The Princess Casamassima: Book Fourth

XXXIX.

ON Saturday afternoons Paul Muniment was able to leave his work at four o’clock, and on one of these occasions, some time after his visit to Madeira Crescent, he came into Rosy’s room at about five, carefully dressed and brushed, and ruddy with the freshness of an abundant washing. He stood at the foot of her sofa, with a conscious smile, knowing how she chaffed him when his necktie was new; and after a moment, during which she ceased singing to herself, as she twisted the strands of her long black hair together and let her eyes travel over his whole person, inspecting every detail, she said to him, “ My dear Mr. Muniment, you are going to see the Princess.”

“ Well, have you anything to say against it ?” Mr. Muniment asked.

“ Not a word ; you know I like princesses. But you have.”

“ Well, my girl, I ’ll not speak it to you.” the young man rejoined. “ There’s something to be said against everything, if you ‘ll give yourself trouble enough.”

“ I should be very sorry if ever anything was said against you.”

“ The man’s a sneak who is only and always praised,” Muniment remarked. “ If you did n’t hope to be finely abused, where would be the encouragement ?”

“ Ay, but not with reason,” said Rosy, who always brightened to an argument.

“ The better the reason, the greater the incentive to expose one’s self. However, you won’t hear it, if people do heave bricks at me.”

“ I won’t hear it ? Pray, don’t I hear everything ? I should like any one to keep anything from me !” And Miss Muniment gave a toss of her recumbent head.

“ There ’s a good deal I keep from you, my dear,” said Paul, rather dryly.

“ You mean there are things I don’t want. I don’t take any trouble, to know. Indeed and indeed there are: things that I would n’t know for the world — that no amount of persuasion would induce me, not if you was to go down on your knees. But if I did — if I did, I promise you that just as I lie here I should have them all in my pocket. Now there are others,” the young woman went on — “ there are others that you will just be so good as to tell me. When the Princess asked you to come and see her you refused, and you wanted to know what good it would do. I hoped you would go, then; I should have liked you to go, because I wanted to know how she lived, and whether she had things handsome, or only in the poor way she said. But I did n’t push you, because I couldn’t have told you what good it would do you : that was only the good it would have done me. At present I have heard everything from Lady Aurora, and I know that it’s all quite decent and tidy (though not really like a princess, a bit), and that she knows how to turn everything about and put it best end foremost, just as I do, like, though I ought n’t to say it, no doubt. Well, you have been, and more than once, and I have had nothing to do with it; of which I am very glad now, for reasons that you perfectly know — you ’re too honest a man to pretend you don’t. Therefore, when I see you going again, I just inquire of you, as you inquired of her, What good does it do you ?”

“ I like it — I like it, my dear,” said Paul, with his fresh, unembarrassed smile.

“ I dare say you do. So should I, in your place. But it’s the first time I have heard you express the idea that we ought to do everything we like.”

“ Why not, when it does n’t hurt any one else ?”

“ Oh, Mr. Muniment, Mr. Muniment !” Rosy exclaimed, with exaggerated solemnity, holding up a straight, attenuated forefinger at him. Then she added, “ No, she does n’t do you good, that beautiful, brilliant woman.”

“ Give her time, my dear — give her time,” said Paul, looking at his watch.

“ Of course you are impatient, but you must hear me. I have no doubt she’ll wait for you ; you won’t lose your turn. Please, what would you do if any one was to break down altogether ?”

“ My bonny lassie,” the young man rejoined, “ if you only keep going, I don’t care who fails.”

“ Oh, I shall keep going, if it’s only to look after my friends and get justice for them,” said Miss Muniment — “ the delicate, sensitive creatures who require support and protection. Have you really forgotten that we have such a one as that ?”

The young man walked to the window, with his hands in his pockets, and looked out at the fading light. “ Why does she go herself, then, if she doesn’t like her ?”

Rose Muniment hesitated a moment. « Well, I ’m glad I’m not a man !” she broke out. “ I think a woman on her back is cleverer than a man on his two legs. And you such a wonderful one, too!”

“ You are all too clever for me, my dear. If she goes — and twenty times a week, too — why should n’t I go, once in ever so long? Especially as I like her, and Lady Aurora does n’t.”

“Lady Aurora doesn’t? Do you think she’d be guilty of hypocrisy ? Lady Aurora delights in her; she won’t let me say that she herself is fit to dust the Princess’s shoes. I need n’t tell you how she goes down before them she likes. And I don’t believe you care a button ; you have got something in your head, some wicked game or other, that you think she can hatch for you.”

At this Paul Muniment turned round and looked at his sister a moment, smiling still and whistling just audibly. “ Why should n’t I care ? Ain’t I soft, ain’t I susceptible ? ”

“ I never thought I should hear you ask that, after what I have seen these four years. For four years she has come, and it’s all for you, as well it might be, and you never showing any more sense of what she ’d be willing to do for you than if you had been that woolen cat on the hearth rug !”

“ What would you like me to do ? Would you like me to hang round her neck and hold her hand, the same as you do ?” Muniment asked.

“Yes, it would do me good, I can tell you. It ’s better than what I see — the poor lady getting clouded over, like a mirror that wants rubbing.”

“ You know a good deal, Rosy, but you don’t know everything,” Muniment remarked in a moment, with a face that gave no sign of seeing a reason in what she said. “ Your mind is too poetical. There’s nothing that I should care for that her ladyship would be willing to do for me.”

“ She would marry you at a day’s notice — she’d do that.”

“ I should n’t care for that. Besides, if I was to ask her, she would never come into the place again. And I should n’t care for that, for you.”

“ Never mind me ; I ‘ll take the risk !” cried Rosy, gayly.

“ But what’s to be gained, if I can have her, for you, without any risk ?”

“ You won’t have her for me, or for any one, when she’s dead of a broken heart.”

“ Dead of a broken tea-cup ! ” said the young man. “ And, pray, what should we live on, when you had got us set up ? — the three of us, without counting the kids.”

He evidently was arguing from pure good-nature, and not in the least from curiosity; but his sister replied as eagerly as if he would be floored by her answer : “ Has n’t she got two hundred a year of her own ? Don’t I know every penny of her affairs ?”

Paul Muniment gave no sign of any mental criticism he may have made on Rosy’s conception of the delicate course, or of a superior policy; perhaps, indeed, for it is perfectly possible, her inquiry did not strike him as having a mixture of motives. He only rejoined, with a little pleasant, patient sigh, “ I don’t want the dear old girl’s money.”

His sister, in spite of her eagerness, waited twenty seconds ; then she flashed at him. “ Pray, do you like the Princess’s better ?”

“ If I did, there would be more of it,” he answered, quietly.

“ How can she marry you ? Has n’t she got a husband ?” Rosy cried.

“ Lord, how you give me away !” laughed her brother. “ Daughters of earls, wives of princes — I have only to pick.”

“ I don’t speak of the Princess, so long as there’s a prince. But if you have n’t seen that Lady Aurora is a beautiful, wonderful exception, and quite unlike any one else in all the wide world — well, all I can say is that I have.”

“ I thought it was your opinion,” Paul objected, “ that the swells should remain swells, and the high ones keep their place.”

“ And, pray, would she lose hers if she were to marry you ?”

“ Her place at Inglefield, certainly,” said Paul, as patiently as if his sister could never tire him with any insistence or any minuteness.

“ Has n’t she lost that already ? Does she ever go there ?”

“ Surely you appear to think so, from the way you always question her about it,” replied Paul.

“ Well, they think her so mad already that they can’t think her any madder,” his sister continued. “ They have given her up, and if she were to marry you ” —

“ If she were to marry me, they would n’t touch her with a ten - foot pole,” Paul broke in.

Rosy flinched a moment; then she said, serenely, “ Oh, I don’t care for that !”

“ You ought to, to be consistent, though, possibly, she should n’t, admitting that she would n’t. You have more imagination than logic — which, of course, for a woman, is quite right. That’s what makes you say that her ladyship is in aiffiction because I go to a place that she herself goes to without the least compulsion.”

“ She goes to keep you off,” said Rosy, with decision.

“ To keep me off ? ”

“ To interpose, with the Princess ; to be nice to her and conciliate her, so that she may not take you.”

“ Did she tell you any such rigmarole as that ?” Paul inquired, this time staring a little.

“ Do I need to be told things, to know them ? I am not a fine, strong, superior male ; therefore I can discover them for myself,” answered Rosy, with a dauntless little laugh and a light in her eyes which might indeed have made it appear that she was capable of wizardry.

“ You make her out at once too passionate and too calculating,” the young man rejoined. “ She has no personal feelings, she wants nothing for herself. She only wants one thing in the world — to make the poor a little less poor.”

“ Precisely ; and she regards you, a helpless, blundering bachelor, as one of them.”

“ She knows I am not helpless so long as you are about the place, and that my blunders don’t matter so long as you correct them.”

“ She wants to assist me to assist you, then !” the girl exclaimed, with the levity with which her earnestness was always interfused; it was a spirit that seemed, at moments, in argument, to mock at her own contention. “ Besides, is n’t that the very thing you want to bring about ?” she went on. “ Is n’t that what you are plotting and working and waiting for ? She wants to throw herself into it — to work with you.”

“ My dear girl, she does n’t understand a pennyworth of what I think. She could n’t if she would.”

“ And no more do I, I suppose you mean.

“ No more do you ; but with you it’s different. If you would, you could. However, it matters little who understands and who does n’t, for there’s mighty little of it. I ’m not doing much, you know.”

Rosy lay there looking up at him. “ It must be pretty thick, when you talk that way. However, I don’t care what happens, for I know I shall be looked after.”

“ Nothing will happen — nothing will happen.” Paul remarked, simply.

The girl’s rejoinder to this was to say in a moment, “ You have a different tone since you have taken up the Princess.”

She spoke with a certain severity, but he broke out, as if he had not heard her, “ I like your idea of the female aristocracy quarreling over a dirty brute like me.”

“ I don’t know how dirty you are, but I know you smell of soap,” said Rosy, with serenity. “ They won’t quarrel ; that’s not the way they do it. Yes, you are taking a different tone, for some purpose that I can’t discover just yet.”

“ What do you mean by that ? When did I ever take a tone ?” her brother asked.

“ Why, then, do you speak as if you were not remarkable, immensely remarkable — more remarkable than anything any one, male or female, good or bad, of the aristocracy or of the vulgar sort, can ever do for you ?”

“ What on earth have I ever done to show it ? ” Paul demanded.

“ Oh, I don’t know your secrets, and that’s one of them. But we ’re out of the common beyond any one, you and I, and, between ourselves, with the door fastened, we might as well admit it.”

“ I admit it for you, with all my heart,” said the young man, laughing.

“Well, then, if I admit it for you, that’s all that’s required.”

The brother and sister considered each other a while in silence, as if each were tasting, agreeably, the distinction the other conferred; then Muniment said, “ If I ‘m such an awfully superior chap, why should n’t I behave in keeping ?”

“ Oh, you do, you do !”

“All the same, you don’t like it.”

“ It is n’t so much what you do ; it’s what she does.”

“ How do you mean, what she does ? ”

“ She makes Lady Aurora suffer.”

“ Oh, I can’t go into that,” said Paul. " A man feels like a muff, talking about the women that ‘ suffer ’ for him.”

“ Well, if they do it, I think you might bear it !” Rosy exclaimed. “ That’s what a man is. When it comes to being sorry, oh, that’s too ridiculous !”

“ There are plenty of things in the world I’m sorry for,” Paul rejoined, smiling. “ One of them is that you should keep me gossiping here when I want to go out.”

“ Oh, I don’t care if I worry her a little. Does she do it on purpose ? ” Rosy continued.

“ You ladies must settle all that together,”Muniment answered, rubbing his hat with the cuff of his coat. It was a new one, the bravest he had ever possessed, and in a moment he put it on his head, as if to reinforce his reminder to his sister that it was time she should release him.

“Well, you do look genteel,” she remarked, complacently, gazing up at him. “ No wonder she has lost her head! I mean the Princess,” she explained. “ You never went to any such expense for her ladyship.”

“ My dear, the Princess is worth it — she’s worth it,” said the young man, speaking seriously now, and reflectively.

“Will she help you very much?” Rosy demanded, with a strange, sudden transition to eagerness.

“Well,” said Paul, “that’s rather what I look for.”

She threw herself forward on her sofa, with a movement that was rare with her, and shaking her clasped hands she exclaimed, “Then go off, go off quickly !”

He came round and kissed her, as if he were not more struck than usual with her freakish inconsequence. “ It’s not bad to have a little person at home who wants a fellow to succeed.”

“ Oh, I know they will look after me,” she said, sinking back upon her pillow with an air of agreeable security.

He was aware that whenever she said “ they,” without further elucidation, she meant the populace surging up in his rear, and he rejoined, always hilarious, “ I don’t think we ‘11 leave it much to ‘ them.’ ”

“ No, it’s not much you ’ll leave to them, I ’ll be bound.”

He gave a louder laugh at this, and said, “ You ’re the deepest of the lot, Miss Muniment.”

Her eyes kindled at his praise, and as she rested them on her brother’s she murmured, “ Well, I pity the poor Princess, too, you know.”

“ Well, now, I’m not conceited, but I don’t,” Paul returned, passing in front of the little mirror on the mantel-shelf.

“ Yes, you ’ll succeed, and so shall I — but she won’t,” Rosy went on.

Muniment stopped a moment, with his hand on the latch of the door, and said, gravely, almost sententiously, “ She is not only beautiful, as beautiful as a picture, but she is uncommon sharp, and she has taking ways, beyond anything that ever was known.”

“ I know her ways,” his sister replied. Then, as he left the room, she called after him, “ But I don’t care for anything, so long as you become prime minister of England ! ”

Three quarters of an hour after this Muniment knocked at the door in Madeira Crescent, and was immediately ushered into the parlor, where the Princess, in her bonnet and mantle, sat alone. She made no movement as he came in ; she only looked up at him with a smile.

“ You are braver than I gave you credit for,” she said, in her rich voice.

“ I shall learn to be brave, if I associate a while longer with you. But I shall never cease to be shy,” Muniment added, standing there, and looking tall in the middle of the small room. He cast his eyes about him for a place to sit down, but the Princess gave him no help to choose ; she only watched him, in silence, from her own place, with her hands quietly folded in her lap. At last, when, without remonstrance from her, he had selected the most uncomfortable chair in the room, she replied —

“That’s only another name for desperate courage. I put on my bonnet, on the chance, but I did n’t expect you.”

“ Well, here I am — that’s the great thing,” Muniment said, good-humoredly.

“ Yes, no doubt it’s a very great thing. But it will be a still greater thing when you are there.”

“ I am afraid you hope too much,” the young man observed. “ Where is it ? I don’t think you told me.”

The Princess drew a small folded letter from her pocket, and, without saying anything, held it out to him. He got up to take it from her, opened it, and, as he read it, remained standing in front of her. Then he went straight to the fire and thrust the paper into it. At this movement she rose quickly, as if to save the document, but the expression of his face, as he turned round to her, made her stop. The smile that came into her own was a little forced. “ What are you afraid of ?” she asked. “ I take it the house is known. If we go, I suppose we may admit that we go.”

Muniment’s face showed that he had been annoyed, but he answered, quietly enough, “ No writing — no writing,”

“ You are terribly careful,” said the Princess.

“ Careful of you — yes.”

She sank down upon her sofa again, asking her companion to ring for tea ; they would do much better to have some before going out. When the order had been given, she remarked, “ I see I shall have much less keen emotion than when I acted by myself.”

“ Is that what you go in for — keen emotion ? ”

“ Surely, Mr. Muniment. Don’t you ? ”

“ God forbid ! I hope to have as lit-

tle of it as possible.”

“ Of course one doesn’t want any vague rodomontado; one wants to do something. But it would be hard if one could n’t have a little pleasure by the way.”

“ My pleasure is in quietness,” said Paul Muniment, smiling.

“ So is mine. But it depends on how you understand it. Quietness, I mean, in the midst of a tumult.”

“ You have rare ideas about tumults. They are not good in themselves.”

The Princess considered this a moment ; then she remarked, “ I wonder if you are too prudent. I should n’t like that. If it is made an accusation against you that you have been — where we are going — shall you deny it ? ”

“ With that prospect, it would be simpler not to go at all, would n’t it ? ” Muniment inquired.

“ Which prospect do you mean ? That of being found out, or that of having to lie ? ”

“ I suppose that if you lie you are not found out,” Muniment replied, humorously.

“ You won’t take me seriously,” said the Princess. She spoke without irritation, without resentment, with a kind of resigned sadness. But there was a certain fineness of reproach in the tone in which she added, “ I don’t believe you want to go at all.”

“ Why else should I have come, especially if I don’t take you seriously?”

“ That has never been a reason for a man not going to see a woman,” said the Princess. “ It’s usually a reason in favor of it.”

Muniment turned his smiling eyes over the room, looking from one article of furniture to another : this was a way he had when he was engaged in a discussion, and it suggested not so much that he was reflecting on what his interlocutor said as that his thoughts were pursuing a cheerfully independent course. Presently he observed, “ I don’t know that I quite understand what you mean by that question of taking a woman seriously.”

“ Ah, you are very perfect,” murmured the Princess. “ Don’t you consider that the changes you look for will be also for our benefit ? ”

“ I don’t think they will alter your position.”

“ If I did n’t hope for that, I would n’t do anything,” said the Princess.

“ Oh, I have no doubt you ’ll do a great deal.”

The young man’s companion was silent for some minutes, during which he also was content to say nothing. “ I wonder you can find it in your conscience to work with me,” she observed at last.

“ It is n’t in my conscience I find it,” said Muniment, laughing.

The maid-servant brought in the tea, and while the Princess was making a place for it on a little table beside her she exclaimed, “ Well, I don’t care, for I think I have you in my power !”

“ You have every one in your power,” returned Muniment.

“ Every one is no one,” the Princess replied, rather dryly; and a moment later she said to him, “ That extraordinary little sister of yours — surely you take her seriously ? ”

“ I ’m wonderful fond of her, if that’s what you mean. But I don’t think her position will ever be altered.”

“ Are you alluding to her position in bed? If you consider that she will never recover her health,” the Princess said, “ I am very sorry to hear it.”

“ Oh, her health will do. I mean that she will continue to be, like all the most amiable women, just a kind of ornament to life.”

The Princess had already perceived that he pronounced amiable “ emiable;" but she had accepted this peculiarity of her visitor in the spirit of imaginative transfigurement in which she had accepted several others. “ To your life, of course. She can hardly be said to be an ornament to her own.”

“ Her life and mine are all one.”

“ She is certainly magnificent,” said the Princess. While he was drinking his tea, she remarked to him that for a revolutionist he was certainly most extraordinary ; and he inquired, in answer, whether it were not rather in keeping for revolutionists to be extraordinary. He drank three cups, declaring that his hostess’s decoction was rare; it was better, even, than Lady Aurora’s. This led him to observe, as he put down his third cup, looking round the room again, lovingly, almost covetously, “ You’ve got everything so handy, I don’t see what interest you can have.”

“ How do you mean, what interest? ”

“ In getting in so uncommon deep.”

On the instant the Princess’s expression flashed into pure passion. “ Do you consider that I am in — really far ? ”

“ Up to your neck, ma’am.”

“ And do you think that il y va of my neck — I mean that it’s in danger ? ” she translated, eagerly.

“Oh, I understand your French. Well, I’ll look after you,” Muniment observed.

“ Remember, then, definitely, that I expect not to lie.”

“ Not even for me ? ” Then Muniment added, in the same familiar tone, which was not rough nor wanting in respect, but only homely and direct, suggestive of growing acquaintance, “ If I was your husband, I would come and take you away.”

“ Please don’t speak of my husband,” said the Princess, gravely. “ You have no qualification for doing so ; you know nothing whatever about him.”

“ I know what Hyacinth has told me.”

“ Oh, Hyacinth ! ” the Princess murmured, impatiently. There was another silence of some minutes, not disconnected, apparently, from this reference to the little bookbinder ; but when Muniment spoke, after the interval, it was not to carry on the allusion.

“ Of course you think me very plain, very rude.”

“ Certainly, you have not such a nice address as Hyacinth,” the Princess rejoined, not desiring, on her side, to evade the topic. " But that is given to very few,” she added; “ and I don’t know that pretty manners are exactly what we are working for,”

“ Ay, it won’t be very endearing when we cut down a few allowances,” said Muniment. “ But I want to please you; I want to be as much as possible like Hyacinth,” he went on.

“ That is not the way to please me. I don’t forgive him ; he’s very silly.”

“ Ah, don’t say that; he’s a little brick ! ” Muniment exclaimed.

“ He’s a dear fellow, with extraordinary qualities, but so deplorably conventional.”

“ Yes, talking about taking things seriously — he takes them seriously,” remarked Muniment.

“ Has he ever told you his life ? ” asked the Princess.

“ He has n’t required to tell me. I’ve seen a good bit of it.”

“ Yes, but I mean before you knew him.”

Muniment reflected a moment. " His birth, and his poor mother ? I think it was Rosy told me about that.”

“ And, pray, how did she know ? ”

“ Ah, when you come to the way Rosy knows ! ” said Muniment, laughing. “ She does n’t like people in that predicament. She thinks we ought all to be finely born.”

“ Then they agree, for so does poor Hyacinth.” The Princess hesitated an instant; then she said, as if with a quick effort, " I want to ask you something. Have you had a visit from Mr. Vetch ? ”

“ The old gentleman who fiddles ? No, he has never done me that honor.”

“ It was because I prevented him, then. I told him to leave it to me.”

“ To leave what, now ? ” Muniment looked at her in placid perplexity.

“ He is in great distress about Hya cinth — about the danger he runs. You know what I mean.”

“ Yes, I know what you mean,” Mu niment replied, slowly. " But what does he know about it ? I thought it was supposed to be a deadly secret.”

“ So it is. He does n’t know anything ; he only suspects.”

“ How do you know, then ? ”

The Princess hesitated again. “ Oh, I ’m like Rosy — I find out. Mr. Vetch, as I suppose you are aware, has known Hyacinth all his life ; he takes a most affectionate interest in him. He believes there is something hanging over him, and he wants it to be turned off, to be stopped.” The Princess paused, at this, but her visitor made no response, and she went on : “ He was going to see you, to beg you to do something, to interfere ; he seemed to think that your power, in such a matter, would be very great; but, as I tell you, I requested him, as a particular favor to me, to let you alone.”

“ What favor would it be to you ? ” Muniment asked.

“ It would give me the satisfaction of feeling that you were not worried.”

Muniment appeared struck with the curious inadequacy of this explanation, considering what was at stake ; he broke into a laugh, and remarked, “ That was considerate of you, beyond everything.”

“ It was not meant as consideration for you ; it was a piece of calculation.” The Princess, having made this announcement, gathered up her gloves and turned away, walking to the chimneypiece, where she stood a moment arranging her bonnet-ribbons in the mirror with which it was decorated. Muniment watched her with evident curiosity; in spite both of his inaccessibility to nervous agitation and of the skeptical theories he entertained about her, he was not proof against her general faculty of creating a feeling of suspense, a tension of interest, on the part of those who associated with her. He followed her movements, but, plainly, he did n’t follow her calculations, so that he could only listen more attentively when she inquired suddenly, “ Do you know why I asked you to come and see me ? Do you know why I went to see your sister ? It was all a plan,” said the Princess.

“We hoped it was just an ordinary humane, social impulse,” the young man returned.

“ It was humane, it was even social, but it was not ordinary. I wanted to save Hyacinth.”

“ To save him ? ”

“ I wanted to be able to talk wit you just as I am talking now.”

“That was a fine idea!” Muniment exclaimed, ingenuously.

“ I have an exceeding, a quite inexpressible, regard for him. I have no patience with some of his opinions, and that is why I permitted myself to say just now that he is silly. But, after all, the opinions of our friends are not what we love them for, and therefore I don’t see why they should be what we hate them for. Hyacinth Robinson’s nature is singularly generous and his intelligence very fine, though there are some things that he muddles up. You just now expressed strongly your own regard for him ; therefore we ought to be perfectly agreed. Agreed, I mean, about getting him out of his scrape.”

Muniment had the air of a man who felt that he must consider a little before he assented to these successive propositions ; it being a limitation of his intellect that he could not respond without understanding. After a moment he answered, referring to the Princess’s last remark, in which the others appeared to culminate, and at the same time shaking his head a little and smiling, “ His scrape is n’t important.”

“You thought it was when you got him into it.”

“ I thought it would give him pleasure,” said Muniment.

“ That ’s not a reason for letting people do what is n’t good for them.”

“ I was n’t thinking so much about what would be good for him as about what would be bad for some others. He can do as he likes.”

“ That’s easy to say. They must be persuaded not to call upon him.”

“ Persuade them, then, dear madam.”

“ How can I persuade them ? If I could, I would n’t have approached you. I have no influence, and even if I had my motives would be suspected. You are the one to interpose.”

“Shall I tell them he funks it?” Muniment asked.

“ He does n’t — he does n’t !” exclaimed the Princess.

“ On what ground, then, shall I put it ? ”

“ Tell them he has changed his opinions.”

“ Would n’t that be rather like denouncing him as a traitor, and doing it hypocritically ? ”

“ Tell them, then, it’s simply my wish.”

“ That won’t do you much good,” Muniment said, with his simple laugh.

“ Will it put me in danger? That’s exactly what I want.”

“ Yes ; but as I understand you, you want to suffer for the people, not by them. You are very fond of Robinson — that’s perfectly natural,” the young man went on. “ But you ought to remember that, in the line you have chosen, our affections, our natural ties, our timidities, our shrinkings ”— His voice had become low and grave, and he paused a little, while the Princess’s deep and lovely eyes, attaching themselves to his face, showed that, in an instant, she was affected by this unwonted adjuration. He spoke now as if he were taking her seriously. “ All those things are as nothing, and must never weigh a feather beside our service.”

The Princess began to draw on her gloves. “ You ’re a most extraordinary man.”

“ That’s what Rosy tells me.”

“ Why don’t you do it yourself ? ”

“ Do Hyacinth’s job ? Because it’s better to do my own.”

“ And, pray, what is your own ? ”

“ I don’t know,” said Paul Muniment, with perfect serenity and good-nature. “ I expect to be instructed.”

“ Have you taken an oath, like Hyacinth ? ”

“Ah, madam, the oaths I take I don’t tell,” said the young man, gravely.

“ Oh, you . . . ! ” the Princess murmured, with an ambiguous cadence. She appeared to dismiss the question, but to suggest, at the same time, that he was very abnormal. This imputation was further conveyed by the next words she uttered : “ And can you see a dear friend whirled away like that ? ”

At this, for the first time, Paul Muniment exhibited a certain irritation. “You had better leave my dear friend to me.”

The Princess, with her eyes still fixed upon him, gave a long, soft sigh. “ Well, then, shall we go ? ”

Muniment took up his hat again, but he made no movement toward the door. “ If you did me the honor to seek my acquaintance, to ask me to come and see you, only in order to say what you have just said about Hyacinth, perhaps we need n’t carry out the form of going to the place you proposed. Was n’t this only your pretext ? ”

“ I believe you are afraid ! ” the Princess exclaimed ; but in spite of her exclamation the pair presently went out of the house. They quitted the door together, after having stood on the step for a moment, looking up and down, apparently for a cab. So far as the darkness, which was now complete, permitted the prospect to be scanned, there was no such vehicle within hail. They turned to the left, and after a walk of several minutes, during which they were engaged in small, dull by-streets, emerged upon a more populous way, where there were lighted shops and omnibuses and the evident chance of a hansom. Here they paused again, and very soon an empty hansom passed, and, at a sign, pulled up near them. Meanwhile, it should be mentioned, they had been followed, at a distance, by a cautious figure, a person who, in Madeira Crescent, when they came out of the house, was stationed on the other side of the street, at a considerable distance. When they appeared he retreated a little, still, however, keeping them in sight. When they moved away he moved in the same direction, watching them, but maintaining his distance. He drew nearer, seemingly because he could not control his eagerness, as they turned into Westbourne Grove, and during the minute they stood there he was exposed to recognition by the Princess if she had happened to turn her head. In the event of her having felt such an impulse, she would have discovered, in the lamp-light, that her noble husband was hovering in her rear. But the Princess was otherwise occupied; she failed to see that at one moment he came so close as to suggest that he had an intention of addressing himself to the couple. The reader scarcely needs to be informed that his real intention was to satisfy himself as to the kind of person his wife was walking with. The time allowed him for this inquiry was brief, especially as he had perceived, more rapidly than he sometimes perceived things, that they were looking for a vehicle, and that with its assistance they would pass out of his range — a reflection which caused him to give half his attention to the business of hailing any second cab which should come that way. There are parts of London in which you may never see a cab at all, but there are none in which you may see only a single one; in accordance with which fortunate truth, Prince Casamassima was able to wave his stick to good purpose as soon as the two objects of his pursuit had rattled away. Behind them now, in the gloom, he had no fear of being seen. In little more than an instant he had jumped into another hansom, the driver of which accompanied the usual exclamation of “ All right, sir ! ” with a small, amused grunt, which the Prince thought eminently British, after he had hissed at him, over the hood, expressively, and in a manner by no means indicative of that nationality, the injunction, “ Follow, follow, follow ! ”

XL.

An hour after the Princess had left the house with Paul Muniment, Madame Grandoni came down to supper, a meal of which she partook, in gloomy solitude, in the little back parlor. She had pushed away her plate, and sat motionless, staring at the crumpled cloth, with her hands folded on the edge of the table, when she became aware that a gentleman had been ushered into the drawing-room, and was standing before the fire in an attitude of discreet expectancy. At the same moment the maidservant approached the old lady, and remarked, with bated breath, “ The Prince, the Prince, mum ! It ’s you he ’ave asked for, mum ! ” Upon this, Madame Grandoni called out to the visitor from her place, addressed him as her poor young friend, and bade him come and give her his arm. He obeyed with solemn alacrity, and conducted her into the front room, near the fire. He helped her to arrange herself in her arm-chair, and to gather her shawl about her; then he seated himself near her, and remained with his pathetic eyes bent upon her. After a moment she said, " Tell me something about Rome. The grass in the Villa Borghese must already be thick with flowers.”

“ I would have brought you some, if I had thought,” he answered. Then he turned his eyes about the room. “ Yes, you may well ask, in such a black little hole as this. My wife should not live here,” he added.

“ Ah, my dear friend, for all that she’s your wife ! ” the old woman exclaimed.

The Prince sprang up in sudden, passionate agitation, and then she saw that the rigid quietness with which he had come into the room and greeted her was only an effort of his good manners. He was really trembling with excitement. “ It is true — it is true ! She has lovers — she has lovers ! ” he broke out. “ I have seen it with my eyes, and I have come here to know !”

“ I don’t know what you have seen, but your coming here to know will not have helped you much. Besides, if you have seen, you know for yourself. At any rate, I have ceased to be able to tell you.”

“ You are afraid — you are afraid ! ” cried the visitor, brandishing his arms.

Madame Grandoni looked up at him with slow speculation. “ Sit down and be tranquil, very tranquil. I have ceased to pay attention — I take no heed.”

“ Well, I do, then,” said the Prince, subsiding a little. “ Don’t you know she has gone out to a house, in a horrible quarter, with a man ? ”

“ I think it highly probable, dear Prince.”

“ And who is he ? That’s what I want to discover.”

“ How can I tell you ? I have n’t seen him.”

He looked at her a moment, with his distended eyes. “ Dear lady, is that kind to me, when I have counted on you ? ”

“ Oh, I am not kind any more ; it’s not a question of that. I am angry — as angry, almost, as you.”

“ Then why don’t you watch her, eh ? ”

“ It’s not with her I am angry. It’s with myself,” said Madame Grandoni, meditatively.

“ For becoming so indifferent, do you mean ? ”

“ On the contrary, for staying in the house.”

“ Thank God, you are still here, or I could n’t have come. But what a lodging for the Princess !” the young man exclaimed. “ She might at least live in a manner befitting.”

“ Eh, the last time you were in London you thought it was too costly ! ” she cried.

He hesitated a moment. “ Whatever she does is wrong. Is it because it’s so bad that you must go?” he went on.

“It is foolish — foolish—foolish,” said Madame Grandoni, slowly, impressively.

“ Foolish, ehè, chè ! He was in the house nearly an hour, this one.”

“ In the house ? In what house ? ”

“ Here, where you sit. I saw him go in, and when he came out it was after a long time, with her.”

“ And where were you, meanwhile ? ”

Again Prince Casamassima hesitated. “ I was on the other side of the street. When they came out I followed them. It was more than an hour ago.”

“ Was it for that you came to London ? ”

“ I don’t know what I came for. To torment myself.”

“ You had better go back to Rome,” said Madame Grandoni.

“ Of course I will go back, but if you will tell me who this one is! How can you be ignorant, dear friend, when he comes freely in and out of the house where I have to watch, at the door, for a moment that I can snatch ? He was not the same as the other.”

“ As the other ? ”

“ Doubtless there are fifty ! I mean the little one, whom I met, in the other house, that Sunday afternoon.”

“ I sit in my room almost always now,” said the old woman. “ I only come down to eat.”

“ Dear lady, it would be better if you would sit here,” the Prince remarked.

“ Better for whom ? ”

“ I mean that if you did not withdraw yourself you could at least answer my questions.”

“ Ah, but I have not the slightest desire to answer them,” Madame Grandoni replied. “You must remember that I am not here as your spy.”

“ No,” said the Prince, in a tone of extreme and simple melancholy. “ If you had given me more information, I should not have been obliged to come here myself. I arrived in London only this morning, and this evening I spent two hours walking up and down opposite the house, like a groom waiting for his master to come back from his ride. I wanted a personal impression. It was so that I saw him come in. He is not a gentleman — not even like some of the strange ones here.”

“ I think he is Scotch,” remarked Madame Grandoni.

“ Ah, then, you have seen him ? ”

“ No, but I have heard him. He speaks very loud — the floors of this house are not built as we build in Italy — and his voice is the same that I have heard in the people of that country. Besides, she has told me — some things. He is a chemist’s assistant.”

“ A chemist’s assistant ? Santo Dio ! And the other one, a year ago — more than a year ago — was a bookbinder.”

“ Oh, the bookbinder !” murmured Madame Grandoni.

“ And does she associate with no people of good? Has she no other society ? ”

“ For me to tell you more, Prince, you must wait till I am free,” said the old lady.

“ How do you mean, free ? ”

“ I must choose. I must either go away — and then I can tell you what I have seen — or if I stay here I must hold my tongue.”

“ But if you go away you will have seen nothing,” the Prince objected.

“ Ah, plenty as it is — more than I ever expected to.”

The Prince clasped his hands together in tremulous suppliance; but at the same time he smiled, as if to conciliate, to corrupt. “ Dearest friend, you torment my curiosity. If you will tell me this, I will never ask you anything more. Where did they go ? For the love of God, what is that house ?”

“ I know nothing of their houses,” she returned, with an impatient shrug.

“ Then there are others — there are many ?” She made no answer, but sat brooding, with her chin in her protrusive kerchief. Her visitor presently continued, in a soft, earnest tone, with his beautiful Italian distinctness, as if his lips cut and curved the sound, while his fine fingers quivered into quick, emphasizing gestures : " The street is

small and black, but it is like all the streets. It has not importance; it is at the end of an endless imbroglio. They drove for twenty minutes; then they stopped their cab and got out. They went together on foot some minutes more. There were many turns; they seemed to know them well. For me it was very difficult — of course I also got out; I had to stay so far behind — close against the houses. Chiffinch Street, N. E. — that was the name,” the Prince continued, pronouncing the word with difficulty ; “ and the house is No. 32 — I looked at that after they went in. It ’s a very bad house — worse than this ; but it has no sign of a chemist, and there are no shops in the street. They rang the bell — only once, though they waited a long time ; it seemed to me, at least, that they did not touch it again. It was several minutes before the door was opened; and that was a bad time for me, because as they stood there they looked up and down. Fortunately you know the air of this place ! I saw no light in the house — not even after they went in. Who let them enter, I could n’t tell. I waited nearly half an hour, to see how long they would stay and what they would do on coming out; then, at last, my impatience brought me here, for to know she was absent made me hope I might see you. While I was there, two persons went in — two men, together, smoking, who looked like artisti (I did n’t see them near) — but no one came out. I could see they took their cigars — and you can fancy what tobacco ! — into the presence of the Princess. Formerly,” pursued Madame Grandoni’s visitor, with a touching attempt at a humorous treatment of this point, “ she never tolerated smoking — never mine, at least. The street is very quiet — very few people pass. Now what is the house ? Is it where that man lives ? ” he asked, almost in a whisper.

He had been encouraged by her consenting, in spite of her first protests, to listen to him — he could see she was listening ; and he was still more encouraged when, after a moment, she answered his question by a question of her own : “ Did you cross the river to go there ? I know that he lives over the water.”

“ Ah, no, it was not in that part. I tried to ask the cabman who brought me back to explain to me what it is called ; but I could n’t make him understand. They have heavy minds,” the Prince remarked. Then he went on, drawing a little closer to his hostess: “ But what were they doing there ? Why did she go with him ? ”

“ They are plotting. Ecco ! ” said Madame Grandoni.

“ You mean a secret society, a band of revolutionists and assassins ? Capisco bene, — that is not new to me. But perhaps they only pretend it’s for that,” added the Prince.

“ Only pretend ? Why should they pretend ? That is not Christina’s way.”

“ There are other possibilities,” the Prince observed.

“ Oh, of course, when your wife goes away with strange men, in the dark, to far-away houses, you can think anything you like, and I have nothing to say to your thoughts. I have my own, but they are my own affairs, and I shall not undertake to defend Christina, for she is indefensible. When she does the things she does, she provokes, she invites the worst construction ; there let it rest, save for this one remark, which I will content myself with making : If she were a dishonest woman, she would not behave as she does now, she would not expose herself to irresistible interpretations ; the appearance of everything would be good and proper. I simply tell you what I believe. If I believed that what she is doing concerned you alone, I should say nothing about it — at least, sitting here. But it concerns others, it concerns every one, so I will open my mouth at last. She has gone to that house to break up society.”

“ To break it up, yes, as she has wanted before ? ”

“ Oh, more than before. She is very much entangled. She has relations with people who are watched by the police. She has not told me, but I have perceived it by simply living with her.”

Prince Casamassima stared. “ And is she watched by the police ? ”

“ I can’t tell you; it is very possible — except that the police here is not like that of other countries.”

“ It is more stupid,” said the Prince. He gazed at Madame Grandoni with a flush of shame on his face. “ Will she bring us to that scandal ? It would be the worst of all.”

“ There is one chance — the chance that she will get tired of it,” the old lady remarked. “ Only the scandal may come before that.”

“ Dear friend, she is the devil,” said the Prince, solemnly.

“ No, she is not the devil, because she wishes to do good.”

“ What good did she ever wish to do to me ? ” the Italian demanded, with glowing eyes.

Madame Grandoni shook her head very sadly. “ You can do no good, of any kind, to each other. Each on your own side, you must be quiet.”

“ How can I be quiet when I hear of such infamies?” Prince Casamassima got up, in his violence, and, in a tone which caused his companion to burst into a short, incongruous laugh as soon as she heard the words, exclaimed, “ She shall not break up society ! ”

“ No, she will bore herself before the trick is played. Make up your mind to that.”

“ That is what I expected to find — that the caprice was over. She has passed through so many follies.”

“ Give her time — give her time,” replied Madame Grandoni.

“ Time to drag my name into an assize court ? Those people are robbers, incendiaries, murderers ! ”

“ You can say nothing to me about them that I have n’t said to her.”

“ And how does she defend herself ?”

“ Defend herself ? Did you ever hear Christina do that ? ” Madame Grandoni asked. " The only thing she says to me is, ‘ Don’t be afraid; I promise you by all that’s sacred that you sha’n’t suffer.’ She speaks as if she had it all in her hands. That is very well. No doubt I’m a selfish old woman, but, after all, one has a heart for others.”

“ And so have I, I think I may pretend,” said the Prince. “ You tell me to give her time, and it is certain that she will take it, whether I give it or not. But I can at least stop giving her money. By Heaven, it’s my duty, as an honest man.”

“ She tells me that as it is you don’t give her much.”

“ Much, dear lady ? It depends on what you call so. It’s enough to make all these scoundrels flock around her.”

“ They are not all scoundrels, any more than she is. That is the strange part of it,” said the old woman, with a weary sigh.

“ But this fellow, the chemist — tonight — what do you call him ? ”

“ She has spoken to me of him as a most estimable young man.”

“ But she thinks it ’s estimable to blow us all up,” the Prince returned. “ Does n’t he take her money ? ”

“ I don’t know what he takes. But there are some things — Heaven forbid one should forget them ! The misery of London is something fearful.”

“ Che vuole ? There is misery everywhere,” returned the Prince. “ It is the will of God. Ci vuol’ pazienza! And in this country does no one give alms ? ”

“ Every one, I believe. But it appears that it is not enough.”

The Prince said nothing for a moment ; this statement of Madame Grandoni’s seemed to present difficulties. The solution, however, soon suggested itself; it was expressed in the inquiry, “ What will you have in a country which has not the true faith ? ”

“ Ah, the true faith is a great thing; but there is suffering even in countries that have it.”

“ Evidentemente. But it helps suffering to be borne, and, later, it makes it up ; whereas here ! . . .” said the young man, with a melancholy smile. “ If I may speak of myself, it is to me, in my circumstances, a support.”

“ That is good,” said Madame Grandoni.

He stood before her, resting his eyes for a moment on the floor. “ And the famous Sholto — Godfrey Gerald — does he come no more ? ”

“ I have n’t seen him for months, and know nothing about him.”

“ He does n’t like the chemists and the bookbinders, eh ? ” asked the Prince.

“ Ah, it was he who first brought them — to gratify your wife.”

“ If they have turned him out, then, that is very well. Now, if only some one could turn them out !”

“Aspetta, aspetta !” said the old woman.

“ That is very good advice, but to follow it is n’t amusing.” Then the Prince added, “You alluded, just now, as to something particular, to quel giovane, the young artisan whom I met in the other house. Is he also estimable, or has he paid the penalty of his crimes?”

“ He has paid the penalty, but I don’t know of what. I have nothing bad to tell you of him, except that I think his star is on the wane.”

“ Poverino !” the Prince exclaimed.

“ That is exactly the manner in which I addressed him the first time I saw him. I did n’t know how it would happen, but I felt that it would happen somehow. It has happened through his changing his opinions. He has now the same idea as you—that ci vuol’ pazienza.”

The Prince listened with the same expression of wounded eagerness, the same parted lips and excited eyes, to every added fact that dropped from Madame Grandoni’s lips. “ That, at least, is more honest. Then he does n’t go to Chiffinch Street ?”

“ I don’t know about Chiffinch Street; but it would be my impression that he does n’t go anywhere that Christina and the other one—the Scotchman — go together. But these are delicate matters,” the old woman added.

They seemed much to interest her interlocutor. “ Do you mean that the Scotchman is — what shall I call it ? — his successor ?”

For a moment Madame Grandoni made no reply. “ I think that this case is different. But I don’t understand; it was the other, the little one, that helped her to know the Scotchman.”

“And now they have quarreled — about my wife ? It is all tremendously edifying !” the Prince exclaimed.

“ I can’t tell you, and should n’t have attempted it, only that Assunta talks to me.”

“ I wish she would talk to me,” said the Prince, wistfully.

“ Ah, my friend, if Christina were to find you getting at her servants !”

“ How could it be worse for me than it is now ? However, I don’t know why I speak as if I cared, for I don’t care any more. I have given her up. It is finished.”

“ I am glad to hear it,” said Madame Grandoni, gravely.

“ You yourself made the distinction, perfectly. So long as she endeavored only to injure me, and in my private capacity, I could condone, I could wait, I could hope. But since she has so recklessly thrown herself into the most criminal undertakings, since she lifts her hand with a determined purpose, as you tell me, against the most sacred institutions — it is too much; ah, yes, it is too much. She may go her way ; she is no wife of mine. Not another penny of mine shall go into her pocket, and into that of the wretches who prey upon her. who have corrupted her.”

“ Dear Prince, I think you are right. And yet I am sorry ! ” sighed the old woman, extending her hand for assistance to rise from her chair. " If she becomes really poor, it will be much more difficult for me to leave her. This is not poverty, and not even a good imitation of it, as she would like it to be. But what will be said of me if, having remained with her through so much of her splendor, I turn away from her the moment she begins to want ?”

“ Dear lady, do you ask that to make me relent ?” the Prince inquired, after an hesitation.

“ Not in the least ; for whatever is said and whatever you do, there is nothing for me in decency, at present, but to pack my trunk. Judge, by the way I have tattled.”

“ If you will stay on, she shall have everything.” The Prince spoke in a very low tone, with a manner that betrayed the shame he felt at his attempt at bribery.

Madame Grandoni gave him an astonished glance, and moved away from him. “ What does that mean ? I thought you did n’t care.”

I know not what explanation of his inconsequence her companion would have given her if, at that moment, the door of the room had not been pushed open, to permit the entrance of Hyacinth Robinson. He stopped short on perceiving that Madame Grandoni had a visitor, but before he had time to say anything the old lady addressed him with a certain curtness : " Ah, you don’t fall well; the Princess is n’t at home.”

“ That was mentioned to me, but I ventured to come in to see you, as I have done before.” Hyacinth replied. Then he added, as if he were retreating, “ I beg many pardons. I was not told that you were not alone.”

“ My visitor is going, but I am going too,” said Madame Grandoni. " I must take myself to my room. I am nervous and very sad. Therefore, kindly excuse me.”

Hyacinth had had time to recognize the Prince, and this nobleman paid him the same compliment, as was proved by his asking of Madame Grandoni, in a rapid aside, in Italian, " Is n’t it the bookbinder ? ”

“ Siccuro,” said the old lady; while Hyacinth, murmuring a regret that he should find her indisposed, turned back to the door.

“One moment — one moment, I pray !” the Prince interposed, raising his hand persuasively, and looking at him with an unexpected, exaggerated smile. “ Please introduce me to the gentleman,” he added, in English, to Madame Grandoni.

She manifested no surprise at the request— she had none left, apparently, for anything — but pronounced the name of Prince Casamassima, and then added, for Hyacinth’s benefit, “ He knows who you are.”

“ Will you permit me to keep you a very little minute ? ” the Prince continued, addressing the other visitor ; after which he remarked to Madame Grandoni, “ I will speak with him a little. It is perhaps not necessary that we should incommode you, if you do not wish to stay.”

She had for a moment, as she tossed off a satirical little laugh, a return of her ancient drollery : “ Remember that if you talk long she may come back. Yes, yes, I will go up-stairs. Felicissima notte, signori !” She took her way to the door, which Hyacinth, considerably bewildered, held open for her.

The reasons for which Prince Casamassima wished to converse with him were mysterious ; nevertheless, he was about to close the door behind Madame Grandoni, as a sign that he was at the service of her companion. At this moment the latter raised again a courteous, remonstrant hand. “After all, as my visit is finished, and as yours comes to nothing, might we not go out ? ”

“ Certainly, I will go with you,” said Hyacinth. He spoke with an instinctive stiffness, in spite of the Prince’s queer affability, and in spite also of the fact that he felt sorry for the nobleman, to whose countenance Madame Grandoni’s last injunction, uttered in English, had brought a deep and painful blush. It is needless to go into the question of what Hyacinth, face to face with an aggrieved husband, may have had on his conscience, but he assumed, naturally enough, that the situation might be grave, though indeed the Prince’s manner was, for the moment, incongruously conciliatory. Hyacinth invited his new acquaintance to pass, and in a minute they were in the street together.

“ Do you go here — do you go there ? ” the Prince inquired, as they stood a moment before the house. " if you will permit, I will take the same direction.” On Hyacinth’s answering that it was indifferent to him the Prince said, turning to the left, “ Well, then, here, but slowly, if that pleases you, and only a little way,” His English was far from perfect, but his errors were mainly errors of pronunciation, and Hyacinth was struck with his effort to express himself very distinctly, so that, in intercourse with a little representative of the British populace, his foreignness should not put him at a disadvantage. Quick as he was to perceive and appreciate, Hyacinth noted how a certain quality of breeding that was in his companion enabled him to compass that coolness, and he mentally applauded his success in a difficult feat. Difficult he judged it, because it seemed to him that the purpose for which the Prince wished to speak to him was one which must require a deal of explanation, and it was a sign of training to explain adequately, in a foreign tongue, especially if one were agitated, to a person in a social position very different from one’s own. Hyacinth knew what the Prince’s estimate of his importance must be (he could have no illusions as to the character of the people his wife received) ; but while he heard him carefully put one word after the other, he was able to smile to himself at his needless precautions. Hyacinth reflected that at a pinch he could have encountered him in his own tongue; during his stay at Venice he had picked up an Italian vocabulary. " With Madame Grandoni I spoke of you,” the Prince announced, dispassionately, as they walked along. “ She told me a thing that interested me,” he added ; “ that is why I walk with you.” Hyacinth said nothing, deeming that better by silence than in any other fashion he held himself at the disposal of his interlocutor. “ She told me you have changed — you have no more the same opinions.”

“ The same opinions ? ”

“ About the arrangement of society. You desire no more the assassination of the rich.”

“I never desired any such thing!” said Hyacinth, indignantly.

“ Oh, if you have changed, you can confess,” the Prince rejoined, in an encouraging tone. “ It is very good for some people to be rich. It would not be right for all to be poor.”

“ It would be pleasant if all could be rich,” Hyacinth suggested.

“Yes, but not by stealing and shooting.”

“ No, not by stealing and shooting. I never desired that.”

“Ah, no doubt she was mistaken. But to-day you think we must have patience,” the Prince went on, as if he hoped very much that Hyacinth would allow this valuable conviction to be attributed to him. “ That is also my thought.”

“Oh, yes, we must have patience,” said Hyacinth, who was now smiling to himself in the dark.

They had by this time reached the end of the little Crescent, where the Prince paused under the street-lamp. He considered Hyacinth’s countenance for a moment by its help, and then he pronounced, “ If I am not mistaken, you know very well the Princess.”

Hyacinth hesitated a moment. “She has been very kind to me.”

“She is my wife—perhaps you know.”

Again Hyacinth hesitated, but after a moment he replied, “ She has told me that she is married.” As soon as he had spoken these words he thought them idiotic.

“ You mean you would not know if she had not told you, I suppose. Evidently, there is nothing to show it. You can think if that is agreeable to me.”

“ Oh, I can’t think, I can’t judge,” said Hyacinth.

“ You are right — that is impossible.” The Prince stood before his companion, and in the pale gas-light the latter saw more of his face. It had an unnatural expression, a look of wasted anxiety ; the eyes seemed to glitter, and Hyacinth conceived the unfortunate nobleman to be feverish and ill. He continued in a moment: “ Of course you think it

strange — my conversation. I want you to tell me something.”

“ I am afraid you are very unwell,” said Hyacinth.

“ Yes, I am unwell; but I shall be better if you will tell me. It is because you have come back to good ideas — that is why I ask you.”

A sense that the situation of the Princess’s husband was really pitiful, that at any rate he suffered and was helpless, that he was a gentleman and even a person who would never have done any great harm—a perception of these appealing truths came into Hyacinth’s heart, and stirred there a desire to be kind to him, to render him any service that, in reason, he might ask. It appeared to Hyacinth that he must be pretty sick to ask any service at all, but that was his own affair. “If you would like me to see you safely home, I will do that,” our young man remarked ; and even while he spoke he was struck with the oddity of his being already on such friendly terms with a person whom he had hitherto supposed to be the worst enemy of the rarest of women. He found himself unable to consider the Prince with resentment.

The nobleman acknowledged the civility of his offer with a slight inclination of his long, attenuated person. “ I am very much obliged to you, but I will not go home. I will not go home till I know this — to what house she has gone. Will you tell me that?”

“ To what house ? ” Hyacinth repeated.

“ She has gone with a person whom you know. Madame Grandoni told me that. He is a Scotch chemist.”

“A Scotch chemist?” Hyacinth stared.

“ I saw them myself — two hours, three hours, ago. Listen, listen; I will be very clear,” said the Prince, laying his forefinger on the other hand with an explanatory gesture. “ He came to that house — this one, where we have been, I mean— and stayed there a long time. I was here in the street — I have passed my day in the street ! They came out together, and I watched them, I followed them.”

Hyacinth had listened with wonder, and even with suspense ; the Prince’s manner gave an air of such importance, such mystery, to what he had to relate. But at this he broke out: “ This is not my business — I can’t hear it! I don’t watch, I don’t follow.”

The Prince stared a moment, in surprise ; then he rejoined, more quickly than he had spoken yet, “ But they went to a house where they conspire, where they prepare horrible acts. How can you like that ? ”

“ How do you know it, sir ? ” Hyacinth inquired, gravely.

“ It is Madame Grandoni who has told me.”

“ Why, then, do you ask me ? ”

“ Because I am not sure, I don’t think she knows. I want to know more, to be sure of what is done in that house. Does she go there only for the revolution,” the Prince demanded, “or does she go there to be alone with him?”

“With him ?” The Prince’s tone and his excited eyes infused a kind of vividness into the suggestion.

“ With the tall man — the chemist. They got into a hansom together ; the house is far away, in the lost quarters.”

Hyacinth drew himself together. “ I know nothing about the matter, and I don’t care. If that is all you wish to ask me, we had better separate.”

The Prince’s face elongated ; it seemed to grow paler. “ Then it is not true that you hate those abominations ! ”

Hyacinth hesitated a moment. “ How can you know about my opinions ? How can they interest you ? ”

The Prince looked at him with dismal eyes; he raised his arms a moment, a certain distance, and then let them drop at his sides. “ I hoped you would help me.”

“ When we are in trouble we can’t help each other much ! ” our young man exclaimed. But this valuable remark was lost upon the Prince, who at the moment Hyacinth spoke had already turned to look in the direction from which they had proceeded, the other end of the Crescent, his attention apparently being called thither by the sound of a rapid hansom. The place was still and empty, and the wheels of this vehicle reverberated. The Prince peered at it, through the darkness, and in an instant he cried, under his breath, excitedly, “ They have come back — they have come back ! Now you can see — yes, the two ! ” The hansom had slackened pace and pulled up; the house before which it stopped was clearly the house the two men had lately quitted. Hyacinth felt his arm seized by the Prince, who, hastily, by a strong effort, drew him forward several yards. At this moment a part of the agitation that possessed the unhappy nobleman seemed to pass into his own blood ; a wave of anxiety rushed through him — anxiety as to the relations of the two persons who had descended from the cab ; he had, in short, for several instants, a very exact revelation of the state of feeling of a jealous husband. If he had been told, half an hour before, that he was capable of surreptitious peepings, in the interest of such jealousy, he would have resented the insult; yet he allowed himself to be checked by his companion just at the nearest point at which they might safely consider the proceedings of the couple who alighted. It was in fact the Princess, accompanied by Paul Muniment. Hyacinth noticed that the latter paid the cabman, who immediately drove away, from his own pocket. He stood with the Princess for some minutes at the door of the house — minutes during which Hyacinth felt his heart beat insanely, ignobly, he could n’t tell why.

“ What does he say ? what does she say?” hissed the Prince; and when he demanded, the next moment, “ Will he go in again, or will he go away?” our sensitive youth felt that a voice was given to his own most eager thought.

The pair were talking together, with rapid sequences, and as the door had not yet been opened it was clear that, to prolong the conversation on the steps, the Princess delayed to ring. “ It will make three, four, hours he has been with her,” moaned the Prince.

“ He may be with her fifty hours ! ” Hyacinth answered, with a laugh, turning away, ashamed of himself.

“ He has gone in — sangue di Dio ! ” cried the Prince, catching his companion again by the arm and making him look. All that Hyacinth saw was the door just closing ; the Princess and Muniment were on the other side of it. " Is that for the revolution ? ” the trembling nobleman panted. But Hyacinth made no answer; he only gazed at the closed door an instant, and then, disengaging himself, walked straight away, leaving the Prince in the darkness, to direct a great, helpless, futile shake of his stick at the indifferent house.

Henry James.