriesEnglish, German, Irish. They all speak their
proper language.’
The gentleman gave a smile. ‘Has my daughter been un-
der the care of one of the Irish ladies?’ And then, as he saw
that his visitors suspected a joke, though failing to under-
stand it, ‘You’re very complete,’ he instantly added.
‘Oh, yes, we’re complete. We’ve everything, and every-
thing’s of the best.’
‘We have gymnastics,’ the Italian sister ventured to re-
mark. ‘But not dangerous.’
‘I hope not. Is that your branch?’ A question which pro-
voked much candid hilarity on the part of the two ladies;
on the subsidence of which their entertainer, glancing at his
daughter, remarked that she had grown.
‘Yes, but I think she has finished. She’ll remain—not big,’
said the French sister.
‘I’m not sorry. I prefer women like books—very good and
not too long. But I know,’ the gentleman said, ‘no particular
reason why my child should be short.’
The nun gave a temperate shrug, as if to intimate that

324 The Portrait of a Lady