After the aviation week Vanno Della Robbia still had the excuse of waiting for Prince Angelo and his bride. It was as well therefore to be at Monte Carlo as anywhere else in the neighbourhood of the villa they would occupy at Cap Martin.

They had been detained in England by a "command" visit to royalty, but would soon come to the Riviera. In a letter Angelo asked his younger brother to go over to Cap Martin and look at the house, which Vanno did: and prolonging his excursion to the ruined, historic convent on the Cap, met Miss Grant strolling there with Jim Schuyler and Dick Carleton. He passed near enough to hear that Schuyler was telling the legend of the place: how the nuns played a joke on the men of Roquebrune, the appointed guardians of their safety, by ringing the alarm bell to see if the soldiers of the castle town on the hill would indeed turn out to the rescue. How the very night after the men had run down in vain, the bell pealed out again, and the guardians remained snugly in their beds, only to hear next day that this time the alarm had been real. Saracens had sacked the convent, carried off all the young and pretty nuns, and murdered the old ones.

Schuyler and Carleton both bowed to Vanno, whom they had met several times during the "flying week" at Nice, and Schuyler interrupted his story long enough to say to Mary, "That's Prince Giovanni Della Robbia, who invented the parachute Rongier tested so successfully the other day. Dick met him once in Egypt. He goes star-gazing in the desert, I believe, consorting with Arabs, and learning all sorts of Eastern patois."

Neither Vanno (who caught the sound of his name in passing) nor Schuyler guessed the half-reluctant interest with which Mary heard the name of her sulky neighbour at the HÔtel de Paris, and learned those few details of his life.

Vanno had been more than once to Roquebrune since the first day, and knew that the curÉ had called twice upon Miss Grant, without finding her at home. He knew, too, that the priest had received no visit from her in return; nor had he again seen or heard of the "strange lady" who had come to question him about Prince Angelo.

Vanno was deeply disappointed at the failure of his plan, and feared that Mary wished to avoid knowing the priest; otherwise she might at least have gone to church at Roquebrune. She made other excursions, when she could tear herself from the Casino, on irresistibly bright afternoons. Not only had he seen her at Cap Martin, but in Nice and in Mentone; once, motoring into Italy with people whose faces were strange to Vanno, and unpromising; and with the same party again in the beautiful garden at Beaulieu, where it is fashionable to drink tea and watch the sunset. But she did not make time to go to Roquebrune, and show a little graceful gratitude for the curÉ's kindly interest.

The desire grew stronger in Vanno to speak to her, to know something of her besides the perhaps deceiving beauty of her face, but he clung in firmness or obstinacy to the resolve of which he had told his friend. He knew that he could not help her as the curÉ might, and secretly he feared himself. Once the ice was broken in making her acquaintance, he was not sure that he could still be strong.

But one afternoon he had been taking a long walk alone, as was his custom every day. Coming down from a Ligurian fort, by an old mule track that ended on the upper Corniche road, he saw an automobile which had stopped at the foot of the path. A girl in a rose-red motor-bonnet and a moleskin coat was standing up in the car, her eyes raised, her chin lifted like a flower tilted in its stem, intent on something which Vanno could not see. The girl was Miss Grant, and Vanno's heart gave a bound, then seemed to contract at sight of her, so near him and alone.

The automobile was drawn up so close to the descending mule path that Vanno saw it would be impossible to pass unless the chauffeur started the engine and moved the car on a little; but rather than this should be necessary, he halted abruptly a few yards above the level of the road.

The rattle of footsteps on rough cobbles roused Mary from her study of the thing which Vanno could not see. She glanced up, expecting some peasant who would want to pass her car. At sight of the Prince halted on the path and looking down into her uplifted face, she blushed. It was just such a blush as had dyed her cheeks painfully the night when he frowned in answer to her friendly smile; and Vanno knew that she was thinking of it. The remorse he had suffered then, when too late, came back to him. If she had not blushed now in the same childlike, hurt way, he was sure that he could have kept to his resolution not to speak. He would simply have stood still, gazing away into distance until she was ready to go on; or at most he would have said with cool politeness, "Please don't let me disturb you. I am in no hurry to pass." But in an instant it rushed over him that here was his chance to atone for an unkindness, and that if he did not quickly seize it he would be sorry all the rest of his life. Besides, it flashed into his mind that by speaking of a certain thing he could easily lead up to the subject of the curÉ. He wanted very much to know whether she attached any importance to the visits of the priest.

Vanno took off his hat to Mary, bowing gravely. He had guessed her reason for bringing the car to rest at this place, and it gave him his excuse. A step or two farther down the mule path brought him near enough to speak without raising his voice. "I think," he said, "you must have stopped here to look at the marble tablet set in the rock. Will you let me tell you something about it—unless you know its history already?"

"I thank you. I don't know. I was wondering about it." Mary stammered a little, blushing very deeply, partly with embarrassment—though she was not embarrassed when other strangers spoke to her—partly in surprise at hearing the "Roman Prince" speak English like an Englishman. "Please do tell me."

Before he spoke, she had given a quick order to the chauffeur to move on and leave the end of the mule path free. Now the heart of the motor began to beat, and the car rolled a few feet farther on. Vanno came out into the thick white dust of the much-travelled road, and he and Mary could both look up to the tablet he had mentioned.

It was an oblong piece of marble, set high on the face of gray rock which on one side walled the upper Corniche, Napoleon's road. On it was the curious inscription: "Remember eternal at my heart. February, 1881."

"It is so strange," Mary said, trying to seem at ease, and not show the slightest emotion. It was ridiculous to feel emotion! Yet she could not help being absurdly happy, because this man who had snubbed her once and apparently disapproved her always was speaking to her of his own accord, in kindness.

"'Remember eternal at my heart?' It's like the English of a person not English. But why did he not have the words put in his own language, which he knew?"

"That is what everybody wonders," Vanno said, finding it as difficult as Mary found it, not to show that this conversation was of immense, exciting importance. "It puzzled me so much when I first came this way that I couldn't get it out of my head. I asked a friend who has lived for years not many miles away, if he could tell me what it meant."

"And could he tell you?"

"He told me a story which he believed but would not vouch for. Only, a very old inhabitant told it to him. It appeals to me as true. It must be true." A new warmth stole into Vanno's voice as he spoke. They had both been looking up at the tablet on the rock, but as that thrill like a chord on a violin struck her ear, Mary turned to him. Their eyes met, as they had so often met, but to-day there was no coldness in Vanno's, or hurt pride in Mary's.

"Can you think of any reason for the bad English?" he asked. He longed to hear what she would say.

She thought for a minute. "Could it be," she reflected aloud, "that the person who had the tablet put up associated this place with some one who was English—maybe a woman, if he was a man—and so he wanted to use her language, not his own?"

"You have guessed right!" exclaimed Vanno, boyishly delighted with her intuition. "He was an Italian. He loved an English girl." The romantic dark eyes which had so often burned with gloomy fire in looking at her burned with a different flame for an instant; then quickly, as if with a common impulse, the girl and the man tore their looks apart. "They met here on the Riviera," Vanno went on, not quite steadily. "It was at this spot they first found out that they loved each other, according to the story of my friend."

He paused involuntarily. His mouth was dry. When he began to explain the tablet, he had not realized what it would be like to tell the story to this girl at this place. It was as if some other voice, talking above his with his words, gave a meaning and an emphasis which must be unmistakable to her. It was hard to go on, for with each sentence he would surely stumble deeper into difficulty. Yet the silence was electrical. Unsaid things seemed rustling in ambush. He dared not look again at Mary, and he felt that she dared not look at him. But it was necessary to go on, and he took up the narrative clumsily, fearing to tangle the thread.

"The Italian asked the girl to marry him—here, where we stand. And they were engaged. But in a few weeks or months something happened. My friend is not sure whether she died, or whether some one came between them. He is sure only that they parted. And afterward the man had this tablet put up to mark the spot where he had lived his happiest hour."

"It is a sad story," Mary said.

"Yes. It is sad. But it is beautiful, too. He was faithful. 'Remember eternal at my heart.'"

"Perhaps those were the very words he spoke to her here, when—they loved each other and he was trying to talk in her language."

"I thought of that, too. It's almost certain he said these words, to assure her that he could never forget this place."

"No one else can forget, who knows the story. It makes the tablet seem haunted."

"Would you be afraid to see the ghosts of those lovers?" Vanno asked.

"No," Mary answered. "For if he too is dead—and 1881 is quite a long time ago!—they must be happy together now. Happy ghosts would try to give happiness to others."

Instantly the sentiment was uttered Mary regretted it. She feared that the man might think she associated herself with him in some vague hope of happiness. "I trust at least," she hurried on, "that the story of the lovers is true."

"It was the curÉ of Roquebrune who told it to me. He thinks it more probable than two or three other tales," Vanno said, speaking slowly, to impress the name of his informant upon the girl. "The curÉ is a most interesting man. Perhaps you've met him?" He asked this question doubtfully, lest Mary should guess that it was to him she owed the curÉ's visits; but she was unsuspicious.

"No. He called on me when I was out. I don't know why he came," she said. She looked a little guilty, because she would have gone up to the church of Roquebrune after the second call if she had not been afraid that the curÉ had been sent to see her by some one at home who had found out that she was on the Riviera. Vanno, misunderstanding her change of expression, said no more, though he had begun his story with the intention of leading up to this. They parted with polite thanks from Mary for his information, thanks which seemed banal, a strange anti-climax coming after the story of the lovers. Yet they went away from one another with an aftermath of their first unreasoning happiness still lingering in their hearts. That night at dinner they bowed to each other slightly; and during the week that followed before Christmas eve, sometimes Vanno almost believed in the girl; sometimes he lost hope of her, and was plunged from his unreasoning happiness to the dark depths of a still more unreasoning despair. But he knew that she thought of him. He saw it in her eyes, or in the turn of her head if she ostentatiously looked away from him. And he did not know whether he were glad or sorry, for he saw no good that could come of what he began to call his infatuation.

The morning of Christmas eve arrived, and with it a telegram to say that Angelo and his bride Marie were delayed again until the eve of New Year's Day, the great fÊte of France. Vanno was disappointed, for he had expected them that night, and would have liked to be with them on Christmas. He resolved to invite the curÉ to dine with him on Christmas night; and meanwhile, strolling on the Casino terrace in the hope of seeing Mary, he ran across Jean Rongier, the airman, the young French baron who had achieved a sensational success at Nice for the new Della Robbia parachute. On the strength of this feat the two had become good friends, and Vanno had been up several times in Rongier's Bleriot monoplane.

"A favour, mon ami," Rongier began as they met. "I was on the point of calling at your hotel, to ask it of you. Go with me to-night to a dance on board the big yacht White Lady, that you can see down there in the harbour."

"Many thanks, but no!" laughed Vanno. "I haven't danced since I was twenty; and even if I had I don't know White Lady's owner."

"That is nothing," said Rongier. "Nobody knows him, but every one is going—that is, all the men we know are going; and you will go, to please me."

"I'd do a good deal to please you, but not that," Vanno persisted.

"If I tell you a lady whom I am anxious—particularly anxious—to please, will be angry with me if you refuse? She makes it a point that I bring you."

"That's a different matter," said Vanno good-naturedly. "I suppose she doesn't make it a point for me to stay through the whole evening?"

"You can settle that with her," Rongier reassured him. "I thought you wouldn't fail me. She's heard about your blue comet and your yellow desert, and your new parachute, and has probably mixed them all up; but the result is that she wants to meet you."

"Very kind. I wish I could do the comet and the desert the same credit you do the parachute. But who is 'She'?"

"Miss Holbein, the daughter of the yacht's owner. English people here, I understand, won't know her father because he was once an I.D.B. and is now a money-lender; but thank heaven we who have Latin blood in our veins are neither snobs nor hypocrites. By the way, Holbein called some fellow at the Casino a 'snob' the other night, and the man returned, 'If I were a snob, I wouldn't know you.' Holbein thought it so smart he goes about repeating the story against himself, which proves he balances his millions with a sense of humour. Miss Holbein is handsome. Jewesses can be the most beautiful women in the world, don't you think? and though she is snubbed by the grandes dames here and perhaps elsewhere, I notice that snubs generally come home to roost. She will have all the millions one day, and she is clever enough to pay people back in their own coin—not coin that she would miss in spending. And she is clever enough to be Madame la Baronne Rongier, wife to the idol of the French people, if she thinks it worth while! Just for the moment, though, I am on my probation. I dare refuse her nothing she wants, and she wants Prince Giovanni Della Robbia at her mother's dance."

"That unworthy person is at her service," Vanno said, bored at the prospect, but willing to please his friend.

---

Mrs. Ernstein and Dodo Wardropp were eagerly looking forward to the Christmas eve dance on board White Lady. Mrs. Collis and Lottie had been looking forward to it too; and after they went from the villa they wrote almost humbly to ask Mrs. Holbein if they might still come, though they were no longer with her friend Lady Dauntrey. To their joy and surprise she had written back cordially to say she hoped most certainly they would come, and bring friends. She had seemed far from cordial to them or anybody else when lunching at the Villa Bella Vista on the unfortunate occasion of the dish-towel; indeed, she had been lymphatic, and had scarcely troubled to speak to any one; but now the Collises thought they had misjudged her.

This was the first entertainment for which Lady Dauntrey had contrived to secure invitations for her guests; and Dodo, Mrs. Ernstein, and the Collises had been delightedly telling every one they knew (not a large number) that they were going to the White Lady dance. It was a pleasure at last to be able to tell of something happening to them which might excite envy. So far, they had felt that as the Dauntreys' guests they were being pitied or laughed at by those they would have liked to impress.

There was no doubt that the Holbeins, being enormously rich, would do everything very well; and Lady Dauntrey remarked more than once that Mrs. Holbein had told her people were "simply crawling" for invitations.

Not till the last moment did Eve inform any one that she was taking Miss Grant, for she had not yet mentioned speaking to her the other day at the Casino. It was arranged that, the villa being much nearer than the HÔtel de Paris to the yacht, Mary should call for her chaperon; therefore, as Eve had said nothing, it was a great surprise when the house party had assembled in the drawing-room, putting on their wraps and buttoning their gloves, to hear the "sulky codfish" announce Miss Grant.

Mary walked into the dull drab room in a dress which appeared to be made entirely of fine gold tissue, her hair banded with a wreath of diamond laurel leaves, which made her look extraordinarily Greek and classic.

No one else, not even the rich Mrs. Ernstein, had a dress which compared to this, and Mary's entrance was received in shocked silence by the ladies, with the exception of Eve, who greeted her "mascotte" warmly, with compliments.

Lady Dauntrey's efforts to make the drawing-room more habitable before Mary saw it would have seemed almost pathetic to any one who understood; and they had seemed pathetic to Lord Dauntrey. He was more or less in her confidence, and still under her spell. It was for him, she had said, that she wanted to secure a new paying-guest who had plenty of money to put into the "system," and who loved gambling better than anything else. He had helped Eve and the codfish decorate both drawing-room and dining-room for Christmas, in order that Mary might take a fancy to the place, and consent to come as a boarder. There were a good many pine branches pinned on to curtains and stuck into huge, ugly Japanese vases, a few wreaths hiding damp or dirty patches on the wall. Crookedly hung pictures had been straightened; some Christmas magazines were lying about, and bowls of chrysanthemums relieved the room of its wonted gloom. It really had almost a festive air; and after her rather lonely life at the hotel, the place and the people seemed pleasant to Mary. She was so enchanted with a little shivering marmoset, which Miss Wardropp had bought of a wandering monkey-merchant in the Galerie Charles Trois, that Dodo forgave her the wonderful dress and filet, if she did not quite forgive Lady Dauntrey the surprise. Then Mrs. Ernstein produced two trained sparrows, which she called her "mosquito hawks" and took with her everywhere. Mary told them both about an adorable blue frog named Hilda which she had bought at a Mentone china-shop; and in comparing pets the atmosphere cleared. They all started off in cabs for the harbour and White Lady's slip, where a motor-launch from the yacht would meet them; and Mary made friends with Dom Ferdinand, who was the only man in the carriage with her and Lady Dauntrey.

Arriving at the slip they found Major Norwood and the Maharajah of Indorwana also waiting for the launch, with Captain Hannaford; and Mary introduced all three to the party from the Villa Bella Vista, whom they did not yet know. Then came Dick Carleton, alone, for Schuyler had firmly refused to sacrifice himself on the altar of friendship, and half a dozen smart, merry little officers of the Chasseurs Alpins, stationed at Mentone, and up at the lonely fort on Mont Agel. By this time it was late, for Lady Dauntrey wished to make a dramatic entry after most of the guests had already come on board, and the wish was more than granted. She, with her gorgeous widow and the two girls, attended by fifteen men, burst upon the crowd, who, for the best of reasons, had not yet begun to dance. Besides Mrs. Holbein and her daughter, there was not another woman present until the party from the Villa Bella Vista appeared.

Seldom could there have been a more curious scene, upon a magnificently appointed yacht, decorated for a dance. Already, when Lady Dauntrey and her impromptu train arrived, forty or fifty men were assembled on a deck screened in by flags and masses of palms and flowers. A Hungarian band imported from Paris was playing, not dance music, for that would have been a mockery in the circumstances, but gay marches and lively airs to cheer drooping spirits. Of all the women invited (some of whom Mrs. Holbein scarcely knew) only Lady Dauntrey and her house-party had accepted, for word had gone forth from the Elect that, in good American slang, the notorious Jew money-lender and his common wife were "the limit." As for the girl, she did not count, except in cash. Now, when it was too late, Mrs. Holbein desperately regretted that she had slighted some of her old friends, who had once been good enough for her to know, and who would have flocked to her dance gladly. There were plenty of them scattered about between San Remo and Nice, who were at this moment feeling aggrieved by the Holbeins' neglect. If only they had been bidden, these contemptuously amused men would have had partners, even though the list of names in the society papers might have excited some derision. Mrs. Holbein had aimed high and overshot the mark. The result was tragic. And though her vulgar nature, writhing in humiliation, judged others by itself and believed all to be laughing maliciously, there were some who could not laugh.

Vanno Della Robbia detested vulgar people, and had disliked the idea of coming to the dance; but now that he was here, on their beautiful yacht, he pitied the wretched Holbeins so intensely that he felt physically ill. The man, with fiercely shining eyes and hawk nose, hunching up his round shoulders as he clenched and unclenched his pudgy hands, deeply hidden in his pockets, was horribly pathetic to Vanno, who tried not to see the little bright beads that oozed out of the tight-skinned forehead. Even more pathetic was the woman, blazing in 20,000 diamond-power, haggard under her rouged smile, her large uncovered back and breast heaving, her fat, ungloved hands mere bunches of fingers and rings. The girl did not so much matter. She was young and handsome, her moustache as yet but the shadow of a coming event; and the affair was not so tragic to her since she had the attention of Rongier and plenty of other men. But Vanno had seen such faces and figures as those of Sam Holbein and his wife in dusky shops at Constantine. They had been happier and more at home there.

Disgustedly he knew that it comforted the woman to be talking with Prince Giovanni Della Robbia, yet he gave the comfort and spread it thickly for her by showing deference, listening patiently to desperate boastings of her splendid possessions: her house in Park Lane, the castle "Sam" had bought in Fifeshire. "I am a county lady there, I can tell you, Prince!" she said, with a giggle that just escaped being a sob. "I hope you will come to my ball at Dornock Castle next August, in the Games Week, your Highness; all the men in kilts and mostly with titles; our own family pipers, never less than six, playing for the reels. My daughter has taken lessons, and I tell you she can give points to some of those Calvanistic cats with Macs to their names, and a lot of rot about clans, who think just because they're Scotch they're everybody. Why, some of the old nobility up there have got such poor, degenerated taste in decoration, they have nasty plaid carpets and curtains all over their houses. We had a firm from Paris send their best men to do our castle over new from cellar to attic, Empire and Louis. It's an example to some of those stuck-up Scotch earls and their prim countesses. If I had a title I'd live up to it!"

"You seem to do very well without," Vanno said.

"Well, we like to show them what's what. And I shouldn't wonder if my daughter would attract one into the family some day. But talking of titles, here comes the Viscount and Viscountess Dauntrey and that gentleman friend of theirs who may be a king any minute. There's a foreign Marquis and an Englishman with them, and some pretty girls, so maybe things will begin to wake up a bit."

Vanno turned in the direction of her glittering eyes, and saw Mary Grant approaching with a large party; three over-dressed, over-painted, over-jewelled women; the Maharajah of Indorwana, scintillating with decorations; six French officers in uniform, and eight other men. The little brown Indian royalty was walking with Mary, clinging closely to her side, seeing no one but her, and trying ostentatiously to "cut out" Dom Ferdinand, who kept almost equally near on the other side. Mary, as she waited for Lady Dauntrey to be boisterously greeted by host and hostess, smiled gently and softly from one man to the other, as if she wished to be kind to both, and was pleased with their attentions.

So, indeed, she was pleased. It was nice to be admired. Men were amusing novelties in her life. She thought them most entertaining creatures, and quaintly different in all their ways from women. She was charmed with her own dress and the lovely filet of diamond laurel leaves which she had bought at the shop of the nice jeweller who was so kind. She had smiled and nodded to her image in the mirror before leaving the hotel, as Cinderella might have smiled; for this was her first ball. Never had she been to a dance except those got up among a few young people after dinner at Lady MacMillan's, years ago when she was only a schoolgirl, and the convent dances where the pupils had learnt to waltz together, and one of the dear sisters had played the old piano in the schoolroom.

Mary was wearing a good deal of jewellery, because she loved it, and had never had any before. Much of her winnings she had given away. Any one who asked, and made up a pitiful tale, could have something from her. The latest story going about in connection with her reckless and unreasoned generosity was of what she had done for a band of strolling Italian musicians. She had encouraged them to bleat and bawl their wornout songs in wornout voices, under the windows of the HÔtel de Paris, until it had been politely intimated to her that the shriekings and tinklings were a nuisance. Mary, who loved and understood good music, had enjoyed these disastrous efforts no more than others had, but her heart had been full of pity for the battered little band. She could not bear to have their feelings hurt; and when at last she had to tell them that they must sing no more under her window, she gave the leader and his wife a mille note each to buy new instruments and costumes for the entire company. The man and woman had been seen bursting into tears, and pressing garlic kisses on Mary's hands, apparently against her inclination. Thus the story had got about, with many others of her eccentric and exaggerated charities. But beyond what she did for all who were in need, or made her think they were, she had more money than she knew what to do with for herself; and much of it she had spent with the jeweller in the Galerie Charles Trois, who was openly her slave.

If he offered her beautiful things at prices which gave him no margin of profit, she in her ignorance of values did not know that the jewels were surprisingly cheap. She bought of this man because he was kind, because he begged her to come to his place, because he seemed to enjoy showing her lovely ornaments, and knew always, as if by instinct, exactly what was most suitable and becoming. But gossip said that the jeweller made presents to the eccentric and beautiful girl whose career at Monte Carlo was an interesting mystery to every one. Vanno had heard these stories from Rongier, before he could find presence of mind to cut them short by turning to another subject: and seeing her to-night, dazzling with diamonds, surrounded by men whose admiration she evidently liked, the good thoughts of her which he had eagerly cherished were burnt up in a new flame of suspicion, a rage of jealous anger. He was furious with the girl for coming to this dance which ladies of position had ignored, furious because she had come with such people, women who painted their faces, and a crowd of men of different nations.

The two sides of his nature warred like opposing forces. The wild passion of Othello was in him. He could have snatched up the slender white-and-gold figure, wrapped the shining jewelled head in the trailing scarf of point lace, and rushed away with the girl in his arms—anywhere, far from these people who had no right to be near her. He could not bear to see the Maharajah's eyes on her face and on her long white throat. A hateful thought sprang into his mind concerning the rope of Indian pearls, with ruby and emerald tassels, tied loosely round her neck. He wondered if the Maharajah of Indorwana had given it to her, if she would have accepted such a gift from the brown man; and the thought seemed to take colour in his brain, as if it were a bright scarlet spot which grew larger and redder, spreading behind his eyes till he could see nothing else.

Vanno had told himself many times that he must not draw too near this girl; that for the sake of love's nobility, for the sake of his respect for womanhood sacred in her and in all women, he must not draw near unless her soul were a star behind the eyes that were like stars. And he had not been able to believe in the stars for more than a few happy, exalted moments, which passed and came again, only to be blotted out once more.

But now, suddenly, it no longer mattered whether he believed or not. He had to try and tear her away from the life she was leading. He did not know which impulse was master—the impulse to save a soul, or the impulse to possess selfishly a thing coveted; at least, to snatch it from others, if he did not take it for himself.

As he stood pale and quiet in the background, Mary was accepting invitations to dance; for now Mrs. Collis and Lottie had arrived, bringing three American girls and a youthful American mother from the HÔtel Metropole, where they had gone to stay. Counting the hostess and her daughter, the number of women had been swelled to a dozen by these last arrivals, and dancing was to begin. The younger men, entering into the spirit of the occasion, struggled with each other to engage partners, and the smiling ladies were promising to split each dance between four partners.

Mary, being the prettiest girl as well as something of a celebrity, was almost alarmingly in request. She was besieged by men who begged her bodyguard to introduce them quickly, and laughing like a child she was busily giving away dances when Vanno came forward. For a moment he stood silently behind the other men, taller than any, dark and grave, and as always mysteriously reproachful, as if for some sin of Mary's which she had committed unconsciously.

She looked up, struck almost with fear by the contrast between his gravity and the frivolous gayety of the others. But he made all the rest look puerile, and even common.

"Will you dance with me?" he asked.

"Yes," she answered, forgetting to add the polite "with pleasure," which years ago had been taught at the convent as the suitable reply for a dÉbutante to a prospective partner.

"The third waltz?"

"Very well—the third waltz," she echoed.

There was no question of splitting it up. No man dared make the suggestion. Something in the Roman's manner and Mary's look gave every one the idea that they knew each other well, that no one must try to interfere between them.

---