There were, of course, moments of terrible vacillation, a period even when something almost like passion bid her throw refinement to the winds.  And there was something in her, an unexpurgated vestige of vulgarity that made a strenuous attempt at proving that Snooks was not so very bad a name after all.  Any hovering hesitation flew before Fanny’s manner, when Fanny came with an air of catastrophe to tell that she also knew the horror.  Fanny’s voice fell to a whisper when she said Snooks.  Miss Winchelsea would not give him any answer when at last, in the Borghese, she could have a minute with him; but she promised him a note.

She handed him that note in the little book of poetry he had lent her, the little book that had first drawn them together.  Her refusal was ambiguous, allusive.  She could no more tell him why she rejected him than she could have told a cripple of his hump.  He too must feel something of the unspeakable quality of his name.  Indeed he had avoided a dozen chances of telling it, she now perceived.  So she spoke of “obstacles she could not reveal”—­“reasons why the thing he spoke of was impossible.”  She addressed the note with a shiver, “E.K.  Snooks.”

Things were worse than she had dreaded; he asked her to explain.  How could she explain?  Those last two days in Rome were dreadful.  She was haunted by his air of astonished perplexity.  She knew she had given him intimate hopes, she had not the courage to examine her mind thoroughly for the extent of her encouragement.  She knew he must think her the most changeable of beings.  Now that she was in full retreat, she would not even perceive his hints of a possible correspondence.  But in that matter he did a thing that seemed to her at once delicate and romantic.  He made a go-between of Fanny.  Fanny could not keep the secret, and came and told her that night under a transparent pretext of needed advice.  “Mr. Snooks,” said Fanny, “wants to write to me.  Fancy!  I had no idea.  But should I let him?” They talked it over long and earnestly, and Miss Winchelsea was careful to keep the veil over her heart.  She was already repenting his disregarded hints.  Why should she not hear of him sometimes—­painful though his name must be to her?  Miss Winchelsea decided it might be permitted, and Fanny kissed her good-night with unusual emotion.  After she had gone Miss Winchelsea sat for a long time at the window of her little room.  It was moonlight, and down the street a man sang “Santa Lucia” with almost heart-dissolving tenderness...  She sat very still.

She breathed a word very softly to herself.  The word was “Snooks.”  Then she got up with a profound sigh, and went to bed.  The next morning he said to her meaningly, “I shall hear of you through your friend.”