ink, that English people abroad go so very QUEER--so
ultra-English--INCREDIBLE!--and at the same time so perfectly
impossible? But impossible! Pathological, I assure you.--And as for
their sexual behaviour--oh, dear, don't mention it. I assure you it
doesn't bear mention.--And all quite flagrant, quite unabashed--under
the cover of this fanatical Englishness. But I couldn't begin to TELL
you all the things. It's just incredible."

Aaron wondered how on earth Francis had been able to discover and bear
witness to so much that was incredible, in a bare two days. But a little
gossip, and an addition of lurid imagination will carry you anywhere.

"Well now," said Francis. "What are you doing today?"

Aaron was not doing anything in particular.

"Then will you come and have dinner with us--?"

Francis fixed up the time and the place--a small restaurant at the other
end of the town. Then he leaned out of the window.

"Fascinating place! Oh, fascinating place!" he said, soliloquy. "And
you've got a superb view. Almost better than ours, I think.--Well then,
half-past seven. We're meeting a few other people, mostly residents or
people staying some time. We're not inviting them. Just dropping in,
you know--a little restaurant. We shall see you then! Well then, _a
rivederci_ till this evening.--So glad you like Florence! I'm simply
loving it--revelling. And the pictures!--Oh--"

The party that evening consisted all of men: Francis and Angus, and a
writer, James Argyle, and little Algy Constable, and tiny Louis Mee, and
deaf Walter Rosen. They all snapped and rattled at one another, and
were rather spiteful but rather amusing. Francis and Angus had to leave
early. They had another appointment. And James Argyle got quite tipsy,
and said to Aaron:

"But, my boy, don't let yourself be led astray by the talk of such
people as Algy. Beware of them, my boy, if you've a soul to save. If
you've a soul to save!" And he swallowed the remains of his litre.

Algy's nose trembled a little, and his eyes blinked. "And if you've
a soul to LOSE," he said, "I would warn you very earnestly against
Argyle." Whereupon Algy shut one eye and opened the other so wide, that
Aaron was almost scared. "Quite right, my boy. Ha! Ha! Never a truer
thing said! Ha-ha-ha." Argyle laughed his Mephistophelian tipsy laugh.
"They'll teach you to save. Never was such a lot of ripe old savers!
Save their old trouser-buttons! Go to them if you want to learn to
sa