with life and soul. At other times
he was silent and embarrassed, too conscious of his own limitations in
larger subjects, and impatient of that small talk which is the
conventional refuge of those who have no thoughts to express.

And yet for some years there had been an acquaintanceship which appeared
to be slowly ripening into a friendship between these two very different
rivals. The base and origin of this lay in the fact that in their own
studies each was the only one of the younger men who had knowledge and
enthusiasm enough to properly appreciate the other. Their common
interests and pursuits had brought them together, and each had been
attracted by the other's knowledge. And then gradually something had
been added to this. Kennedy had been amused by the frankness and
simplicity of his rival, while Burger in turn had been fascinated by the
brilliancy and vivacity which had made Kennedy such a favourite in Roman
society. I say "had," because just at the moment the young Englishman
was somewhat under a cloud.

A love affair, the details of which had never quite come out, had
indicated a heartlessness and callousness upon his part which shocked
many of his friends. But in the bachelor circles of students and
artists in which he preferred to move there is no very rigid code of
honour in such matters, and though a head might be shaken or a pair of
shoulders shrugged over the flight of two and the return of one, the
general sentiment was probably one of curiosity and perhaps of envy
rather than of reprobation.

"Look here, Burger," said Kennedy, looking hard at the placid face of
his companion, "I do wish that you would confide in me."

As he spoke he waved his hand in the direction of a rug which
lay upon the floor.

On the rug stood a long, shallow fruit-basket of the light wicker-work
which is used in the Campagna, and this was heaped with a litter of
objects, inscribed tiles, broken inscriptions, cracked mosaics, torn
papyri, rusty metal ornaments, which to the uninitiated might have
seemed to have come straight from a dustman's bin, but which a
specialist would have speedily recognized as unique of their kind.

The pile of odds and ends in the flat wicker-work basket supplied
exactly one of those missing links of social development which are of
such interest to the student. It was the German who had brought them
in, and the Englishman's eyes were hungry as he looked at them.

"I won't interfere wit