A Florentine Episode: In Two Parts. Part Second

TOWARDS the end of June, the weather, hitherto comparatively cool, with frequent showers,became suddenly warm. The white roads, stretching out so alluringly, beckoning Keith and Phillis to follow, grew whiter still as they settled deep into dust; the landscape lost color; in fact, the midsummer heats had begun. The favorite excursion was now to Fiesole by tramway early in the morning, and after lunch and dinner at the Trattoria Aurora they would return in the late dusk to Florence. As they ascended and descended the mountain side, Phillis often asked her companion which one of the walled villas they were passinghe would choose for his honeymoon residence. The joke, no matter how stale, could hardly lose its pungency for Keith, when not only the possibility, but the inevitableness, of such a fate grew more real hour by hour. A woman may be irresponsible about the future, but not a man, and he felt that these summer days were fixing his destiny. Did he wish to alter it? Could he ever let Phillis drift away from him into that world of poverty and makeshift at which she hinted? Never. She loved Italy ; she had eaten of its fatal fruit, could be happy nowhere else ; and it flattered all his manly instincts that he could keep her in that promised land.

On one of these warm afternoons Phillis was sitting in the lowest circle of the ruins of the Roman theatre at Fiesole, her sketchbook in her lap. Keith had picked her a handful of poppies, and she had fastened them in the belt of her white linen blouse. Her hat lay tossed on the stones beside her, and as she sat looking up at the engirdling hills, with which Nature herself has amplified the amphitheatre until its highest circles kiss the sky, her features took on an expression which reminded him of a sibyl. He often felt that he saw thoughts in her face which she never uttered to him. Of what was she thinking ? Their eyes met, and his heart beat.

“ I am going to make a sketch of you,” she called. “It suddenly dawns upon me that, if we were to go our two ways, I have nothing tangible by which to remember you.”

“ Go our two ways ? ” said Keith, startled. “What makes you suggest such a thing ? ”

“ There are few ideas which, first or last, do not come into my head. I sometimes have glimpses into heaven ; then again, I say to myself it is not Dante alone who has walked in the Inferno.”

“ Scale any heights you please, but don’t go into the depths,” said Keith, balancing himself on a fragment of a shaft. “ Don’t talk of our being separated. I can’t bear it.”

“Nonsense. There — don’t move! I want to catch that expression. Keith Tresillian, do you know that sometimes you are perfectly beautiful ? ”

Her glance and words sent lightnings through his veins, but he knew by the very frankness of her compliment that it meant nothing.

“ There is an altar-piece by Titian in the Frari at Venice,” said Phillis, as if in a dream, “ and out of a dull group looks a boy’s face, — oh, such a lovely face !”

“ Do you mean that I am like him? ”

“ No; at this moment you are like Raphael’s St. John in the Tribuna. I was thinking about beauty — beauty. What is beauty in a face ? What does it mean? What does it interpret? I know a man whose soul is so lovely he ought to be more beautiful than the Antinous, yet he is homely, common-looking, without a fine feature. I was thinking whether I wished he might look like the Antinous. But I do not. Antinous always seems half sulky.”

“ It is not often,” said Keith, “ that I have an idea, but I have an idea about the Antinous. When I look at him, I say to myself that I understand him.”

“ Is it a secret between you two ? ”

“ I don’t mind telling you. The presentiment of his early death is imposed from on high. He feels the stirring in him of great powers, but Fate lays her finger on bis hope and withers it, like blasted fruit on a green bough. All his victory is to be victorious over death. People quarrel, too, with Achilles for sulking in his tent when he ought to be fighting ; but I always pitied Achilles when he said to his mother that, since Jove had made his life so brief, he ought to have crowned it with happiness and honor.”

“ Did he say that? ” said Phillis, her pencil busy. “ Whom the gods love die young.”

Keith flung up his arms. “ Love me not too well, O ye gods!” he cried. “ I would not die young.”

“ Do not move, for the world. I want that pose ! ” she cried eagerly.

But he soon dropped out of it, ashamed of his freak, and began leaping restlessly from stone to stone, spouting a medley from Homer, Sophocles, and Byron. Phillis had by this time finished her outline, and was now filling it up with her usual frenzy, and he determined to satisfy a vagrant curiosity by exploring the excavations. All at once he heard a sharp exclamation. Bounding back into the arena, he perceived that a stranger, a man of thirty or more, had joined Phillis, and was addressing her with the air of an old acquaintance, his smiling assurance in singular contrast with her suddenly serious, almost indignant mien.

While Keith stood in doubt whether to advance or recede, the intruder gave a light mocking laugh, with an ironic gesture in his direction, made a motion as of despairing entreaty to Phillis, then ran up the steps, and, pausing on the highest, offered a deep salute, and vanished behind the railing.

By this time Keith had come up.

“ So you met a friend?” he remarked, startled afresh by her flushed cheeks and dilated eyes.

“ Don’t call him a friend,” she returned, in a husky voice. “ The beast! I detest him! I should like to run a stiletto into him.”

“ He was impertinent to you! ” said Keith, lips, eyes, voice, and clenched fist all instinct with sudden fury.

“ He is always impertinent,” she replied. “ He is one of those men who cannot have an idea about a woman that is not impertinent. But no matter.”

“ It matters very much. Who is the coward ? ”

“ His name is Rau.”

“ What countryman is he? ”

“ A French Creole from Porto Rico. He is the Paris agent of a New York house.”

“ When did you ever know him ? ”

“ In Paris, two years ago.”

“ What did he say to you now? ”

She grew uneasy as she looked at Keith: his eyes were expanded, his nostrils quivered, his mouth was set, and the effect was to give a strength and elevation which aggrandized his whole bearing.

“ I could n’t repeat it, and nothing would induce me to repeat it,”she said, drawing a long breath ; “and after all, it does not matter.”

“ It does matter. Who strikes at you strikes at me. You are under my protection.”

“ How foolish ! ” she exclaimed petulantly. “I am not in the least under your protection. You have no right to assume such a thing. We are casual acquaintances who have found it convenient to go about together for a few days. Please dismiss it all from your mind, for actually what he said was nothing. Only I have hated the horrible creature for two years, and his presence is offensive to me. I loathe the expression of his eyes and his slimy smile.”

Keith had already discovered that Phillis could at need assume the dignity and decision of a mature woman. Now, while he stood looking at her, wounded by her response to his passionate outburst, she changed the subject, and tried to dispel the impression she had given of her humiliation and pain. She showed him the sketch she had made of him, — a sketch, we admit, calculated to humble a young man’s pride into the dust ; then, observing that his wrath was not appeased, she asked him to climb the hill with her, declaring she had always been curious to see what was on the other side. She had been languid all day, but now a tricksy spirit had apparently entered into her. Yet, pretty and coquettish as she was, Keith could not so easily get over the effect of his wrath, and that chill of apprehension like a lump of ice in a glass of fiery wine.

But when they had gained the top of the ridge, she declared that there was nothing to see save hills and more hills, ilexes and olives, all alike dull and dreary. The laughing side of Fiesole lay towards Florence. Her spirits had flagged ; she confessed she was tired, and wanted to go down and sit on the “ Strangers’ Seat,” near the monastery. Luckily, the bench on the high terrace was empty, and she sank down as if exhausted. The straw-workers came up to offer their baskets and fans with smiling importunity, and Keith dispersed them with a franc apiece; and a handful of sous and an imperative “ Andate via ! ” scattered the children who offered bunches of carnations. The Franciscan monks toiling up the ascent cast bright-eyed glances at the two young people. Keith believed that Phillis wished to enjoy the tranquillity which rested over heights and valley. His own first vivid emotion had died away. He leaned over the parapet and gazed across the wide plain where the far-away bends of the Arno were beginning to take the light. The olive-trees beneath him felt the breeze, and broke into a silver ripple. It was a pleasure to tell over the domes and towers of the city, like beads in a rosary. The reddening rays of the sun, as it neared the horizon, divided into broad level bars of rosy light, which made an interchange of shine and shadow, flushing the Campanile and the Duomo, while Santa Croce and the Palazzo Vecchio stood out clear, but rayless.

“Oh, look!” he said, turning back to his companion ; but instead of meeting her quick smiling attention he saw quite a different Pillis from the one he had known hitherto. She was huddled into a corner of the bench, her face covered with her hands.

“ You are crying ! ” he exclaimed in bewilderment.

“ Of course I am crying,” she returned tartly. “ Who has more to cry about than I have, I should like to know ? ”

There seemed to him a note of accusation in her voice.

“ Have I done or said anything wrong?” he gasped.

“ You are so unfeeling, — everybody is so unfeeling,” she sobbed.

“ What have I said? What have I done ?” he asked, in an agony of remorse. “ If I held my tongue, it was because I did not wish to remind you of that scoundrel.”

“You were thinking about me. Doubts of my being a proper person rose in your mind.”

“ Never for an instant.”

“Then you have less knowledge of the world than I gave you credit for,” she said indignantly, “for I told you that creature was impertinent, and all appearances were against me. The matter is simply this: I once took M. Rau for a gentleman, and found out my dire mistake. That was all. And it would be strange indeed if a girl, not wholly unattractive, should live all alone in Europe for five years, utterly unbefriended, so poor that she cannot extricate herself from awkward contretemps by drawing out a full purse, boarding in pensions where horrid women spy and cackle all day long, or lodging by herself in lonely rooms so high up the concierge will take no trouble about them, and never have anything happen. Why, queens on their thrones have been insulted. Nothing can protect a woman against a man’s brutality except the safeguard in himself.”

“ I can protect you,” said Keith, that horrible dread once more overtaking him.

“I did not say I wanted you to protect me. I meant only that I hate to be suspected. I have always protected myself. I always shall protect myself. I should scorn to conceal anything if I had actually done wrong. I should kill myself outright if I could not take the world honestly.”

“You do!” cried Keith, at his wits’ end to say something to soothe her.

“ This sort of experience makes me feel as if I were a Pears’ soap or an Epps’s cocoa advertisement,” she continued. “ It is as if I were placarded all over Europe. I loathe myself ! I want to enter a nunnery, — hide myself behind grate and veil for the rest of my life.”

“Oh,good heavens,” Keith murmured, “ don’t, please don’t! ”

“ I told you I had a fit of homesickness now and then,” she faltered, as she looked at him, her thick lashes heavy with tears, her whole face sad, quivering, pallid, yet still dimpled childishly, and more passingly sweet in its distress even than in its laughter. He longed to kiss her, to comfort her, to claim her, to hold her. “ At such moments,” she went on with a sob, “ I feel so thankful that there is somebody in the world who, in spite of all my follies and mistakes, adores me; not out of idle love of amusement, not out of an occasional impulse, but out of a complete faith and knowledge; who held me in his arms when I was a baby ; who in spite of all my five years of absence has never for an instant forgotten me.”

Keith tingled as if he had been struck a blow. Evidently he was not that man.

“If I said you were like him, you would probably be indignant,” she proceeded. “ Still, what attracted me towards you at first sight was the expression of your eyes, which reminded me of his. He is a plain man, not dressed by Bond Street tailors. I don’t suppose he ever wore a pair of gloves in his life. He never knows what to do with his hands or his legs, yet all the same, in essentials, I have felt there was a likeness between you. You have always been kind to me, — never flippant, never coarse. You have understood that I have a mind, a heart, a soul. Too often I have been treated like a show, baited, as it were, to make myself an amusing spectacle, led on simply to see what my high spirits would bring me to. It is pleasant to be set aglow, but when the intoxication is past I hate the idea of it. Don’t be afraid but that I have my poor moments, like a jelly-fish left by the tide.”

Keith was studying her face.

“ I can’t help being curious about this paragon whom I resemble. Where does he live ?” he inquired.

“ In Saugatuck, Ohio.”

“ Is he a brother ? ”

“ No.”

“ A cousin ? ”

“ Well, a sort of cousin ; at least I call him 1 cousin David.’ Don’t ask me to define him. I like simply to feel that he exists, like the bounty of God ; that at need I can call him ; that he will never fail me while he lives.”

Keith experienced a dismay shot through with a genuine pang. Her piercing sweet voice, her tender lips, her lovely eyes, thrilled him, but did he dare to wrestle with this phantom of a “sort of cousin,” overcome it, and claim her for his own ? He had for days been in the mood to ask Phillis to marry him. He admired her, enjoyed her companionship, and felt tenderly towards her. Of course, being in love with anybody, after his experience with Rose Bellew, was out of the question. As well might a lovely crystal jar broken at the well be restored to flawless perfection. When certain things go to pieces, they go to pieces for good and all, and a youngman’s heart is one of those things. Still, happy or unhappy, there is a necessity for living on ; honor exists and duty exists, and if Phillis would accept a share in his destiny, and they could establish themselves in a white villa guarded by two cypresses and set about with fig and olive orchards, he thought existence might be endurable. He was already interested in Italian agriculture ; and how enchanting to study the processes of irrigation, and make little channels to bring water to his terraces and vineyards, while his charming Phillis looked on, the cicadas chirped, and the fountain splashed ! The girl had risen, and they were leaning together over the wall, looking down at the valley, where the sunset lights had changed the Arno into a sinuous track of rose and flame. How easily he might at this moment have broached the subject, except for that spectre of a cousin she had so unfeelingly invoked! Was there actually such an individual, or was he a happy invention ? He thought of asking if she had a photograph of him about her.

The monastery bells had been ringing with a sweet wild clangor, but now ceased.

“ I don’t wonder,” she remarked casually, breaking in upon his dubitations, “ that women who commit imprudences like to be Catholics. There are so many saints to meet you halfway, if you have a little votive offering ready.”

“ Let me be your patron saint,” Keith returned, with new ardor in his voice. “ I will meet you more than halfway.”

“ I don’t wish,” she said earnestly, “ to do anything wrong. I only like to do what I like, and when people see harm in my actions it simply shows that they have horrid imaginations. The reason I sometimes long to turn Catholic is that Protestantism is so right up and down, — it insists that you shall be either one thing or the other ; no rounding off, no tenderness for human infirmity ! It is so matter of fact, so masculine ! ”

“ Now I insist,” said Keith, with enthusiasm, “ that poetry, all-embracing tenderness, large magnanimity, are purely masculine traits. If you want full sympathy, confess your sins to a man, not to a woman.”

She burst into a fit of laughter.

“ That is so exactly like cousin David ! ” she said.

Naturally Keith was nettled.

“ Meanwhile, I have no objection to dinner or supper,” he observed. “ Shall we go over to the Aurora? ”

She grew nervous on the instant. It was evident that she had apprehensions of a possible second encounter with the objectionable acquaintance. She suggested that it was high time to take the tramway back to town, where they might sup at Bonciani’s.

Every table in the upper dining-room was full, when they entered the place. But some gentlemen were just settling their bill, Angelo, Keith’s favorite waiter, hastened to suggest, and if the signora would but sit down in the anteroom for a moment! The signora was glad enough to withdraw into the shadow ; indeed, as she saw two men issuing from the room, she even hid her face with a scarf she pretended to be readjusting. Keith did not perceive that the stranger who had vexed Phillis was passing, but the stranger recognized Keith. A few minutes later, when Angelo had summoned the signor and signora to the freshened table, and with his obliging air brought a new fiasco of Chianti and the carta del giorno, M. Rau peeped in at the door. Keith was giving his order, when all at once his heart came to his mouth. The Frenchman had approached Phillis, and was beading over her.

“ Mademoiselle failed to give me her address,” he said.

“ I am on the point of leaving Florence,” she replied.

“ Hardly to-night or to-morrow,” he persisted, smiling.

I receive no visitors,” returned Phillis, with the same trepidation and air of revolt she had shown in the afternoon.

“ That is incredible, incredible. I must find you. I cannot so easily believe that you will deny an old friend like me.”

Under his exaggerated deference there was all the time a suggestion of mocking irony.

Keith had risen. “ Permit me, monsieur,” he said, “ to have a word with you outside.” He led the way to the top of the stairway. “ Do you understand,” he asked calmly, “that I am the companion of the lady whom you addressed ? ”

“ I felicitate monsieur upon his good fortune as much as I envy him,” the man replied.

“ Permit me, in the name of the lady, to say that she declines your further acquaintance.”

“ Monsieur could not be so cruel if he understood the claims I have upon mademoiselle. I am an old and most particular friend.”

“ You have no claims ; you are insolent, and I forbid you even to approach her.”

Rau smiled and shrugged his shoulders.

“Is monsieur, then, her husband — her ” —

“ Evidently you are not acquainted with the ideas or manners of decent people,” Keith returned, with disdain. He measured the position of the other as he stood on the top of the shallow stairway. “ Via ! ” he said contemptuously, at the same time raising his foot and giving just sufficient impetus to his kick to send the intruder sprawling down half a dozen steps, where he fell on the midway landing. His companion had been waiting for him in the vestibule below, and now, looking up, saw the scuffle and darted towards Rau, who was regaining his feet with a crimson face, and shaking his clenched fist at Keith.

“I will” — he burst out when his friend caught his arm. “You” — he cried in impotent wrath.

Keith was tugging at the pocket of his waistcoat. He pulled out a card, and with a look of scorn flung it at the two men ; then turned and went back to the table, where Phillis was waiting for him with no little disquietude. His cheeks were flushed, his heart was beating violently, he could hardly restrain angry tears, but for the first time in his life he was able to act a part. He parried the girl’s questions, persuaded her that nothing was amiss, ate his supper with apparent relish, then sent for a cab and put her into it, promising to meet her at the Uffizi at eleven o’clock the next day.

Left alone on the curbstone, he drew a long breath that did not wholly evidence a sensation of relief. As he stood irresolute somebody clapped him on the shoulder. He turned with a start.

“ Why, Mayo ! ” he exclaimed. “ I was just going to look you up.”

“ To ask me to sup with you ? ” said Mr. Mortimer Mayo gayly. “ All right. I ‘m your man. It just occurred to me, as I strolled up the street, that if I had happened to have my purse with me I would have had one of Bonciani’s cutlets before I went to bed.”

“ Come in,” said Keith. He led the way into the lower restaurant, and sat down in the corner on a cushioned seat against the wall, and drew Mayo to his side. “ I want to talk to you,” he said, with subdued vehemence. “ You are a sort of cousin, and you are, besides, the only man I know in Florence.”

“ My young friend, you are, I fear, in some scrape,” rejoined Mayo, his pointed beard bristling and all his features assuming a look of concern.

“ I shall very likely receive a challenge to fight a duel, and in that case may I refer to you as my second ? ”

“ Oh, my dear Keith, what have you been doing ? ”

“ I have done nothing that I regret. I merely kicked a rascal downstairs.”

“I suppose it’s about that girl. I warned you that with that sort of woman there was invariably plenty of drama.”

“ She is as noble and sweet a girl as I ever knew in my life,” said Keith hotly. “ Unluckily, she has been poor and lived about as she could while she devoted herself to art.”

“ O Art, Art! what atrocities are committed in thy name ! ”

“ But that lady’s name must not be drawn into the question,” said Keith, with decision.

“ Who is the man ? ”

“ His name is Rau. He lives in Paris.”

“ What did he do ? ”

“ He was impertinent.”

“ To that — lady ? ”

“ To me.”

“ What did you do ? ”

“ I told you I kicked him downstairs.”

“ That was imprudent, I fear,— most imprudent. Nobody likes to be kicked downstairs.”

“What I wish to know,” Keith proceeded, with growing restlessness, “ is whether you will act as my second in case he takes the matter up.”

“ But I don’t know how to be a second. I rather pique myself,” Mr. Mayo proceeded plaintively, “on my knowledge of the world, but I have never had anything to do with duels. In fact, they are obsolete. They are talked about only in novels and on the stage.”

“ Plenty of duels are fought all the time in Europe.”

“ I don’t even feel certain that I know how to load a pistol,” said Mayo, more and more staggered as the details of the possible affair presented themselves to his imagination. “ I suppose you expect to fight with pistols ? ”

“I don’t object to swords. I’ve taken lessons in fencing,” said Keith moodily.

“Oh, you lamb, you tender lamb! I feel like sprinkling you with mint sauce. You don’t realize what you may be in for. Pistols, swords ! Did you ever use firearms at all ? ”

“ I have had little or no pistol practice, but I have hunted with a rifle in the Adirondack’s, and once, in the Rockies, I killed a bear.”

“ I ’m afraid rifles would be considered wholly out of the question,” observed Mayo mournfully. “ Oh, what folly it is! For an American, a sensible, matter-of-fact American, with a clear sense of the value of human life, of the beauty of law and order — I mean — that is, of course — a really civilized American living in a North Atlantic city ! Have you gone so far as to reflect that people may be killed in duels ? ”

“ Of course that possibility does exist.”

“ It is the object of duels. What else are they for ? And even in a duel of the tamest description at least one of the principals is sure to be wounded. The idea of being wounded ! Horrible ! Do you take into account all the abominable, the disgusting contingencies, — surgeons, stretchers? Have you begun to realize what the thing involves ? ”

“ I have not,” returned Keith impatiently, “and, what is more, I do not intend to work myself up over accidents which have not happened. What I want to be sure of is that, in case I am challenged, I may send the fellow to you.”

“Oh, lord, yes! Send him, of course. I ’ll stand by you through thick and thin,” said Mayo, with a groan.

“Very well. I ’m most grateful. Goodnight.”

“Oh, by the way ! ” cried Mayo, conscious that he had given the waiter a comprehensive order, “ have you any spare silver about you ? I thought, as I was ordering for two, and as you generally insist on settling ” —

“ Oh, of course,” said Keith, his hand in his pocket.

“ I shall need to keep up my strength,” murmured Mayo gently, as he shook hands with Keith in a mournfully affectionate way. Left alone, however, he went at his supper with some zest, pulling down the fiasco of Chianti many a time ; yet all the while his thoughts were anxious.

“A duel? What will Mrs. Tresillian say? She will blame me. Blame me? Perhaps Keith will be killed, and I shall be arrested. We may be running a tremendous risk. I have never looked into the Italian laws about dueling. The idea of my permitting myself to be mixed up in this ridiculous mess ! It is incredible that, in spite of my experience of the world, I should be in such a position. So foolish, so reckless ! A young fellow, with all the money he wants to spend, setting himself up as a target for a frenchman to shoot at,— for all I know a crack shot and a hardened duelist, — and all for the sake of a little diable of an artist! I won’t let myself be exposed to such mischances. I ‘ll warn the police. I ‘ll have Keith watched. I might telegraph to Mrs. Tresillian. She could come in time to stop it. Of course that is the right, the only thing to do. She would never forgive me if I did otherwise.”

And before he slept Mr. Mayo did telegraph to Mrs. Tresillian. That is, reflecting that Mrs. Tresillian was an anxious mother, and probably a nervous, delicate, excitable woman, that he had never met her, while he did chance to be well acquainted with Miss Rose Bellew, who was traveling in the same party, he addressed his dispatch to that young lady.

“ Break news carefully to Mrs. Tresillian. Keith is on the point of fighting a duel with a Frenchman. In absence of lawful guardians, shall I speak to police? Young lady in the case; quandary; no jurisdiction ; dread of interference ; need of instructions from interested parties. MORTIMER MAYO.”

Keith turned into his bed as soon as he reached the Hotel Europa, feeling that, although it would be of no use to try to sleep, it must bring relief to shut away the light from his throbbing head. But he slept nevertheless: he did not hear the clatter of the market wagons at dawn, the bells of the donkeys, nor the summons to matins, and when he awoke it was seven o’clock. As usual, his first thought was of Rose Bellew; that he was not to see her that day, and that the day she was to brighten for him was never to shine again. Then suddenly he started into a sitting posture, and, staring at the canopy, rubbed his forehead with his hand. Recollection had smitten him, and the events of yesterday had to be met and marshaled. He tingled afresh at the affront to Phillis. It helped him to accept the consequence of his own acts. Yesterday he had been excited, carried away. He now confessed to himself that there had been some swagger in the pose he had assumed, yet, with simple sincerity of outlook, he could not accuse himself of having gone beyond the necessities of the case. The cad had behaved in a way which could be answered only by a kick, and he had kicked him.

Still, at this moment he was under no glamour, and certain perceptions burned in upon his mind. Miss Phillimore’s confession had not been full, but it was evident that she had, at one period, confided in the Frenchman to some degree, until she had been compelled to give him a rebuff, for which he evidently bore her a grudge. Keith could but admit that even the girl’s best friend must have ample faith in her indiscretion. So long as a woman has to do with a man willing to interpret her every speech and action chivalrously she is safe ; but a roué, or even a coxcomb, can easily put an unprotected woman hopelessly in the wrong for her play of innocent coquetry; for it is she who heaps the fagots, and it is he who brings the fire. So long as the world lasts, Keith said with conviction, if a woman aims at enjoying a man’s freedom, she must be at least half a man, not show herself a pretty woman from her finger-tips to the way she sets down her feet in their pointed shoes.

For his idea of Phillis had suddenly assumed all the simplicity, the narrowness, the jealousy, of a lover’s. Of course she must be his wife; nothing else was any longer possible for either of them. That paragon of a Hoosier might or might not have a palpable existence ; but he was four thousand miles away, and could hardly fit into the requirements of the present emergency.

What if a duel came off ? What if he should be killed? Would Rose Bellew remember that she had sent him away desperate ? He would write her a letter, to be delivered in case of his not surviving the encounter. In strong, simple language he would tell her she had said he was too young, that he had never been face to face with the realities of life, but that here he was face to face with death, the only actual reality for mortals.

What a fool he was,— always rehearsing some rôle, but playing no part but that of a dreamer! He must bathe, dress, prepare for visitors. By this time tomorrow, perhaps — He wondered where Florentines fought duels. Were the choice left to him, he would choose the Roman theatre at Fiesole. He remembered the insolent look in Rau’s face as he addressed Phillis, and the fury of yesterday returned. He felt that, standing ten paces from the scoundrel, he should not waste his shot in the air. Yet it was hideous to have this confused sense of trouble, shame, and wrath coupled with his belief in Phillis’s absolute purity and truth. The conviction lay upon his heart like a dead weight that she had once seemed to encourage Rau as she had encouraged himself; then, having discovered that she was playing with fire, had tried to put it out, and had not been over-successful.

Again Keith said to himself that he lacked energy, concentration, — that he must rise and dress; and now he did get up, go through the processes of his morning toilet, ordering his coffee before he had finished in order to gain time. He told the waiter that he should be in all the morning; then thought of calling him back and explaining that he had an engagement at eleven, but desisted, saying to himself that he was weak, fussy, nervous.

It was by this time nine o’clock. He ate his rolls and drank his coffee hurriedly ; then regretted his haste, as he found himself without occupation. He sat down at the table with the intention of writing to his mother. It was out of the question, however, that he should write letters until he knew what was likely to happen. A knock sounded at the door. It was only the man to take away the breakfast things, but Keith’s heart hammered in his ears. However, when, ten minutes later, another knock came, he was glad to find himself perfectly calm. A card was brought him.

M. VICTOR STEINHOF.

Keith directed that the visitor should be shown up. It was, as he expected, the individual who had run to Ruu’s assistance the night before ; a well-dressed, good-looking man of forty, who began talking at once in fairly good English. He said he had been requested by M. Rau to call upon M. Tresillian and suggest that the preceding day had been one of trying heat; at such times the blood goes to the head and the nerves become irritable ; in this climate of Italy a man almost has a sunstroke without being in the sun ; besides, the Chianti is a fiery wine ; one sometimes behaves in a manner not quite satisfactory. In short, M. Tresillian might like a chance to apologize.

“I apologize?” said Keith, whose blood at this moment was certainly all in his head. 11I am conscious of the courtesy of the suggestion, but I have nothing to apologize for.”

“Softly, softly,” said the bland Steinhof. “You are a very young man, traveling perhaps without guardians?”

“ I am twenty-five years of age lacking two months,” replied Keith.

“ Ah, so old ? I should not have thought it. Still, twenty-five is young, and there is sometimes a lack of experience ; and I may venture to say that when a man is older he has learned to smile and to shrug his shoulders instead of taking the trouble to get into a rage. M. Rau has every respect for the lady. Although a Frenchman, he has lived in America, and holds the theory — erroneous, no doubt — that American young ladies are very good-natured. He is an old friend of Mademoiselle Phillimore’s, and he wished to express his pleasure at meeting her unexpectedly. If her pleasure was not equal to his, it is his misfortune, not his fault.”

“ I know nothing of M. Rau’s past acquaintance with any one. What I object to is his very unpleasant manner in the present.”

“ Each man has his own manners,” said Steinhof.

“ M. Rau needs to mend his,” Keith returned dryly.

“ You are very good to dictate to us what we shall do,” said Steinhof, suddenly bristling, “but I came here to insist on an apology from yourself.”

“ You will have no apology from me,” said Keith calmly. “ I cannot feel that I was in the wrong. M. Rau may like an opportunity to apologize.”

“You understand the alternative ? ”

Keith shrugged his shoulders.

14 Will you name a friend with whom we may discuss the business ? ” asked Steinhof, with more and more alertness and decision.

44 Certainly,” answered Keith. He gave Mr. Mortimer Mayo’s name and address at the Albergo Vittoria, and Steinhof withdrew with an air of excruciating politeness.

Left alone, Keith stretched himself with a half laugh. His spirits had risen. He left a message for Mr. Mortimer Mayo, and went out to keep his engagement with Miss Phillimore. He had heard the bells ringing all the morning; now, as he walked along the streets, their pealing faltered into sobs, then with a final note they were silent. Everything wore a festival air : niches and shrines were heaped with flowers; crowds had gathered before the Duomo, and he suddenly recalled the fact that this was the day of Florence’s patron saint, St. John. As it was a holiday, of course all the galleries would be closed; his engagement was void. He was glad; it was better that he and Phillis should not meet today.

The bishop was alighting from his carriage as Keith reached the cathedral, and almost against his own volition he found himself swept along with the procession info the church, where he was presently seated in the nave, with a clear view of the magnificently decorated altar. The choir was full of canons in vestments of white and gold ; acolytes came and went, bearing missals, chalices, and candlesticks. As the rich vibration of the organ voluntary died away, a grand mass of Rossini’s began, played by an orchestra, and sung by a great chorus. Keith found himself in a condition of mind and senses to feel the full charm of the splendid ceremonial. He watched the celebrant at the altar ; he studied the faces of the priests, stamped in general with distinction and self-confidence. He gazed up into Brunelleschi’s dome, and his heart swelled at the thought of the patient, heroic effort of men; that is, of the men who have moulded the world. Ah, what a world ! What possibilities it offered for achievement! What privileges for those who did not act, yet could feel with admiration and with sympathy the greatness of other men ! How short was even the longest life, how pathetic, how conclusively final, the general decree of death ! Yet here he had been almost exulting that he was about to fight a duel. But he was too much under the influence of the music and the service to give himself to a distinctly personal idea. He was diverted by the incessant and serious occupation which the bishop’s mitre imposed upon the attendant priest, who was constantly receiving it, then readjusting it on the anointed brows; the waving of the censers before the high dignitary, whose rich robes were parted to receive the clouds of incense, started more problems in Keith’s mind than he could solve ; the mystery of the " pax ” touched him ; the priest who carried the blessing had a sweet illuminated face, and the young fellow felt that his own devouring restlessness, his growing insurrection against the fate hurrying towards him, might be appeased by that laying on of hands.

The music was so piercingly sweet it brought the tears to his eyes. Verses from one of Tourgenieff’s prose poems forced themselves upon his mind.

“ What shall I think of when if comes to me to die, if indeed I am then in a condition to think ?

“ Shall I think of this, — that I have made a poor use of my life, that I have slept it away, dreamed it away, that I knew not how to enjoy its gifts ?

“How? This already death? So soon ? Impossible. When I have not succeeded in doing anything, — I have only gathered things to do.”

The thoughts conscience imposed began to be unbearable. Keith looked on all sides, to see if, somewhere in the great crowd, there was not some movement, some possible outlet. As his eyes turned this way and that, they suddenly rested on Miss Phillimore’s head and shoulders rising above the choir screen at the left. She was evidently standing on her chair, in order to look into the chancel. As usual, she took the eye irresistibly. She challenged observation; he could not remove his gaze from her. It was clear that she had a companion, towards whom she constantly leaned with smiles and whispers. Keith asked himself, with incredulous anger, whether it could be the man Rau. He must satisfy himself about the matter. The trouble of head and brain began again. He hated this suspense, this inaction, this waste of life and feeling. He longed to have the whole affair ended, no matter how.

He had not counted on the density of the crowd. It was impossible to gain a glimpse of Miss Phillimore on his way out. As soon as he was free of the throngs of people in the square it was time to go back to his hotel, where he had left word for Mr. Mayo he would be between twelve and two o’clock. He found this note awaiting him : —

“ Everything settled ; hope it’s satisfactory. To-morrow at nine, outside the Prato gate. Pistols, twenty paces. Very busy. Try to see you before two o’clock.

M. M.”

Keith read the missive over and over. Certainly it was packed full of meaning for him. His brain could not have been entirely clear, for it was impossible to carry all the points in his mind, and he had constantly to refer to the document, when he would repeat, “ Pistols— twenty paces — to-morrow morning, outside the Prato gate, at nine! ”

It was explicit, yet somehow he felt the necessity of having more details, although of course it was the business of the seconds to spare the principals all the burden of minor arrangements. In spite of the exciting nature of the situation, time hung heavy on his hands. He could settle to nothing until he had had a satisfactory talk with Mr. Mortimer Mayo. Two o’clock finally came, and that gentleman had not appeared. Keith ordered luncheon. He hoped that matters would seem less hazy and unsubstantial when he had reinforced his strength with food and a bottle of Orvieto. Yet, strange to relate, his sense of the painful realities of his position was not deepened by a hearty meal. He felt lighter of heart. As he luxuriously smoked a cigar, it amused him to call up time-honored stories of duels, particularly of encounters between Frenchmen and Englishmen. There was one, in which an Englishman had fired up the chimney and brought down the Frenchman, over which he chuckled irresistibly, although the particulars had escaped him, save for this desirable climax.

Four o’clock, half past four! Five o’clock, half past five ! Still his second did not appear. Keith sent a messenger to the Albergo Vittoria for Mr. Mayo, but word came that the gentleman had been out since eleven o’clock. Keith shrugged his shoulders. After all, he himself had nothing to do save to play out his own part the next morning outside the Prato gate, - a part which it was impossible to rehearse. He decided to dismiss all feeling of responsibility, and to go to San Miniato, leaving word that if Mr. Mayo called he was to follow him thither and dine. He joined the crowd outside, which laughed and buzzed in a happy fashion. Every one turned into the dimly lighted Baptistery, where a few priests were singing an office sitting in their stalls, and another, at the altar, was going through genuflections, attended by an acolyte. The edifice was full of children, who played hide-and-seek round the columns, or were lifted by their mothers to kiss the images of the Madonna and of the patron saint, which were almost hidden in flowers. Keith made his way through the joyous groups, passed out at an opposite door from that by which he had entered, and threaded his way through the constantly increasing crowds as far as the Signoria, where he took the tramway for San Miniato. Here at last he found the tranquillity he had been seeking. He walked up and down the terrace, and half in reverie, and half in haze of mind, watched the lovely colors of the fading day. From the city below rose a soft clangor of bells, sobbing out a final appeal only to recommence with new entreaty. The many-bridged river, the villa-crowned slopes, the white walls of Fiesole, were all a dream within a dream. The engagement for the morrow, his foolish wrath, even Miss Phillimore herself, — all had alike become far off, dim, unimportant. It was irksome to think about the absurd imbroglio. His sweep of vision was so wide, his sense of space so unconfined, — for the sapphire and amethystine hills appeared not to inclose him with horizons, but to lead the eye up to grander vistas, — that he liked simply to look, to Feel, to enjoy. Bells went on sounding from the spires, campaniles, pinnacles, and turrets, but they helped to intensify the silence which seemed like a visible presence to fold its wings and brood. Seven o’clock ! Where was Mr. Mortimer Mayo ? Streams of people began to pass along the walks and terraces, spoiling the solitude. Keith searched the place for his guest, sat down in the restaurant, ordered a dinner which he left almost untouched, then again took his stand at the high angle overlooking the city to wait for the illumination. The sun was setting, and the Arno caught the light in rosy patches, breaking the monotony of the dusky levels. The tiers upon tiers of olivetrees along the slopes grew gray, silvery, weird ; the hills deepened through every lovely gradation of blue and chocolate into violet, and the sky faded from rose to daffodil.

Keith’s eyes, ranging round the great amphitheatre, fastened by chance on the bronze David. Something plucked at his heart with sudden reminder, and he felt a hot throb of excitement. All day long he had been trying to catch up with himself, as it were, to take hold of himself with his two hands. But this boy’s look and attitude, as he measured himself against his destiny, taught him what he, Keith Tresillian, ought to be feeling. Not that he himself could conquer Goliath, or even a pigmy ; but if he had an ounce of David’s heroism in his veins, he ought to be able to summon a force which would make him a match for the powers he had to contend with. This was no happy shepherd lad, like Donatello’s David with his foot on the neck of the giant. This battle was unfought, the victory unwon. Michael Angelo always perpetuated, not the triumph, but the struggle.

The crowd behind pressed tumultuously forward. A galaxy of stars shot out of the deepening shadows, gemming the lovely outlines of the Duomo and of Giotto’s Tower.

“ Now did you ever see anything in Ohio equal to that ? ” said a voice out of the babel, whose every intonation Keith knew by heart.

“ Wa’al, no, not exactly.”

Keith had turned. Miss Phillimore was just behind him ; not looking at him, however, nor even at the illumination, but at a tall man beside her, on whose stalwart arm rested a little bare hand, a hand whose curves Keith had studied by the hour, as it wrought with brush or crayon. He could not withdraw his gaze from the couple, although the fireworks had begun, and the city was enveloped in a rosy blaze, while the Arno mirrored a deadly crimson.

Miss Phillimore soon felt his compelling glance.

“ Oh, Mr. Tresillian ! ” she burst out. “How very odd! I wanted so much to see you ! I owe you a thousand apologies for not being at the Uffizi this morning, but my cousin—let me introduce you to Mr. David Norton — reached Florence just after sunrise.”

Had Keith shown his real feelings, his blank amazement would have been a comic display. He felt like a dog on the chase whose track has run up a tree. He murmured something, nevertheless, about his pleasure in making Mr. Norton’s acquaintance.

“Happy to meet you, sir,” that gentleman returned, grasping the young fellow’s hand with warmth. “ Matty was telling me what a good friend you had been to her this past fortnight, and any friend of hers is a friend of mine.”

“ It is quite the other way; she has made Florence delightful to me, ” replied Keith, coerced to respond, though his words seemed to come from a hitherto unknown corner of his brain, where the parts of speech exercised themselves independently of his own thought and will. “ I have been waiting for my mother and her party to join me, and unless I could have carried Miss Phillimore’s sketchbook around for her I must have perished of sheer dullness.”

“She is going to lay aside that sketchbook now,” observed Mr. Norton, in the large, serene way which characterized his look, manner, and speech. “ She has got tired of painting at last, and is going back to real life. We are to be married at the American consul’s day after tomorrow, and shall hope to see you, Mr. Tresillian. Next day we propose to set out for the lakes and Switzerland, and July 14th we sail from Bremen for home.”

While he was speaking a fresh discharge of fireworks sent long streamers of violet-colored flame almost up to the zenith. For a moment, Florence, with its spires, domes, towers, and turrets, set in its encircling hills, shone in a light that never was on sea or land. At the spectacle, the crowd, pressing forward to gain a point of vantage, broke and was scattered like the crest of a wave. Miss Phillimore had withdrawn her hand from the arm of her fiancé, and while he was swept in one direction, she and Keith, to whom she happened to cling, were borne in the other.

“ Are you surprised ? ” she asked, looking up into his face with a sad, shy, but candid glance.

“‘Surprised’ is a word I have used before,” said Keith. “ I need a new vocabulary. Tell me one thing: were you expecting him ? ”

“ He had written that he was coming for me,” she replied soberly. “ Of course I could n’t be absolutely sure about the date of his arrival.”

Keith looked at her as if he would read her heart.

“ One more question : have you been engaged to him all this time I have known you ? ”

“ All this fortnight ? David says that I promised to marry him when I was seventeen, and now I am twenty-six. No doubt it was all fixed and settled at the beginning. Everything comes to an end finally, and so has my European experience. Every dog has his day, and I have had mine.”

He was certain that there were tears in her eyes.

“ But,” he murmured, “ if it is a sacrifice ” —

“ A sacrifice ? ” she repeated “ A sacrifice ? Hitherto I have painted wretched pictures ; think of me hereafter in Ohio, making butter, looking after hens and chickens, dividing my year by the spring and autumn cleaning.”

He whispered her name ; he put his hand upon hers, but she threw off his clasp.

“ No, no, no,” she said, with a little sound, half a laugh and half a sob. “Did you hear him call me Matty? Phillis was just a pretense, like the rest of it. She has gone to be a ghost, never to take body again. My real name is Martha Jane, and plain Martha Jane I shall be to the end of my life. I shall settle down, and like it. no doubt. I have loved him always, he is so good! Although he is not clever or learned, although he has had no experience, although he has certain ideas I am ready to laugh at, and little habits that, by a foolish fastidious taste, I might wish to be different, yet in my real honest heart I render him and all his ideas and traits and ways homage. And the life I shall go back to in Ohio, crude as it is, is the only real life I have or can have, for all my early impressions centre there ; with eyes and ears and heart and mind I absorbed them from my infancy; they grew with my growth and strengthened with my strength. We are born only once; we have only one childhood, and that maps out our mental estate for us.”

“ I want you to be happy,” began Keith. “ I ” —

“ I shall be very happy,” she interrupted resolutely, “ and I am going to make David wildly happy. Here he is.”

“ I can find you a better place for seeing,” said the individual to whom this beatitude was promised, “ if you and Mr. Tresillian will come this way, Matty.”

They nodded at Keith, expecting him to follow; but after one faint effort he seemed to give it up as hopeless, and, dizzily making his way out of the crowd, sat down on the steps of the statue. He felt as if a limb had been lopped off. He was conscious of a silent, weak rage against himself that he had suffered this thing to happen. He loved Phillis,— that is, he was fond of her, and could have grown to love her, and was ready to swear that she could have loved him ; yet he had permitted this possible felicity to drift away, as he permitted everything to drift away from him. By one moment of clear intuition that he had missed a complete and possible felicity he paid his debt to Phillis — that is, to Martha Jane Phillimore — for making him almost happy. She was so witty, so wise, so foolish, so clever, so everything that he required to give zest to his existence. Almost happy! The twinkling rushlight she had offered had sometimes made him content without the full-orbed moon he had once worshiped. Now all was sheer blackness; in his firmament shone no star. And, as if his desolation were not enough, he had a duel on his hands for the next day ! Seen in these new lights, the complication was as monstrously false as it was monstrously absurd, full of a grim irony. Had he put his whole head and heart into his half love affair, he might have been willing to endure the results which grew out of the situation, no matter how incalculable. However, if those creeping hours ever passed, if the farce of the next morning’s encounter were ever gone through, and he found himself once more awake, alive, he would try to snatch at the realities of life he had hitherto passed by.

He went back to his hotel, feeling sure that there he should at last find Mr. Mortimer Mayo ; but that gentleman went on defeating expectation.

Accordingly, as it was almost midnight, Keith went to bed, giving orders that he should be called at five o’clock, and fell asleep as soon as his head touched the pillow.

He was roused by a terrible pounding at the door.

“ I am awake,” he returned calmly.

“ Let me in, won’t you ?" said Mortimer Mayo. “ It is almost nine o’clock.”

With a blank horror clutching at his conscience, Keith tottered to his feet, unbolted the door, and stood, tall, lean, disconsolate, in his night gear, staring as if stupefied at his visitor, who entered, sat down, and gave way to irrepressible laughter.

“ Is it too late ? ” Keith gasped.

“Too late to reach the Prato gate? Yes, by an hour.”

For a minute there was danger in Keith. He looked ready to fly at Mayo, seize and shake him. Then he relented, but with a crimson face and quivering nostrils began to pace the room.

“ What shall I do? ” he cried finally, like a creature driven to the wall.

“ Do? Nothing to do now,” said Mayo cheerfully.

Keith beat his forehead with his hands. His vanity felt the blow.

“ It is your fault! ” he burst out. “ Why did you keep away from me yesterday ? And to-day you let me sleep on.”

“ The people downstairs tell me they tried to rouse you at five o’clock, but could get no answer.”

Keith palpitated in every pulse with anger and shame. He longed to break bonds, but knew not on whom to visit his wrath except himself. Such a fiasco! It whipped him like a lash across his tenderest feelings that, the story would run about and people would hear of it.

“ Come, come, Keith,” said Mayo. “ Be sensible. Get yourself dressed, and be thankful you are well out of a bad mess. I told you people did not fight duels nowadays.”

“ But it was all arranged ! ” shrieked Keith.

“ Oh, well, in a way. Steinhof is a right-minded fellow, and he felt that Rau had behaved ill. He said he was always warning the brute that his little civilities would be answered by the pistol or bowie-knife of some irate American. I assured him that if the thing went on they would find themselves in no end of trouble with the authorities.”

“ Do you mean you gave notice to the police ? ” Keith gasped.

“ I should not have ventured on such a step. So long as it was a mere affair of picnics and sight-seeing I was willing to act in loco parentis, but when it came to the question of a duel I thought Mrs. Tresillian’s advice ought to be asked.”

“ And she has come ? ” said Keith, with a twitching nostril and clenched hands.

“ Her representative is here.”

“Who, the courier Simone?”

“ As I say, her representative reached Florence yesterday afternoon. We had an interview with Rau and Steinhof, and extracted an apology, which will be given you if you will take the trouble to put on some clothes.”

“ If you will leave me,” said Keith, with what loftiness he could assume, “ I will dress.”

“ Then I may inform Mrs. Tresillian’s representative that you will soon appear ? ”

“ You may send the fellow to me.”

“ Oh, I don’t allude to the courier.”

“Then I suppose it is Colonel Talbot,” said Keith, with intense disgust.

Mr. Mayo went out and shut the door, and we will follow his example. Left face to face with what seemed to Keith the most ridiculous passage of his luckless life, he was in no happy frame of mind. When he issued from his room, his face was pale and a fire burned at the bottom of his eye. He negatived Mayo’s proposal of breakfast with no little energy in his accent and disdain in his glance, for he detected a twinkle in the eye of that gentleman.

“ Please lead the way,” he said.

” Up these stairs,” said Mayo, and, tapping at a door, he ushered Keith into a small parlor with a balcony looking out upon the Piazza. “ Mr. Keith Tresillian,”he announced, “let me introduce you to Mrs. Tresillian’s representative.” Then, with the tact and discretion which invariably characterized Mr. Mortimer Mayo, he withdrew.

Keith stood gazing. There she was, the girl he had loved before he was old enough to put on knickerbockers, whom he had loved every year since, and should love till he died, — a slim princess of a woman, with eyes of the serenest brilliancy, and the loveliest smile in the world.

“ Keith,” she said, holding out her hand.

“ I expected to find Colonel Talbot,” he blurted out.

“ No, it is I.”

“ Do you mean it is you who have made me a laughing-stock ? ”

“ I certainly did not want you to fight a duel.”

“ You told me I was too young, only a boy. It is consistent, perhaps, that you should treat me like a child, but — but ” —

“ I did not stop to think of consistency, Keith,” she said, now holding out both hands as if in entreaty. Her color came and went; her lips quivered.

“ Did my mother send you ? ” he faltered.

“ No ; Mr. Mayo telegraphed to me. I did not tell your mother.”

“ Did you come alone ? ”

“ I had my maid besides Simone.”

He tried to make a brave stand against this insidious enemy.

“ I suppose I ought to thank you,” he said stiffly, in a very low voice. “ But a woman cannot perhaps realize what it is for a man to feel that he has been helped out of a position from which there is but one honorable door.”

“ I assure you, both Mr. Rau and Mr. Steinhof were glad of any excuse. It needed but a word.”

“ What was that word ? ” he demanded.

“ Mr. Rau said that he could not have presumed to meddle with Miss Phillimore if he had supposed you were her suitor. I told him you were incapable of anything except serious and respectful attentions to a girl.” She looked up into his face. “ Keith, you see I could speak for you, for once you even put me on a pedestal and worshiped me. You cannot think how deep my sympathy is for this new happiness you have found. I insist that you shall take me to see Miss Phillimore.”

“ I hardly think ” — he began stiffly.

She laid her hand on his sleeve.

“ Why are you so cold to me ? ” she asked coaxingly. “ Surely not because that foolish duel is off ? Those two men started for Venice this morning at six o’clock. It is actually they who ran away. Surely you cannot consider dueling anything butwicked and absurd, and why should you be angry with me simply because I want you to live and be happy ? ”

“Much you care about my happiness ! ” he burst out. “ I loved you. I had gone on loving and loving you. You knew that you were my conscience, my aspiration, all that I hoped for or cared about. Then when I put it into words, you said I seemed to you a mere boy.”

“ Certainly you consoled yourself promptly,” said Miss Bellew, with spirit. “ And since you have so easily consoled yourself, Keith, I will tell you this ; it can make no difference now except that it may help you to forgive my interference. You had not been gone a day, scarcely an hour, before I was wretched. I had nobody to turn to. I suddenly found out ” —

She met his startled, incredulous eyes, and broke off.

“ You found out” — he repeated. His face was transfigured. He had grasped both her hands, and she found further confession difficult. She blushed more and more deeply, her eyes dropping their lids. She tried to turn away.

“ Can you mean,” he whispered, detaining her, “that, you found out you loved me ? ”

“ Of course I loved you, ” she said, with a sob. “ You understood me so well, you ought to have known it all the time — for you saw that — indeed, instead of being my slave, you actually were my master — I ” —

A subtle fire ran through his veins. He longed to play with the possibilities of this moment, to test the reality of this strange, sweet confession, now at last that he had her at his mercy. But the revulsion of feeling made him beside himself with joy, and he clasped her in his arms.

“ But Miss Phillimore!” cried Miss Bellew.

“ I will take you to see her to-morrow morning,” he returned, with a low laugh. “ She is to be married. She is to marry an excellent man, a man I honor and rejoice in, — Mr. David Norton, of Ohio.”

Ellen Olney Kirk.