Margaret went to her beautiful suit of rooms that night with a beating heart and a mind sorely troubled.

Prince Rivani had proposed to her!

It had come so unexpectedly that it overwhelmed her. There are a great many princes in Italy—they are commoner there than with us, but still a prince is a prince, and this one was amongst the best and highest of his order. Margaret had not dreamed that he would have condescended to bestow more than a passing and friendly thought upon the unknown English woman who dwelt in his house as the governess and companion to his sister.

And now, quite suddenly, without preparation, he had asked her to be his wife!

It seemed incredible, but it was only too true; and what was she to do?

It would have been bad enough if she had been an ordinary English woman, and her insignificance and poverty the only drawbacks; but her position was not so good as that even. There was a blot upon her escutcheon which made it impossible for her to be the wife of any honest man, however humble he might be, least of all the wife of so great a man as Prince Rivani!

She had so completely buried all thought of love in the tomb of the past, that it had never occurred to her that a man might fall in love with her, and now, as she stood before the glass and looked dreamily and sadly at her face, she was bound to admit, and that without vanity, that she was beautiful; but how beautiful, how supremely lovely, she herself did not guess.

But now what was she to do? Improbable and unlikely as it seemed, Prince Rivani had fallen in love with her and asked her to be his wife, and, as it was simply impossible that she should marry him, there was only one course open for her; she must leave the villa and Florence, and at once.

She sighed deeply as the conviction was forced upon her. She had been, after a fashion, almost happy; she had been at peace at any rate with these great people, who had lavished their kindness upon her and won her gratitude and love.

And now she must go! Must leave the kind old lady, who, with all her stateliness, had ever been tender to the unknown English girl; leave Florence who loved her with all the warmth of her young unscathed heart!

She sighed again, and, opening the window, looked out at the night, or rather morning, for midnight had passed some hours since, and as she did so the faint perfume of a cigar floated up to her, and she saw the tall figure of the prince walking to and fro on the terrace beneath. He, too, was sleepless, and thinking of her! She closed the window quietly and was beginning to undress, when there came a knock at the door and the Princess Florence entered.

For the first time Margaret was not glad to see her, but Florence unsuspectingly ran in and put her arm round the white shapely neck.

"Oh, forgive me, dear!" she murmured, with the impulsive enthusiasm of her age. "But I could not go to sleep until I came to you and told you how glad I am!"

"Glad?" said Margaret, flushing quickly, and tossing the long tresses of silky hair so that they hid her face.

"Yes, glad!" repeated Florence, joyously. "Why, you dear, sly girl, you are not going to be so wicked as to pretend that you don't know what has happened?"

"What has happened?" said Margaret, her face all aflame for a moment, then growing pale.

"I mean your great success to-night," said the girl, sinking at Margaret's feet and leaning her head against her knee. "I can't sleep for thinking of it. The countess says she remembers nothing like it, it is not only the picture, which was quite enough to make you famous, but yourself, dear—yourself! Isn't it almost too unfair for one person to be so lovely and bewitching and also so clever?"

Margaret forced a smile and smoothed the girl's rather rough locks.

"Are you making fun of me, princess?" she said pleasantly, and yet a little sadly.

The princess looked up at her amazedly, then uttered an exclamation.

"Then it really is true that you don't know that you have caused such a sensation?" she exclaimed. "Why, dear, it was a furore, it was a 'Veni, vidi, vici,' as our ancient emperor said. Do you know that directly you left the salon everybody fell to talking about you, though they had done that while you were there under pretense of talking about your picture. They all talked about you as if you were something that had dropped out of the skies, and we Rivanis were lucky to own the particular spot of earth upon which your divinityship descended."

Margaret laughed softly. The girl's enthusiasm amused her, and yet it was honest enough.

"You may laugh, but let me tell you, you quiet little woman, that your name will be ringing all through Italy before the week is out!"

"I sincerely trust not," said Margaret.

"Oh, but it will!" retorted the princess. "Signor Alfero is going to send your picture to be exhibited, and he will express the admiration he feels for it all through Rome; and Rome—which is the art-center of the world—will spread it through Europe, and you will be famous! And then people will ask what the artist is like, and the countess and all those whose hearts you won to-night will tell what a lovely and charming girl you are, and you will have the world at your feet!"

"You talk nonsense very eloquently, princess," said Margaret gently.

"Is it nonsense? That is good! I will tell Ferdinand!"

"Ferdinand—the prince!" said Margaret.

"Yes," laughed Florence. "For if it is nonsense, it is his nonsense, for I heard him say it after you left the room; and he said it almost gravely, as if he were sad rather than otherwise. Now, why should he be sad?" she went on, looking up at Margaret's face thoughtfully.

"Isn't it rather too late for guessing riddles, dear?" suggested Margaret.

"Late! Who could sleep after such a night?" exclaimed the princess, with the sublime contempt for repose belonging to her age. "Why should he be sad, dear? I know he admires you, for when the countess asked him if he thought you pretty—pretty! What impertinence!—he smiled and said, 'No!' and he meant that he thought you more than pretty—lovely!"

"Do you think it is quite fair to construe his thoughts?" said Margaret.

"Oh, everything is fair in love and war——" She stopped suddenly and looked up at Margaret, and her face flushed eagerly. "Oh! Do you know a thought has struck me. Only think, if Ferdinand should——" She stopped, and clasped Margaret round her waist. "Why, I believe he does already. Oh, dear! It seems almost too good to be true. But fancy if you should, some day, become my real sister!"

Margaret's face crimsoned, then gradually grew pale and strained.

"Princess," she said slowly, "never jest on such a subject again—for my sake and your own."

Gently as the words were spoken, they frightened the young girl.

"Oh, what have I said?" she murmured. "Was it very wicked?" and her lips began to tremble.

Margaret forced a smile, and caressed the rumpled hair tenderly.

"A philosopher who was also a wit once declared that a thing was worse than wicked, it was absurd," she said; "and that is also my answer, and now go to bed, dear, or you will appear at the breakfast table and frighten all your friends, for they will think they see the ghost of the Princess Florence."

The girl thought that her incautious speech had struck some discord in her dear friend's heart, and, kissing her penitently, stole from the room.

"Yes," said Margaret to herself, "I must leave them—I must go into hiding again. Oh, Blair, Blair, you have not only ruined my past, but blighted all my future! It is not only that no love can ever visit my heart again, but you have made even peace impossible!"

Meanwhile the prince strode up and down the terrace, smoking his cigar and glancing now and again up at the windows of the room which contained the woman he loved.

Prince Rivani, the descendant of a noble race, was young, handsome, a favorite at court, a gallant officer, a popular young man all round, and yet he was neither vain nor a fool—which is singular.

To say that he had fallen in love with Margaret the first time he saw her, when he nearly rode her down, would be to say too much; but when she came to live at the villa, and he saw her day by day, her beauty, and grace, and that sweetness which is given to so few women, but which she possessed so abundantly, grew upon him, until he awoke one day to find that his heart had left him, and that he loved the young English girl of whose past he knew—nothing!

King Cophetua and the beggar girl is a very pretty story, and no doubt the king was very happy with his bride for a time, but the story does not go on to tell us that they were happy ever afterward, and as a matter of fact we may conclude that the monarch who marries a beggar maid commits a remarkably rash act. Such matches are not always happy ones.

Prince Rivani knew that he was expected to marry a lady of his own rank, or at any rate, of his own class. He knew that there were at least half a dozen beautiful women at the court, from whom he might choose a wife, and from whom he would be expected to choose one. "To marry beneath him," would, if it did not quite break her heart, make his mother, the signora, very unhappy, and would probably ruin his promising career.

He was a gentleman, and he was not a fool, so he went off to court determined to cure himself of the passion which had assailed him, and to forget the lovely English girl with the sad look in her dark eyes, and the sweet smile which made him long to keep it on her face forever.

It was a task beyond his strength, this forgetting her, but he had hoped that he was out of danger, when he returned and lo!—discovered that her love had taken too firm a hold upon his heart to be rooted out. The girl he had left unknown and of little account in the world, had suddenly, in a night, become famous. The glamour of her beauty, which had so affected even strangers, exercised a fascination for him, and he had spoken and avowed his love.

And she had refused him—or something like it. It was this refusal he was pondering over as he paced up and down, smoking cigar after cigar, long after the rest of the villa was hushed in quietude, if not repose.

Should he accept her refusal? No, he would not, he could not! She had become part and parcel of his very life; all his thoughts centered in her. At night he lay awake and called up her face; at day he thought of and longed for her. And to lose her at a word! She had said "No," because he had startled her. He had been too sudden and too abrupt!—the very first night of his return to the villa. He should have waited and prepared her by his attentions for the avowal he had sprung upon her last night.

No, he would not relinquish the hope which made life sweet to him so easily; he would win her even against herself if need were.

So, with one more glance at the window, the prince went to his rooms, to lie awake and watch the dawn creeping over the fair city which his race had helped to make illustrious.

Margaret did not appear at the breakfast table; but her absence was not commented on, for it was understood by all that the Villa Capri was Liberty Hall, and that each guest was fit to come and go as he or she pleased. So they made up for her absence by talking of her as they had talked the preceding night.

They were all curious, highly curious, to know something about her; but the signora, when appealed to, smiled her serene smile and shook her head.

"I can't tell you anything about her," she said; "I have never asked her for her confidence. She is a lady, and that is sufficient for me."

And they remained silent, for they could scarcely be so rude as to suggest that what sufficed for the signora did not satisfy them!

The guests dispersed after breakfast, the ladies to their boudoirs and the music-room, the gentlemen to the armory for their guns, for a shooting expedition had been planned.

The prince, as in duty bound, went with it, though he would far rather have remained at home in his study to think of Margaret.

They returned in time to dress for dinner, and the prince, who seemed tired, went straight to his sister's room.

"Oh, is it you, Ferdy?" she said; "you have just come in time to coil up this plait for me. My maid has run off to Miss Leslie's room; she is always so anxious to desert me for her. They are all alike—the servants, I mean; I think they worship her!" and she laughed with a poor imitation of a pout.

The prince gathered up a plait of the shining hair, and kissed it with brotherly affection as he attempted to arrange it.

"They all love her, do they?" he said; "and you, too, Florrie, eh?"

"And you, too, Ferdy, eh?" she retorted, glancing round at him wickedly.

He did not flush, but met her gaze steadily.

"And I, too, Florence," he said, gravely.

"Oh, Ferdy," she exclaimed, clasping her hands, "I am so glad!—I am so happy! I thought it was so, but I only thought. And—oh, I don't know what to say—and when are you going to tell her?" she demanded impetuously.

"I have told her," he said, quietly.

"And—oh!" for she read the result in his eyes.

"Never mind," he said, gently; "all is not lost yet. But do not speak of it—least of all to her. Have you seen her to-day—has she been down?"

"I have seen her, but she has not been down. She has kept her own apartments, and has been working; and yet only a very little, I think. Oh, Ferdy, it can't be because she doesn't love you; that's impossible."

"Thank you," he said, forcing a smile. "You will thrive at court, Florrie."

"But it can't be! There must be something else—somebody else!"

His face grew pale and his lips contracted, and he opened his lips as if to speak, but he remained silent for a moment, then said:

"I must dress, or I shall be late," and left the room.

On his way he passed the door of Margaret's painting-room, and as he did so the princess' maid came out. She started and stepped back with a courtesy, leaving the door open. Margaret came to the door to say something to the maid, and seeing the prince, stopped short.

For a moment they looked at each other without saying anything; then he bowed and drew a little nearer, and as the servant sped noiselessly away, said in a low voice, full of respect and reverence:

"Miss Leslie, will you forget what I said last night? No, not forget, but remember that I will not speak again without your permission?"

Margaret inclined her head.

"You are my mother's guest, as well as the woman I love, and I will keep the silence you commanded! You will honor us with your company at table?"

Margaret could find no words, but she inclined her head in assent, and the prince, with a low bow, which seemed as eloquent of gratitude and worship as the most ardent words could have been, left her.

That night, while the rest gathered round her, vying with each other for a word or a smile, the prince kept away from her side. Only twice did he address her; once to bring her a fan when the room grew hot; and the second time, to lay a shawl by her side when, the windows having been opened, the temperature changed rapidly.

The days glided on. Fresh additions were made to the party, but Margaret's popularity did not decrease. Fame, that had been prophesied for her, came, for her picture had been exhibited.

The great Alfero had expressed his admiration, and her name was ringing through Rome as that of the coming artist.

And through it all Margaret's heart was haunted by trouble. Day after day she met the prince, and his conduct toward her was the same. But though he refrained from paying her marked attention, it was evident to her and Florence—who watched him—that he was continually thinking of her.

Others might flock round her with the ready flattery of their ready tongues, courting the young girl whose picture had become famous in the world of art, and her beauty the theme in the world of fashion, but it was he who now and again stood with extended hand to help her into the carriage, or placed some choice blossom near her plate. No woman, daughter of Eve, could be insensible to devotion such as this; it would have touched a heart of stone, and Margaret's heart was anything but stony.

She scarcely exchanged three words a day with him, but she found herself looking toward him when he spoke to others, and meeting his gaze, which seemed to be always wandering toward her, her own eyes would fall, and her lips tremble.

Get away she must: and yet how? Night after night she lay awake trying to frame some excuse which would withstand the entreaties of the signora and Florence; and she decided to remain until the party broke up and the prince returned to the court, and then she would vanish—forever.

The last night arrived. The party had been out on the hills, and returned with the gayety of spirits which we English—alas!—know nothing of. The great banqueting hall was brilliant with light, and the guests in their magnificent costumes and gorgeous uniforms gave additional splendor to the decorations.

Margaret stole down to the drawing-room a few minutes before the gong sounded, and her advent was the signal for a crowd of courtiers to throng round her.

"I should think you would be glad when we are all gone!" said one, a white-haired veteran, who seemed to find it impossible to leave the side of the quiet English girl, with her sweet smile and rare eyes. "I know you artists so love quiet, and we make such a noise, do we not? Alas! we shall all be quiet enough to-morrow, for we shall be far away from the dear villa, and thinking of you——"

"Please include me, count," said the signora.

He made her a bow.

"I spoke collectively, of course," he said, amidst the general laugh, and not a whit discomposed. "If you knew how dreary you make the court after your villa, and how we pine after you all!" he said, with a sigh. "Why, I declare, to-day, if it had not been for the effort which becomes a duty, we should most of us have been in tears. I missed everything I shot at, did I not, prince? But, bah! I must not appeal to you, for you were as bad. Indeed, I do not know what has come to you lately; you have lost your own altogether."

"That is true," said a young attache; "and Rivani used to be the best shot amongst us; the best I know, except Blair Leyton."

The prince was standing beside Margaret, showing her some photographs of Rome which he had sent for, and was paying no attention to the general conversation.

"That is St. Peter's," he was saying, when suddenly Blair's name smote upon her ear.

She looked up, pale as death, and the photograph fell from her hand to the floor. Half a dozen hands were outstretched to recover it, but the prince stooped and picked it up, and stood in front of her as a screen.

"Are you ill?" he asked in a low voice; but Margaret did not hear him. She sat, leaning forward a little, her face deadly white, her eyes fixed upon the young attache.

The prince took up a fan and unobtrusively fanned her, his fine eyes fixed on her face with the tenderest regard.

She did not seem as if she were about to faint, but rather as if she had fallen into a trance.

"Blair Leyton?" said the count. "Blair Leyton?" and at every repetition of the name a tremulous quiver passed rapidly over Margaret's white face.

"Yes, Viscount Leyton, the Earl of Ferrers' nephew. Surely you remember him, general?"

"Oh, yes," said the count. "I had forgotten for the moment. Yes, yes! He was a good shot. One in a thousand. I was with him in the Black Forest—and in England, too. A wonderful shot! A wonderful young man, too," he added; then, as some reminiscence occurred to him, he warmed into enthusiasm. "A fine specimen of an English sportsman. I do not think I ever saw a young man ride as he rode. It was in one of the English hunting counties; and he was riding a perfect demon of a horse. There was no other man on the field who would have got into the saddle, and yet this young lord rode him as if he were a lady's palfrey. I saw him jump——" He stopped and smiled. "I am afraid, my dear signora, you would not believe me if I were to tell you. It was a tremendous jump, and to miss it meant a broken limb—or a broken neck."

He paused, and Margaret, who had been fighting against the terrible effect the mere mention of Blair's name had worked upon her, recovered, and with a sigh, withdrew her eyes from the speaker, and looked up at the prince.

"Are you better?" he murmured, still screening her from the rest, and affecting to examine the costly fan he held.

"I—I am quite well," she said, looking down. "It must have been the heat."

"Doubtless," he said. "I will see the dining-room is cooler."

The gong sounded at the moment, and he had to leave her and give his arm to the countess, but Margaret heard him give directions to the servants respecting the dining-room windows.

The dinner proceeded. Her chair was placed within about six of his at the bottom of the table, and sometimes he would lean forward and say a few words; but to-night, although he watched her with that tender scrutiny of which Love teaches us the secret, he said nothing. And she sat silent, not listening to the talk around her, but thinking of that past which Blair's name had recalled all too vividly. The splendid room, the brilliant company, faded from her sight, and in their place rose the inclosed garden at the Court, and in the moon rays stood close by her side the man who even then, as she thought, was plotting her ruin!

Suddenly she heard his name again. It was the old general, who, apparently, could not forget the young Englishman who had taken the big jump.

"Has any one seen Viscount Leyton lately?" he inquired.

Margaret had a piece of bread in her hand, and was breaking it, but the prince saw her hand fall, and her fingers close over the bread with a convulsive clutch.

"I saw him when I was in London a month ago, count," said the young attache.

"Indeed. And is he as strong and cheerful as ever? Dear me, I remember him singing a song—a stupid sort of song; but he sang it with that light-hearted chic which the French so pride themselves on, but which, after all, one sees oftenest in the English."

"Blair Leyton wasn't very light-hearted when I saw him last," said the young man. "He was awfully changed. He'd been ill, so they said, and very unlucky, too. Something had gone wrong with him, I fancy; an 'affection of the heart,' I suppose. Your Englishman, when he loses his mistress, invariably takes to drink or gambling. I don't fancy Blair would sink to the former, so I imagine he had been going in for the latter. You know the Green Table Club, general?"

The count made a significant grimace, and executed something very like a wink, and the attache nodded significantly.

"Poor fellow, he was always reckless and careless, but lately they say he was positively desperate. He must have been living pretty hard, for he is so fearfully altered; the mere shadow of his old self; and you know what a splendid fellow he was, general?"

"Ah, yes," assented the old soldier. "I thought when I saw him that I would give a good deal to have him in my brigade. And he was so altered and broken, you say?"

"Oh, terribly. I heard, too, that he had lost nearly all his property. He had a great deal in his own right, in addition to his heirdom of the Ferrers property."

"It is a dreadful thing to see a man so richly endowed go to the dogs in that fashion," said the general, who had borne anything but a character for steadiness in his youth.

A smile went round the table, and the attache, to close the subject, remarked:

"Oh, I hope the dogs will be disappointed yet. There was a rumor of a match between Blair and the great heiress, Miss Violet Graham; but I can't vouch for the truth of it, seeing I got it from a man whose word I wouldn't hang a dog on—Austin Ambrose."

"Austin Ambrose, a man with a face like a mask, and a trick of looking over your head while he is talking to you?" said the general. "Oh, yes, I remember him. He was always with Lord Leyton."

"And is still," said the attache.

The subject had run itself out, and the conversation took another turn, but all the time it had been dealing with Blair Leyton, Margaret had set, her eyes fixed on the cloth, her hand closed on the piece of bread, and when it had concluded she looked up and round about her, like one awaking from a dream.

The signora signaled to the ladies and rose, when the prince held up his hand.

"Pardon, my mother, but you have forgotten the toast."

"Ah, the toast, yes," she said, and with a placid smile sank down again.

The prince filled the glass of the lady near him with wine, and leaning forward poured some into Margaret's glass.

"It is our custom on the night before our departure, Miss Leslie, to drink this toast—'To our next meeting!'" and as he spoke he rose and raised his glass.

All rose, ladies included, and lifted their glasses above their heads, and Margaret did the same. But her hand felt weak and tremulous. Blair's name was still ringing in her ears, and almost unconsciously she let the glass slip from her fingers. The red wine ran down her dress, where it made no sign, but reaching the table-cloth marked it with a blood-like stain.

The party looked rather grave, for it was considered a bad omen, but the prince, with his ever ready tact, laughed.

"Bravo, Miss Leslie!" he exclaimed. "That is the Greek fashion; you have secured the fulfillment of the toast by pouring a libation to the gods."

She looked at him gratefully, as his "bravo" was echoed by the rest of the gentlemen, and then she passed out with the ladies.

As if to dispel the slightly grave impression which poor Margaret's accident had produced, the men were merrier over their wine than usual, and the prince seemed, as in duty bound, the brightest of them all; but at intervals his handsome face grew grave and thoughtful. At last they rose and sauntered into the salon; but the prince, instead of joining a group of ladies, walked through into the conservatory, and sinking into the seat on which Margaret had sat, folded his arms and gave himself up to reverie. He remained there for a quarter of an hour, then, with the firm yet light step peculiar to him, strode into the drawing-room, and going up to Margaret, who was seated, by herself for a wonder, in a shady corner, bent down and said:

"Will you give me a few minutes?"

Margaret looked up at him almost pleadingly, but he met her gaze steadily, and with a little sigh she rose and laid her fingers on his arm.

He led her through a doorway opening to a portion of the terrace, which was inclosed by glass and occupied by some palms and statuary. The moon shone through the brown leaves and fell in white gleams upon the marble figures. Through the thick curtains the sound of the voices and music in the salon came fitfully, but the prince and Margaret were as little likely to be intruded on as if they were in the midst of a forest.

For a moment or two he stood looking up at the moon, as if he were choosing his words, then he turned to her, and laying his hand upon her white fingers, he said in a low but firm voice:

"You know why I asked you to be gracious enough to come here with me?"

Margaret remained silent, her heart beating heavily.

"Miss Leslie, to-morrow I leave Florence. I may not return for months, or I may get leave of absence and come back within a few days. It rests with you. The words I spoke to you the other night, they are what I would speak again now. Miss Leslie, I love you; will you be my wife?"

Margaret raised her pale face, and regarded him sorrowfully.

"Prince, it cannot be," she murmured. "Oh, I wish—I wish you had not told me——"

"I could not do otherwise than tell you," he said gravely, and with a manly tenderness. "Why should I conceal that which my heart feels? And why cannot it be?" and his fingers closed over hers.

"You forget, prince, you are a nobleman, one of the noblest in Italy, and I——" She stopped.

If he but knew how far beneath and removed from him she was!

"It is true I am a nobleman," he said gently, his dark eyes seeking hers eagerly. "It may be true that you have no title, that to the world our rank may seem unequal; but I love you—you, Mary Leslie, and I should not love you better, it could make no difference to me if you were—well, Queen of England. Besides, have you forgotten that you have a rank that is all your own, won by your genius, a rank more exalted and worthy in my eyes than that of an empress. You are a famous artist, while I—I am but the wearer of a title and sundry decorations, which I share with a score of other men as insignificant in other ways. Ah, listen to me, dear Miss Leslie. I have never loved until I saw you. I cannot ever love any one else. I can never hope to be happy unless I win you——"

"Oh, no, no!" she murmured, with deep agitation. "Do not say that, prince, for it can never be, never! never! Even if my rank equaled your own; even if——" she paused.

"Even if you loved me! Is that what you were going to say?" he inquired, his voice tremulous with suppressed passion. "Ah, say it, dearest! Let me hear the sweet words from your lips! You shall love me! Yes, for I will win your love from you, even against yourself," and he made to draw her near to him, but Margaret drew back, her eyes regarding him pleadingly and sorrowfully.

"No, prince," she said, almost inaudibly. "Even if I loved you I could not be your wife."

He waited while she gained strength to go on, waited with that chivalrous delicacy and patience which distinguished him.

"It is impossible, prince. Think what it is you do. You are asking me to share your rank, your noble name, one who is a stranger to you, of whom you know nothing"—she paused—"who may be anything that is base and unworthy——"

"Oh, stop!" he said, pleadingly; "do I not know that you are all that is good, and true, and pure? Have I not lived in the same house with you, listened to your voice? A man blind to all else could not but see that you are worthy to be the wife of any one, be he whom he may."

"No," she murmured; "it cannot be. Let me go, prince. I will go away, far from Florence, from Italy——"

He stopped her with a sudden gesture, a glance of fear and dread.

"You—you are married?" he said.

Margaret started, then she shook her head.

"I am not married, prince; but there is a dark shadow in my life, a sorrow and a shame."

Her voice faltered and broke, and her hand closed on his with a convulsive grasp.

"Shame?" he breathed.

"Yes," she said, nerving herself; "shame! Now, prince, you know why it is that I cannot be your wife. Spare me, and let me go."

He stood, white as the marble faces looking down at him, his eyes fixed on her face, yet scarcely seeming to see her.

"Shame!" he repeated, like a man who speaks during some horrible dream.

Margaret tried to shrink from him, but his hand held hers in a clasp of steel.

"Shame and—you!" he said at last. "You! Oh, it is impossible." Then he looked in her face, bent low and humbly, like a drooping lily, and he uttered a faint cry. It was the cry of a man who has been mortally wounded.

There was silence for a moment, then he let her hand fall, and turned—not to forsake her, but to hide his face from her. Margaret waited a second, then crept closer to him.

"Will you—can you forgive me, prince?" she murmured brokenly. "I should not have come here, but—but I was sorely tempted. I was alone—alone, and craving for sympathy and love—and your mother and sister gave them to me. I had no right to enter their presence, much less to accept their love, but—ah, if you knew all!" and a sigh choked her voice.

"Tell me all," he said, turning to her almost sternly; "tell me all—all! The name of the man——" He stopped, and his hands clinched tightly at his side.

Margaret shrank back with a look of fear.

"No, no!" she gasped; "not a word. It is all past and—and buried. I am as one that is dead to the world, and he—he is forgiven."

"Forgiven!" he echoed. "Ay, by an angel; but we are not all angels. No; some of us are men."

His face was so awful in its wrath and craving for vengeance that Margaret sprung to him and seized his arm.

"Prince, what would you do?"

He took her hand and dropped it from his arm with a little shudder, as if her touch had stung him; then, half mad with love, half frenzied by the passionate desire for vengeance on her behalf and his own, he took her hand and pressed it to his lips.

"I understand!" he said hoarsely; "oh, yes; I understand! He has wronged you—but you love him still!"

Margaret shrunk back, and covered her face with her hands.

"Yes," he muttered: "you love him still. Heaven help me!"

Margaret's heart was wrung by the agony in that cry of a strong man mortally stricken, and in her anguish and pity she fell at his feet, sobbing bitterly.

He looked down at her for a moment, all his soul speaking in his white, working face, then he raised her and gently led her to a door leading to one of the staircases, and held back the curtain that she might pass through.

"Good-bye!" he said. "Do not be afraid that—that I shall torture you with my presence. You spoke of leaving the villa. Do not. I ask that much of you. Grant it to me."

With bowed head, Margaret passed through, and, letting the curtain fall, he stood for awhile like one of the statues surrounding him; then, with a gesture terrible in its intensity, he raised one hand toward heaven, and vowed that he would know no rest till he had avenged her.

And so sprung into existence a foe to Blair more deadly than he had ever known, a foe spurred, not by personal hate, but by the passionate desire to wreak vengeance on behalf of the woman of whose love he had been robbed, whose life this unknown man had stained with shame.

And on that day, miles away, at Leyton Court, lay the great Earl of Ferrers—dying.

"What is the use of being a king if one must die?" exclaimed the Emperor Nero, who had caused death to others too often not to know what it meant.

The great earl, with half a dozen titles to his name, and half a county owning his sway, lay upon a couch in his sitting-room, upon which flickered the rays of the setting sun, fitly typifying his own approaching withdrawal beneath the horizon of life.

At his side sat Violet Graham, who had been sent for in haste some few days back, and who had remained in close attention upon the old man.

Near as he was to that grim door through which all mortality passes never to return, the earl still bore himself as a patrician should. The face was drawn and lined, the white hands were gray and transparent, but the eyes still shone calmly and resolutely.

"Has he come, my dear?" he asked.

"Not yet, my lord," said Violet Graham, starting slightly and flushing faintly. "It is scarcely time, I think."

"I suppose he will come," said the earl, dryly, "or will he find himself unable to leave the gaming-table and his other pursuits for a few hours?"

"I—I do not think Blair plays much now, my lord," she said, in a low voice.

"You do not know," he said, grimly. "No one knows. His life is a mystery. Why has he not been near me—when did you see him last?"

Her face paled as she remembered the night Blair had come to Park Lane and kissed her.

"Not—not very lately, sir. Not for some weeks."

"Then he may be abroad—at Monte Carlo or some other congenial place?"

"No," she said, in a low voice; "he has not left London."

He looked at her with the shrewdness of old age.

"You keep yourself informed of his movements; you care for him still, Violet?"

She did not answer, but her keen eyes met his for a moment, and her small, restless fingers plucked at the edge of the silk shawl which she had thrown over him.

The earl sighed.

"The love of women!" he muttered. "It passes all comprehension. My poor girl!"

"Do not pity me, sir," she said. "Perhaps——" she stopped.

"You think all may yet be well?" he said, with suppressed eagerness, and with a sudden flash of light in his eyes.

She did not reply, but he read her answer in her downcast face.

"It would save him!" he murmured. "But would it make you happy? My poor Violet——"

"If not, then nothing else will," she said, a deep red covering her face.

Before he could make any response, the door opened and a servant announced Viscount Leyton.

Violet Graham turned pale, and rising, passed out of the room by one door as Blair entered by the other.

The earl held out his hand; Blair, advancing quietly, took it, and the two men, the great earl and the one who would so soon take his place, looked at each other; then the earl let Blair's hand drop, and sighed.

"Great heavens!" he said, in the low and feeble voice, "judging by countenances we might well change places!" and he looked at Blair's haggard but still handsome face.

Blair smiled grimly.

"What have you been doing? But no need to ask. Have you been trying to kill yourself?"

Blair smiled again, and then sank into a chair.

"Never mind me, sir," he said, gently, and his voice, for it was as soft as a woman's when he was moved, made the old man wince; "I am of no account. I did not know you were so ill until I got your letter—or rather Violet Graham's. Are you better? I trust so."

"Oh, yes, I am better. I shall soon be quite well—if there is any truth in the pleasant things good people tell us of the other land. But I did not ask you to exchange sickroom commonplaces with a dying man——"

Blair laid his still strong hand upon the thin, shriveled one.

"Don't talk of dying, sir! Please Heaven there are many years before you yet! You have not squandered your strength, as—as some of us have."

"Lord Leyton, for instance," said the earl, with a smile. "No, I won't talk of dying. We will talk of something more profitable. Blair, you will be the Earl of Ferrers presently; a few days, weeks, perhaps, and you will be the master of the Court. I have done my best for you, although you have done the worst for yourself."

"The very worst, sir," assented Blair, with the smile which, grim as it was, was still pleasant to see.

"The very worst! But it is not too late yet."

Blair looked hard at the carpet.

"Not too late! Blair, all your own property is gone, they tell me?"

"They tell you truly, sir," said poor Blair, gravely.

"But there is still the Court, and there will be my own money! I have saved for years. You will be rich, even as rich men go nowadays. Are you going to fling it all in the gutter, like that which has gone before?"

Blair remained silent. The old man watched the weary, haggard face keenly.

"I see! Ah, well! It will not matter to me, I suppose? But it is rather a pity, is it not? Ours is a good title, not a mushroom affair of yesterday. There are stones in the Court upon which time and history have set their seal, and they are to be flung in the gutter, eh? And with the heart of one of the best girls in England to be broken——"

Blair started. For a second he had thought of Margaret, though he knew it was Violet Graham whom the earl meant.

"Poor girl! What fools men are!" Then his voice grew pathetic in its earnestness and entreaty. "Blair, is it too late? You owe me something, I think; I know you owe something to your name and all that belongs to it. Is it too late? Think! A woman's love, a good woman's heart is too priceless to be spurned with a light laugh. Blair, I, your kinsman, lying here dying, prefer one request. I do not ask you to spare this old roof or the wealth I leave you, but I do ask you to grasp the happiness within your reach. Will you make Violet your wife?"

Blair rose and paced the room. An agitation which seemed utterly beyond reason worked in his face. The old earl watched him in silence for a moment, then he said with a sigh:

"I understand. You refuse?"

"No," said Blair, "I consent. I will marry Violet, if she wishes it, and, please Heaven, I will try and be less unworthy of her."

The earl raised himself on his elbow, and touched a silver bell, and fell back panting on his cushions, and as Blair bent over him, the door opened, and Violet entered.

Her quick eyes glanced at Blair questioningly, but before either of them could speak, the earl took her hand and said:

"Violet, Blair has asked you of me for his wife. What have you to say?"

Her face went pale, then grew crimson, and she steadied herself by the head of the couch.

"Yes," she breathed, then just touching Blair's hand, she glided past him and fled to her own room.

The news spread with marvelous rapidity—for Violet told her maid within ten minutes of the proposal; but the interest that was excited was as nothing to that called forth by the further announcement that the marriage was to take place immediately.

The whims of dying men, especially when they are as great and as mighty as the Earl of Ferrers, must be regarded, and it was the desire of the earl that he should see his nephew, Blair, married to his ward, Violet Graham, before he died.

Under such circumstances it could not be anything but a quiet wedding; but even a quiet wedding between two young persons of their rank requires some preparations, and though these were hastened by the expenditure of large sums of money, a week had elapsed since their betrothal before they stood hand in hand before the altar in the little chapel of the Court.

Never perhaps had Violet looked handsomer. She had loved Blair Leyton for years with a passion of which, fortunately for the general peace, the fair sex alone is capable; and now she had got the desire of her heart, and he was her own. The fullness of her happiness almost frightened her, and as she found courage to glance up once at the pale, handsome face of the bridegroom, a sudden pang shot through her, the pang of a doubt and a dread which she strove to kill even as she felt them.

Would she be able to win his love, or, if after all her striving and its success, should she but own the shadow and semblance of the heart she craved for?

The little chapel was nearly empty, for only a few of the household had been permitted to view the ceremony, and no other guests had been asked.

At the request of Blair himself, an invitation had been sent to Austin Ambrose, but he had declined. It was, therefore, with some surprise, that Blair, as he returned from the altar with his wife—his wife—upon his arm, saw Austin Ambrose's tall, thin figure standing near the door. The sight of him gave Blair a sudden chill, for it recalled that other church in sleepy Sefton, and that other bride whom he had lost forever, but whose image was still enshrined in his heart; but he summoned up a smile, and held put his hand.

"You have come after all, then?" he said.

"Yes," said Austin Ambrose, with his calm smile. "I found that I could not keep away, and so ventured to look in, just to see the ceremony."

Then he turned to Violet Graham, who, rather pale now, had stood silently regarding him.

"One inducement, Lady Leyton," he said, his eyes looking over her head and carefully avoiding hers, "one irresistible inducement was my desire to be among the first to wish your ladyship the happiness and joy you so well deserve!" and he held out his hand.

Lady Leyton's face grew even paler as she gave him her hand, but as he grasped hers a shudder ran through her, and her eyes sought his face with a quick glance of alarm, for his hand was so cold that it struck like an icicle even through her glove.

And yet what could harm her? Was she not Blair's wife's, the Viscountess Leyton, the future Countess of Ferrers?

So, with a smile, she passed on.