For a moment Mrs. Hawthorne had nothing to say, busy with pondering what she had heard. In conclusion, "I don't see how, if she really loves this Italian, she could give him up so gracefully," she said. "She has not given him up, Mrs. Hawthorne," said Gerald. "Believe me, she has not. She has some plan, some dream, for bringing about the good end in time. without aid from her parents. I am sure of it. No, she has not given him up." He had before him, vivid in memory, the image of Brenda in the little church, and was looking at that, though his eyes were on Mrs. Hawthorne's friendly and attentive face. "She is at the wonderful hour of her love," he said, "when the world is transfigured and life lifted above the every-day into regions of poetry. When to wait a hundred years for him would seem no more difficult than to wait a day. She is sure of him, the immortality of his passion, as she is sure of herself."

"How wonderful!" breathed Mrs. Hawthorne, after a little silence in which Gerald had been thinking with a very sickness of sympathy of Brenda and the sinister propensity of the Fates for bring ing to nothing the most valiant dreams and hopes; and Mrs. Hawthorne had been thinking entirely of Gerald, whose own heart was so much more certainly revealed by what he said than could be anybody else s.

"Unfortunately," he turned abruptly to another part of his subject,-"he is not of the same temperament. She has some project, I imagine, for earning the money. for her dowry, poor child, by music, singing, painting. But he does not know her vows of fidelity, because her parents did use their authority so far as gently to request her not to write to him or see him; and she promised, and a promise with Brenda is binding. And he has felt his honor involved in not writing or meeting her. But, though separated, they have been in the same city; they could hope to

catch a glimpse of each other now and then. I dare say, too, he cherished the hope of some miracle,-it is so natural to hope. But now they are sending her away, and it seems to him the black end of everything."

"I see.

And what you want is-"

"To be driven half a world apart for indefinite periods, more than probably forever, without one look, one word of leavetaking, is truly too much. Granted that they are not to have each other, they ought not to be torn in two like a bleeding body. Let them have to remember a few last beautiful moments!"

Mrs. Hawthorne had become pensive. He watched her sidewise, trying to divine what turn her thoughts were taking. Her prolonged silence made him uneasy.

"It would n't be wrong, you think?" she asked finally. "Mrs. Foss would n't be cross with us?"

"If it is wrong, my dear Mrs. Hawthorne, let it be wrong!" he cried impetuously. "If any one is cross, we will bow our heads meekly-after having done what we regarded as merciful. Let us not permit a cruelty it was in our power to prevent!"

But Mrs. Hawthorne continued to disquiet him by hesitating, while her face. suggested the travels of her thought all around and in and out of the question under consideration.

"You don't think it would perhaps be cruel to Brenda?" she laid before him another difficulty in the way of making up her mind. "Might n't it just ruin the evening for her, with the painfulness of good-bys? Or, if she does n't in the least. expect him, the shock of the surprise?"

"If I know that beautiful girl, passionate as an Italian under her American selfcontrol, it will be the blessed shock of an answered prayer."

He was growing afraid of the calm common sense that tried to see the thing from every side and weigh the merits of each person's point of view. Feeling it intolerable to be refused, he suddenly appealed to her pity, away from her justice. "O Mrs. Hawthorne, life is so unkind.

and to be always wise simply deadly! A few memories to treasure is all the good we finally have of our miserable days, and to catch at a moment of gold without care that it will have to be paid for is the only way to have in our hands in all our lives anything but copper and lead; yes, dull lead, common copper." He covered his face and pressed his eyes in a way he had when the world seemed too hopeless and baffling; then as suddenly straightened out, remarking more quietly, "The Fosses are too wise."

"They have my sympathy, I must say, Mr. Fane." Mrs. Hawthorne hurriedly defended herself against being moved. "I should be just as much afraid as they to have my daughter marry a foreigner."

"Mrs. Hawthorne, you ought to be afraid to have your daughter marry anybody." He gathered heat again and vehe

mence.

"As regards Italians, we are all one mass of superstitions. We are always comparing our best with their bad. As a matter of truth, our best and their best and the best the world over are one as good as the other, and our worst can't be exceeded by anything Italy can show. If you make the difficulty that we are different, our point of view different, I object that Brenda's is not so different. The international marriages that turn out well make no noise, but there are plenty of them. I have seen any number in the ordinary middle classes. No, parents are twice as old as their children; that is the trouble and always will be. The older people by prudence secure a certain thing, but it's not the thing youth wanted. The older see a certain thing as preferable, because they are old; but the young were right for themselves, for a time, at least, until they, too, grew old and saw a long peace and comfort as superior to a brief love and rapture. Brenda is not shallow or changeable; it may be her one chance of happiness that her parents in their anxious affection are trying to remove her from, and which she will cling to with every invisible fiber of her being until she conquers, or turns into a dismal old maid."

"You seem to like him. Is he such a fine man really?"

"I don't know a finer, in his way." "Good looking?"

"Mrs. Hawthorne, what a frivolous question! But he is. He is one of the most completely handsome men I know. Rather short, that 's all."

"Oh, what a pity!"

"But, if you must insist on that sort of symmetry, Brenda is not tall. He is a kind of Italian, more common than one thinks, that does n't get into literature, having nothing exciting, mysterious, wicked, or even conspicuously picturesque about him. After being a good son,they are very often good sons, - he will be a good husband and a good father, like his own father before him. He is without vanity, while looking like a square-built, stocky, responsible Romeo. Devoted to duty, passionate for order, absolutely punctilious in matters of honor and courtesy, he is a good citizen, a good soldier. He belongs to excellent people, I gathered, whose fortune, once larger, is very small. They live in the Abruzzi, I think he said. He is the eldest son and hope of the house. His gratitude to them comes first of all, he made me understand. He would be an indegno, unworthy of esteem and love, if that were not so. He had never cared for pleasures, he told me; even in the time not demanded by the service he studied. He wished to be useful to his country; he looked for the advancement to be gained by solid capacity in military things. But he had friends, for he is of a manly, modest sort. One evening during Carnival last year certain of these friends dropped in on their way to a dance, a costumeparty at the house of Americans, and seeing him so absorbed by duties and studies, thought it a lark to tempt him from these and take him along. And he, to astonish them for once, he says, let it happen, they assuring him that he would be well received if presented as their friend. One of them had on two costumes, one on top of the other, of which he lent him one, a monk's frock and cowl. So they went. At the ball was Brenda as the Snow

queen. And the fatal thing happened at very first sight of her. It is a repetition of Romeo and Juliet, as you see. These things he told me with actual tears in the finest dark eyes I have perhaps ever seen, and without seeming any the less manly for them. He told me, and I believed him. He came to me, poor fellow, because it was the nearest he could come to Brenda, and he trusted, I suppose, that I would tell her he had been."

Mrs. Hawthorne looked soft and sympathetic, but far away, and when he stopped, did not speak, engrossed, it was to be hoped, by the story just told.

He continued, though discouraged : "He wanted to know if I thought he would be guilty of an unpardonable. breach should he ask permission to write her one letter before she left. This parting without farewell is the last bitter touch to his tragedy. Brenda, when it had been decided that she should leave, sent word to him by that little pianist who comes here. Again through the same channel he received word that the day of departure was fixed. Can you think what it means, Mrs. Hawthorne? Have you in your experience or imagination the wherewith to form any conception, dear Mrs. Hawthorne, of what it means?"

"All right, Mr. Fane; bring him!" she said in haste. "You 've made me want to cry. I must n't let myself cry; it makes my nose red. What did you say his name is?" "Giglioli."

"Spell it. Gig-no, it 's no use. What's the other part of his name?"

"Manlio."

"That's a little better. I guess he 'll have to be Manlio to me. Bring him along, whatever happens, and then let 's pray hard to have everything happen right."

Not much later on the same day Mrs. Hawthorne's brougham might have been seen climbing Viale dei Colli, with the lady inside, alone, engaged in meditation.

"It would be a pity," she was thinking, as she alighted before Villa Foss, "that a little matter of eight thousand dollars should stand in the way of perfect bliss!"

CHAPTER VII

So many forces had been enlisted, into so many hands the white card given, to make Mrs. Hawthorne's ball a success, that it could hardly fail to be somewhat splendid. On a platform raised in one corner of the ball-room sat the little orchestra assembled and conducted by Signor Ceccherelli, who, from his mien, might have been the creator of these musicians and originator of all music.

Charlie Hunt was floor-master, and busy enough. Another might perhaps have done as much and not appeared so busy. The cotillion especially gave him a great deal to do. Everybody understood that he had planned all the figures and bought the favors. Some received an impression that the ball was entirely managed by him, who was such a very great friend of the hostess. Some even carried home an idea that the hostess never did anything without consulting him, and more often than not besought him to do it for her.

Mrs. Foss stood near the central door with Mrs. Hawthorne, receiving. She had not omitted from her list one acquaintance in Florence of the suitable class. Everybody was there; the style of invitation-card sent had suggested a grand occasion.

All the persons she had seen at the Fosses' on the first Friday evening at their house Mrs. Hawthorne saw again, and many more. Balm de Brézé, with a gallantry of old style, bent his black-lacquer mustache over her glove. The dark Landini pressed her hand with a pinch the warmth of which pricked her attention, and she found his eyes fixed on her with more the air of seeing her than is common at a first meeting.

Suddenly her heart thumped like a school-girl's. Gerald was coming, and with him an officer who must surely be Manlio. She tried to keep down her emotion, but the pink of her face deepened, a trembling seized her smile.

The Italian was as white as paper, his mustache and brows made spots of ink on

it; his eyes were as deep and still as wells in the night. She could hardly doubt that his heart was in a tumult, but he spoke without disaster to his voice, thanking her in a formal phrase. She perceived, from a distinct advantage over him in height, how faultlessly handsome he was in a quiet, unmagnetic way. Never had she seen anything to equal the whiteness of his teeth except her pearls in their black velvet case.

After having paid his duty to her, he remained for some minutes speaking with Mrs. Foss, who appeared as kind, while he appeared as calm and natural, as if time had moved back, and they were still at last spring and the beginning of his visits. Of all concerned Aurora was the least collected.

"I can't help it!" she murmured to Gerald, while the other two were talking together. "I'm all of a tremble. I feel as if I were Brenda; and at the same time I feel as if I were him-or he."

Mrs. Foss turned to them to say she believed everybody had arrived, and with Giglioli moved away from the door. Gerald asked Mrs. Hawthorne if they should waltz, but she refused, because she ought to be looking after the people who were not dancing and seeing that every one had a good time. She should dance only once that evening, she told him, and it should be with Mr. Foss, who had promised to dance at her party if she would promise to dance with him.

Gerald sent his eyes around the room to see if any one was free whom it would be a sort of duty to ask to dance. In a doorway, and not quite as festive in looks as the majority, which gave to the room the effect of an animated flower-bed, he perceived a figure in snuff-brown silk, just in front of which, soberly watching the dancers, was a little girl in a short dress of embroidered white, a blue hair-ribbon, and blue enamel locket. At once dropping his search for a partner, Gerald went to join this pair.

"O Gerald!"-the little girl snatched his hand without ceasing for more than a second to watch the ball-room floor,-"I

have promised to go home willingly at ten o'clock!" It was spoken in a gentle wail.

"My child," said Fräulein, "you must begin to prepare, for I fear it cannot be far from ten."

"O Fräulein, don't keep talking about it! Please!"

"When you leave this pleasure, Lili, remember there will be still that other pleasure of the long ride home in the night and the moonlight."

"Yes." Lily, glad again, turned wholly to Gerald, the music having stopped. "Mrs. Hawthorne told mother that if she would let me come I should be taken home in her own carriage, with all the furs around us and a hot water-box for our feet, so that we never could catch cold. Was n't it sweet of her? And we 've both already had ices and cakes, before anybody else, because she said we must. Don't you think she 's sweet, Gerald?" "Sweet as honey," he said.

"O Gerald,"-Lily's tone was fairly lamentable,-"have you seen the baskets of favors that are going to be given away by and by? And I have to go home willingly, cheerfully, promptly, at ten o'clock!"

"Lily, if any lady is so good and so misguided as to honor me with a favor, I will bring it to you in my pocket to-morrow or soon after, I promise."

"What hour is it, Herr Fane?" asked Fräulein over Lily's head.

Gerald drew out his watch and hesitated, sincerely sorry.

"To be exact, it is three minutes and three quarters to ten," he said.

Lily's mouth dropped open, and out of the small dark hollow one could fear for a second that a cry of protest or revolt might come; but the very next moment it was seen that Lily had returned to be the best child in the world and the most honorable.

"Good night, Gerald!" she said, with a wistfully willing, cheerful, ready face. "You won't forget?"

The ball had been raging, if one may so express it, for several hours, the feast was at its height, when Aurora, confused

with the richness and multiplicity of her impressions, and aware of a happy fatigue, withdrew from her guests to be for a few minutes just a quiet looker-on.

the

She could see a little way into the ballroom, where certain younger couples, mad for dancing, were making the most of the time when the floor was relatively empty, supper-room being proportionately full. Supper over, the cotillion would begin. She could hear the merry sound of spoons and glasses, and knew what good things were being consumed. All the house was involved in festivity, and resounding with it. In the up-stairs sitting-room were card-tables. In the improvised conservatory opposite to it one large dim lantern glowed softly amid palms and flowers.

All evening it had seemed to her rather as if she walked in a dream. More than ever now, as she stopped to, take account of all the wonderfulness surrounding her, it felt to her like a dream; so that she said to herself, "This is I, Nell-is it possiIs it possible that this is I-Nell?" doubt because she had been too

ble?

And

no

excitedly happy and was tired, and the

time had

come for some degree of reac

little bit, just what Estelle has taught me since we 've been here. I don't keep step very well; I walk all over my partner's feet. Besides, it would n't do, because I've already refused to dance with Mr. Landini."

"Sit it out with me, then, I beg you will, if you positively do not wish to dance."

tion, her joy fell, withered like a child's collapsing balloon, when, contrasting the present with the past for the sake of seeing the things before her as more rarely full of wonder and charm, she saw those other things. Memories she did not will

ingly

call up rose of themselves, and

"Oh, but you must dance! I want you to. I want to behold you all stuck over with favors."

"It 's true that I must have a few favors for Lily; but could n't a good fairy arrange it, and then we let the others heat themselves while we keep cool and rest? I feared a moment ago that you were feeling tired, Mrs. Hawthorne."

forced her to give them her attention in the midst of that scene of flowers, light, music. The brightness, the flavor, went out of these as if under an unkind magic. "It's a wonder," she thought, "that I be as happy as I am. I do won

can

der

ever

at myself how I can do it to rejoice." But the next minute she was smiling again, sweetly, heart-wholly, forgetfully. She had caught sight of Gerald looking at her as if about to approach.

"Who

"Look!" she whispered, interrupting him.

He imperceptibly turned in the direction of her stolen glance. Two figures were ascending the opposite flight of stairs, looking at each other while they inaudibly talked: Brenda, in filmy white diversified by a thread of silver; Manlio, carrying over his arm, and in his absorption letting trail a little, a white scarf beautiful with silver embroideries, in his hand a white pearl fan. Slowly the pair mounted and were lost to sight.

are you going to dance the cotillion with?" she asked gaily. "You, Mrs. Hawthorne, with your kind consent."

"No, I could n't do it. I only dance at

Neither Gerald nor Mrs. Hawthorne made any comment. Gerald, after a silence, spoke of Lily's increasing resemblance to her sister. Mrs. Hawthorne was reminded that they must go and select some favors for Lily, and led the way.

They sat together through the cotillion, and Gerald more than usual tried to be a sympathetic companion, easy to talk to, easy to get on with. Because he had seen the shadow of sadness on Mrs. Hawthorne's face. He was always quick to see such things.

No trace of it remained. Her dimples were in full play, but he found it according to his humor to continue uncritical, inexpressively tender, toward this big, bonny child who never curbed the expression of a complete kindness toward himself.

More interesting to them than any