"
"No one? Not even Signer Varillo?"
"No," said Angela, smiling a little, "Not even Signor Varillo. I
want to surprise him."
"In what way?" asked the Cardinal, rousing himself from his pensive
reverie.
Angela blushed.
"By proving that perhaps, after all, a woman can do a great thing in
art,--a really great thing!" she said, "Designed greatly, and
greatly executed."
"Does he not admit that, knowing you?" asked Aubrey Leigh
suggestively.
"Oh, he is most kind and sympathetic to me in my work," explained
Angela quickly, vexed to think that she had perhaps implied some
little point that was not quite in her beloved one's favour. "But he
is like most men,--they have a preconceived idea of women, and of
what their place should be in the world--"
"Unchanged since the early phases of civilization, when women were
something less valuable than cattle?" said Leigh smiling.
"Oh, the cattle idea is not exploded, by any means!" put in
Vergniaud. "In Germany and Switzerland, for example, look at the
women who are ground down to toil and hardship there! The cows are
infinitely prettier and more preferable, and lead much pleasanter
lives. And the men for whom these poor wretched women work, lounge
about in cafes all day, smoking and playing dominoes.
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