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had a thin time of it, poor thing, and who watched every
other woman with a cold watchfulness that had become her
second nature, and who said cold, nasty little things which
showed what an utterly low opinion she had of all human
nature. She was also quite venomously overbearing with
the servants, Connie found: but in a quiet way. And she
skilfully behaved so that Sir Alexander should think that
HE was lord and monarch of the whole caboosh, with his
stout, would-be-genial paunch, and his utterly boring jokes,
his humourosity, as Hilda called it.
Sir Malcolm was painting. Yes, he still would do a Vene-
tian lagoonscape, now and then, in contrast to his Scottish
landscapes. So in the morning he was rowed off with a huge
canvas, to his ‘site’. A little later, Lady Cooper would he
rowed off into the heart of the city, with sketching-block
and colours. She was an inveterate watercolour painter, and
the house was full of rose-coloured palaces, dark canals,
swaying bridges, medieval facades, and so on. A little later
the Guthries, the prince, the countess, Sir Alexander, and
sometimes Mr Lind, the chaplain, would go off to the Lido,
where they would bathe; coming home to a late lunch at half
past one.
The house-party, as a house-party, was distinctly bor-
ing. But this did not trouble the sisters. They were out all
the time. Their father took them to the exhibition, miles
and miles of weary paintings. He took them to all the cro-
nies of his in the Villa Lucchese, he sat with them on warm
evenings in the piazza, having got a table at Florian’s: he
took them to the theatre, to the Goldoni plays. There were

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