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This text has been proofread but is not guaranteed to be free from errors. Corrections to the original text have been left in place.
Title: The Count and the Congressman, an electronic edition
Author: Harrison, Burton, Mrs. 1843-1920
Publisher: Cupples and Leon Company
Place published: New York
Date: 1908
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Front cover of  Harrison's The
Count and the Congressman."How intensely beautiful the night is! How restful, how
uplifting!" --Page 82Frontispiece included in Harrison's The
Count and the Congressman.THE COUNT AND THE CONGRESSMANBy MRS. BURTON HARRISON Author of "A Bachelor
Maid," "The Carlyles," "The Circle of a Century,""The
Anglomaniacs," Etc.ILLUSTRATED BY ALEX. O. LEVYNew YorkCUPPLES & LEON COMPANY PublishersCopyright information for Harrison's The
Count and the Congressman.THE COUNT AND THE CONGRESSMANCHAPTER I.A TEPID night of early spring in Washington saw the Honourable Angus McPhail, member of Congress from a city of the middle West which had long ceased to allure him after the close of the session in the National Capital, bidding farewell to the guests convened at his house for dinner followed by "a little bridge."It was one A. M. when they arose from the tables. A brief discussion of pâte sandwiches, hot bouillon, and other enticements, sent them, both men and women, refreshed to the carriages and herdics lined up in the bowery street below. McPhail himself escorted to her brougham the large pink and white Ambassadress who had honoured him with her efflorescent presence. As he put her inside, he kissed the plump hand from whose wrist depended a bag of flexible gold set with sapphires, now comfortably filled with her evening's winnings."Good night, and ever so many thanks for a delightful little party," she said, settling her superb shoulders back upon the cushions. "No one can be depended upon for such good bridge as Mr. McPhail. One thinks always play is better in a bachelor's house. We were a little afraid last winter, yours would lose that prestige, but since Mrs. Wilfred Methuen went abroad, taking with her the so-lovely niece, our fears are--""Have no fears but that my house will always be at the disposition of Mme 1'Ambassadrice," said Angus McPhail, gallantly, stepping back, as her footman received his order to take the great lady home.While the host was remounting the stairs to the drawing-room floor, he passed a man coming down them."Dropped my cigar case and went back to look for it. Good night, again, McPhail.""Good night. Hope you found the missing article.""Yes, thanks, in the little 'porcelain' room at the end of the suite yonder. That--and something else. Won't delay your tête-à-tête."He spoke significantly. McPhail looked annoyed, and a tinge of deeper red came upon his full cheeks."tête-à-tête? What d'ye mean, Grisson? Everybody's gone but you.""And one other," said Grisson, cynically smiling. "About the time I dropped my cigarette case, she must have dropped her fan. She's still looking for it. Let her down gently, Mac. She's older than most women, and has seen better days."McPhail did not answer. When the scoffer had gone out of the open portal with sleepy servants standing on either side, the master of this luxurious bachelor establishment turned with a frowning face, and hurried into the drawing-rooms.As expected, he found, trailing her ruffled skirts over the gleaming parquet amid the furniture already enswathed in summer chintzes, of a perfect little room lined on every side with treasures of ceramic art, a lady in evening wraps. She stopped short, holding out one hand with a sort of imploring gesture as he approached her, darkling."Don't scold, Mac. Wait till you hear why.""But you shouldn't, Betty. Really, you shouldn't. When I'd already bid you good-bye at the door of the cloak-room below. It's a complete give away. I'll swear you can't afford--""I can't afford anything, I know, Mac. I'm going in just one minute. It's all right, I promise you. My

maid's in the cab outside. If you would come to our house, conventionally, with mother at the tea table and all that, I wouldn't be driven to such shifts trying to get a word alone with you. But you won't come, and you won't answer my notes, so what in the world else am I to do?""Had I not the honour of including Miss Carteret among my dinner guests to-night?" he said, stiffening."A stop-gap merely," she answered, impatiently. "If you knew what a misery the evening had been, Mac! To have you so far away at bridge when I'm certain there isn't a woman in Washington you like so well for a partner as myself--""Now, mightn't you really have written that?" he protested, airily."Mac!"She was no longer young, and the make-up on her handsome, well-bred face was cruelly apparent. But this cry of his name came from the bottom of a woman's heart."I beg your pardon, Betty. I didn't mean to hurt you. But I'm annoyed, and you know it. Come, let me put you in your cab, there's a good soul. You

looked splendid, to-night, and your gown is a huge success."She melted at once. She walked with him, obediently. There was a gleam of new hope in her face."You'll come soon--very soon--to-morrow at five, say?""Not to-morrow, but soon," he answered vaguely, then raising his voice, addressed the lurking form of the butler descried behind a door-curtain's crimson flow. "That you, Chapman? You will please see that a careful search is made in here for a--a pendant dropped from Miss Carteret's neck-chain. An aquamarine stone set in pale yellow gold, you say, Miss Carteret? (Tell Miss Carteret's maid she is coming down, Chapman.) So good of you to have been with us, Miss Carteret, and I'm trusting you'll find you never wore the pendant after all. I shouldn't like your evening at my house to end with such a loss.""What I have lost," answered Betty, with a rally of spirit, as they went together down the broad stairs, "is, I really believe, a poor thing, spurious, and of no value, not half worth the fuss I have made over it."She had lifted her small deer-like head, and gathered her wrap together at the throat, with a touch of

the aristocratic grace once marking the reigning belle of Cleveland's first (or was it Arthur's) administration. Her quite famous little feet twinkled down the red velvet carpet resolutely. McPhail saw that she was going to sink with colours at her masthead. He admired her for it, as he had always admired the indefinable insignia of race and breeding stamped upon this charming product of bygone Southern prestige in Washington society. But he felt conclusively that it was as a bygone alone, that she could ever again stir the fountains of his heart.As he shook hands with her in the cab--leaning past her poor yawning ghost of a maid to do so, the odour of the gardenias Miss Carteret generally wore came to him from her person mingled with the as familiar one of stale cigarettes. He noticed that Betty's deep blue eyes seemed sunken in smoky caverns. She made a movement to tear the flowers from her breast and offer them to him, a movement he did not meet half way."You're wise. Already, they're getting to be mere blackened vegetables," she exclaimed, tossing the cluster through the cab-window into the street. "Goodbye, and please tell him to drive fast."Her voice sounded shrill, tuneless. McPhail stood

for an instant after she had gone, then with a sigh half of relief, hurried indoors. On the upper landing, he heard Chapman delivering rebuke to a subordinate."A fan? Who said it was a fan? No matter if the lady did, you fool, when the boss gives an order for a pendant to be looked for in this house, a pendant it is, you bet.""Now, I shouldn't have made that break," said McPhail, smiling to himself. When in his room, he did not at once go to bed, but busied himself first with a glance in the mirror at his large-featured, masterful and handsome face, then apparently deriving inspiration from the survey, sitting down before a desk to unlock a drawer, whence he drew out three widely differing objects. These were the photograph of a very young girl framed in white Roman vellum, embossed with gold, the frame a curio worthy of companionship with the rare trifles scattered everywhere in his house; a legal looking document, recently executed; and a foreign letter, carefully re-read, after a lengthened survey of the portrait."At least there is no other Richmond in the field," he ended triumphantly, "and, here I am asked by my good friend, her chaperon, 'to look them up' at Lake

Como, if I come out this spring to Genoa. If--if--when I at last hold here in this prosaic law envelope, the golden key with which I propose to unlock a palace of delights, my future with adorable Margot! How dull and stale all the rest of womankind seem beside 'my penniless lass with the long pedigree,' and how long she has held out against me! How I've sued and stooped, and now have finally come down in vulgar parlance to turning the screw to win her! If she suspect--! But she won't. She is all lofty dreams and impossible ideals. My action will seem to her that of a Bayard. She will believe me. To-morrow, I will carry my news to her mother--of the mother, I am more than sure. But the father--! Augustin Methuen is a simpleton in business--but--" Here the Honourable Angus uttered a decidedly vulgar exclamation, made a wry face, then, with an inevitable revulsion of feeling, descended from his high horse and disposed himself for bed.By the next afternoon, however, hope hack so far returned to inspire him, that he ventured upon a call, in the respectably forgotten street enshrining the shabby residence of Margot Methuen's father. Mr. Augustin Methuen, of a Virginian family connected

with half the tombstones in the State, had been during the latter years of his threadbare existence in the employ of Government as a clerk of an uninteresting Department. The initial misfortune of his life had been his descent from a long line of English and Virginian Squires who had spent money freely upon their state politics and many acres, bequeathing neither fortune nor energy to the generation shattered by a mighty civil war. His second and greater mishap had been the one accountable for so many kindred failures of young manhood in the South; an early marriage with a pretty, silly girl without a cent, who had borne him too many children to do justice to them or to herself, and was now, in consequence, a shut-in hypochondriac, forever complaining of her lot. After that he had fallen into the hands of sharpers who had ruined him in affairs.It was wonderful, so people said, how the Augustin Methuens had managed to struggle along during all these years and live, with a family of four boys and four girls to feed and clothe and educate and launch upon the world according to their station! But they had lived, the boys were now variously self-supporting, and the three older Misses Methuen were still afloat upon the current of Washington society, the lovely

youngest being abroad with a solvent sister-in-law of their father's, who had taken her husband's niece with the proviso that it was a mere temporary arrangement, binding the lady to no future action.Late in life, Mr. Wilfred Methuen, a handsome ne'er-do-weel of a bachelor fêted in Washington society, had espoused a wealthy widow from New York, who for some years after his demise appeared to ignore the existence of her husband's humble brother and his needy family. A visit to Washington in the interval of time spent mostly abroad had recently put this super-civilized lady in touch with the Augustin Methuen household. The result was the transplanting of Margot.While Mr. McPhail waited in the big empty front parlour pending the progress of a shuffling negro girl to "go and see" if "the ladies" were at home, he became coincidentally aware of the scattering from a dim rear room of several feminine forms previously ensconced upon couches, light literature in hand, or making over old finery in the half-light under paintless shutters bowed to keep out the Southern heat. Later in the day, as he well knew, these young ladies, would be seen sallying forth equipped in the height of fashion in cheap materials, leaving their cards in

the front halls of a dozen desirable houses. From the beginning of the Washington season until the end thereof, the Misses Methuen kept up this ceaseless rite of rendering tribute in pasteboard to the social deities. In certain fashionable streets, they might generally count upon ringing every door along one side of a square then crossing, to perform the same act of civility on the other. One saw them "everywhere," the "Methuen girls," rather good to look at, facile in chatty conversation; repertories of gossip concerning all leaders and diplomats conspicuous in society, all residents or birds of passage who had made a lodgment in public observation, in their time. Appearing in the front rank at receptions, "days," and general entertainments, to what went on outside the District of Columbia save in New York and Newport, they were profoundly indifferent. Thus pursuing the eternal round of petty happenings in their town and family, nothing had occurred to bring the Methuens before the public, until Margot, the youngest girl, after a few preliminary symptoms of beauty and fascination, burst as a perfect rose of maiden loveliness upon the background of their dull home. It was not these charmers whom McPhail now desired to see, and perhaps they

had tact enough to discern the fact. After a discreet interval of audible whispers, giggles and footsteps on the stairs, the negro girl came back, announcing indifferently that Mis' Methuen would be "right down." Before the appearance of the lady of the house whom the visitor understood to be so designated, he had ample leisure to rejoice at the lucky chance that had led Margot's footsteps to deflect from the narrow pathway trodden by her tiresome trinity of sisters. He had never understood the whim of nature by which the dazzling young creature, fine, fair and thoroughbred, meant for the primrose paths of life, to be surrounded by all things beautiful, should have grown up in this unlovely and dismal dwelling. Walls, carpets, furniture were faded and timeworn. A few family portraits darkling at intervals; a few shelves of ancient books, some bits of old china--a centre table displaying the supreme ornament of a bowl of dusty visiting cards--this, was the only setting of his gem, save when her family were boarding at some cheap resort in the mountains of Virginia!Well he knew how distasteful it all was to her eager beauty-craving spirit! He had perceived that the sisters were a weariness to her, the mother a thorn in

her flesh, the father alone claiming her ardent love and sympathy. And yet, in the full reality of such conditions and surroundings, and of her lack of prospect of change from them, Margot had twice refused him. He knew at the time that her heart was empty save of a thousand dreams of uncomprehended sentiment, of lofty ideals hardly to be materialized. In recognizing this fact he had accepted with sick certainty the conviction that it was not he who might ever hope to realize her romantic dreams. His face burned again, in recalling the absoluteness of her repellent gaze when he had urged his willingness to wait, no matter how long, till he might claim her as his wife.There had remained but a single string on which he might play to win her, and this he was now prepared to touch. Ignoble as it was, he designed to work upon her through her love for the father who despised his life and practices. His tool, as heretofore, would be the poor weakling of a mother, craving through him the comforts of a solvent existence; the empty worldlings, her sisters, who aspired so ardently to the privileges of ransacking his establishment at second hand!Hesitation fled, temptation deepened, as, at that moment Margot's beauty gleamed upon him like a new

star, from a large photograph taken recently in Rome and pinned with thumb tacks upon the dingy wall paper.The girl of his picture at home was a peerless child; here was a woman matured in beauty, equipped in some sudden subtle fashion with what she had hitherto lacked--repose, the manner of the high world, elegance, distinction--the woman who would not only grace but crown his life, wherever they might appear together; whom his riches would fitly frame in gold.So rapt was the Honourable Angus in his contemplation of the photograph, he did not observe the timid entry into her drawing-room of the lady of the house. Mrs. Methuen, a delicate featured woman wrapped in an invalid's shawl, her thin face mantled with a pathetically eager welcome, stood beside him holding out a hand so emaciated that he shrank from clasping it. As she sank into an arm-chair by the window, he could see what her effort had been to receive him."You are looking at Margot's latest photo?" she said, with an echo of old-time vivacity in her flat tones, like the waxy tinkle of an old spinet. "Taken in Rome this winter, but it only reached us yesterday. Strange bow my family will persist in saying it resembles her

mamma! Mr. Methuen, now, declares it might have been me at the time of our engagement."McPhail felt an inward chill, but luckily had no time to answer her. Mrs. Methuen's talk dribbled in a steady rivulet on and ever, happily exacting small return. From early youth she had been accustomed to fulfil the supreme duty of a Virginia girl upon her native heath by making herself agreeable to "company." No matter what her physical weakness, once seated to receive a visitor, she would continue to put forth her wan enticements until he left her. On the present occasion, the strain of endeavour was clearly inspired by a feeling of unusual ambition to succeed. She was at a white heat of anxious agitation. McPhail, not unaccustomed to read the signs of the times in expectant chaperones, felt a quick sense of compassion for the poor transparent lady assail his soul. He tried, as soon as practicable, to relieve her distressful curiosity, by saying that his intention was to go abroad almost immediately, asking if he could execute any commissions for her with Mrs. Wilfred Methuen, whom he meant to "look up," in Northern Italy.Truth to tell, the man's riotous blood swelling the veins of his bald forehead and overspreading his feat-

ures in a florid blush, revealed that his emotion, in making this announcement, equalled that of Margot's mother in receiving it. Encouraged by her radiant smile, he went farther, and blurted out an almost boisterous assurance of his continued feeling for her child."Ah! thank God," exclaimed Mrs. Methuen, for the first time giving vent to unaffected impulse. "If you knew--"Real tears, mother's tears,, choked her utterance and welled from her eyes of faded azure."Perhaps I knew more than you give me credit for," he said, trying to escape the trying spectacle by walking over for another look at the photograph. "Come, Mrs. Methuen, cheer up, and help me out in the little business I've really come here to lay before you.""Business," she said, uncomfortably."Not the old debt. That can lie over, as it has done, for a more convenient opportunity.""Mr. Methuen, as I've told him a thousand times, ought never to have gone into those mines with you, and let you advance his share of the cash.""I've done what I could," said the man hurriedly, "to make the obligation sit lightly. But Methuen's

neck does not lend itself to a yoke, even if it were of straw.""Oh! When did Augustin Methuen ever act like other men? If he had, do you think, would his family be in their present wretched position? But for your generosity in getting Tom and Will set upon their feet--""A small exertion on my part, Madam," interrupted her hearer, "which has never deserved the stress you laid on it.""It has been everything to us, Mr. McPhail, and even if it did send the two boys to live so far away from us as Iowa, they're satisfied, and don't want to come back to the District anyhow. The only thing that made me ashamed about that, was Mr. Methuen's never having had the grace to show you he appreciated your kindness. But that's my husband, all over. Let him take a prejudice against anybody--I don't mean he has against you, Mr. McPhail." She stopped with a deep old rose colour rising into her withered cheeks."Believe me I am well aware how much your husband has resented my aspiring to his daughter's hand," said McPhail, clumsily attempting sarcasm. He did not feel comfortable, and showed it. Poor Mrs.

Methuen, ostrich-like, was trying, as she had ever done, to shut her eyes to the only reasons Augustin had vouchsafed her for his distaste of the suitor proposed for his exquisite child. She had told him at the time that she had no idea there was anything in what he had heard against the Congressman, more than the merest gossip. In her grinding poverty, at her distance from the great world, she had chosen always to see only McPhail's great house on Connecticut Avenue with its lordly front door and the liveried servants keeping guard there in visiting hours. She was throbbingly conscious, at this very moment, of his fine automobile waiting in the street outside. She had read in her "Post" that morning, a column descriptive of the "millionaire Congressman's" collection of curios, yearly added to by some splendid purchase in Europe. Other virtuosi, said the writer of the article, might content themselves with mere numbers in their art specimens, but Mr. McPhail's high standard excluded all but perfection of its kind.And it was as the finest and rarest of these treasures, that her child had been twice asked to install herself among them! Margot might have been the sovereign mistress of all that wealth, might easily have owned

a tiara of diamonds for her small head, pearls to bang around her swanlike throat, sables to set forth the rose-and-ivory of her skin, all the outward and visible tokens of the wonderful material splendour of modern days forever denied the mother's pinched, war-smitten life. Poor hapless soul! Just for a little while to see Margot queening it, and she would be content to drop like a dead leaf from the boughs! If Augustin Methuen were only barely reasonable, he would not have backed Margot up in her two refusals of McPhail--!That McPhail had now suddenly, unexpectedly, without a shadow of warning, returned into the Methuen horizon after months when he had kept his distance, excited in her the wildest revival of old hopes. But her husband--her husband! Thin, pale broken-spirited Augustin Methuen, with his chronic stoop, and intermittent interest in affairs outside his office and his home, how could he have shown such obstinacy in holding out against the one brilliant prospect that had ever presented itself to the family as a thing possible of realization. With Maud and Jessy and Julia likely to be indefinitely on his hands, and not one of them fitted to gain a dollar on her own account should he be taken from them--!Oh! the blindness of the man! It was incredible!Exactly what had passed between the two men, in the days when they had been associated in the mining enterprise that ended in disaster for Methuen, and eventually added new dollars to McPhail's already liberal "pile," she had never divined. She knew that the obligation of money lent at a crisis, money which had not yet been returned, and of McPhail's action in providing a livelihood for her two sons, were facts always galling to her husband's thoughts. A dim understanding that Methuen chafed because he could not afford to speak his mind openly about McPhail, had several times dawned upon her slow apprehension. The specific reason alleged for his opposition to the proposed marriage had been the--in his eyes--all sufficient one, of McPhail's previously immoral life. Mrs. Methuen could not forget his telling their girl that he was prouder of her when she "turned down McPhail," than he had ever been since he stepped up to receive his degree of A.M. from the faculty of the University of Virginia. And Margot, whom a word from her father would always melt into loving acquiescence, had answered him with a glance as steadfast and free as a young eagle's!But here was McPhail back again! The glittering mirage shone anew. The terrible grind of their increasing poverty ceased for a moment to echo in her ear. From what she heard daily through the girls, every house in town was glad to throw wide its doors to the successful Congressman. His present life, judged from outside, was impeccable. It must have been Margot's influence that had reformed him--the bare idea lent to her a fresh sentiment of compassion and forgiveness for the sinner's past! After all, Mr. Methuen always took extremest views of the weakness of his fellow man!McPhail, watching her narrowly, saw that here his way was smooth. It would be another thing to gain over the insignificant Department clerk, his debtor and beneficiary, the broken-down gentleman whose eyes he never liked to meet in full. But the effort must be made."It was not only to ask if I could bear any messages to your sister-in-law and daughter, that I ventured to trouble you to-day," he went on, smoothly, but swallowing now and again. "I have very recently, succeeded in concluding arrangements for a piece of property which I knew to be of supreme interest to your family.""Not Harmony Hall!"The words came in an exultant half shriek! This was something that had never entered into Mrs. Methuen's calculations. She sat up, the crocheted shawl slipped down upon the old colonial arm-chair. Her thin, blue-veined hands clasped together ecstatically. A light as of youth came upon her face. For the first time, McPhail did not condemn the suggestion that she could have ever looked like Margot."Yes. Like everybody else, I have sympathized in your husband's having lost the old family home through that lawsuit with the Caldwells."The Caldwells! Think of it, Mr. McPhail. The descendants of Mr. Methuen's father's overseer! Not that I consider a new family beyond the pale--far from it," she added, colouring again that deep old rose. "But they are simply dreadful people--have driven us to the wall to get the place--but how in the world did you ever succeed in making them sell it again to you?""Harmony Hall is a charming old estate," he said, evasively. "Worth a good deal of effort from a man whose fancy lies that way. Apart from its beautiful

situation on the Potomac, are the historic associations of its neighbourhood.""To give it up was the cruelest blow of Mr. Methuen's life, and Margot has felt with her father.""I believe so," said McPhail. "Her cult of an old Virginian ideal appealed to me as a very pathetic and noble thing. Her feeling against the recent ownership was also very strong--""I should think so!" cried the lady, her crest rising. "The commonest, most pretentious lot! Actually doing everything possible to make people believe that they are related to us. But do go on. I am dying to hear all.""There is really nothing to tell, but that I am now the sole and undisputed proprietor of the estate, dwelling-house, river-fisheries and farms. As far as the interesting old mansion is concerned, I have already directed certain necessary repairs to be begun. The furniture, being of the solid variety built to survive the ages, requires but a little polish and upholstery, to be as good as ever.""What would my poor husband have given to have accomplished this!" she said, sighing. "Nobody who has not lived with him can tell what a dream--an

obsession--his longing to get Harmony Hall back has been! But since he cannot	--""You have it in your power, madam, to induce him to accept it at my hands--" interrupted McPhail, brusquely. He could no longer contain himself.The dazzling illumination of the poor woman's face was succeeded by a swift drop into its habitual despondency."Mr. McPhail!" she exclaimed, hysterically. "I never heard anything so grand in all my life. Of course, I know it would be in only one way that our family could--""We understand each other sufficiently not to go further into that, dearest lady--" he protested."But the delicacy--the generosity of your thought, perfectly overpowers me. How shall I tell you the obstacles in our way?""I think I understand them. But I am willing to try to overcome the worst one.""It could only be done through her."McPhail was a little staggered. He did not desire to have his motives so quickly and ruthlessly exposed to daylight. But entrenching himself behind the character of refined and unselfish benefactor just ascribed to him, he was enabled to hold his own."All that will be for the future to work out, Mrs. Methuen. Just now I am content to have done what meets your approbation. This reward, indeed, gives me courage to unfold a scheme that may or may not appeal to you. As I am about to be absent from the country for some months, it has occurred to me that perhaps you and Mr. Methuen and your daughters, might consent to occupy Harmony Hall for the summer months as my guests. I shall put competent people in the house, and my horses in the stables. To have your taste and knowledge directed toward the supervision of my improvements, will be more than an equivalent, as you can see readily. Methuen would have carte blanche to go ahead with the restorations.""Oh! Mr. McPhail!"It was as if Heaven were opening before her. The desire of her husband's heart brought within his grasp! The question was, would he or would he not possess himself of it. If Margot would--ah! Margot must!"Oh, Mr. McPhail," she repeated, brokenly. "I'm not sure--but I think yes, I am almost sure. If she were here, I believe I'd be quite sure.""I shall leave it to you, dear madam," said McPhail with gleaming eyes.CHAPTER II.MARGOT leaned over the balustrade of the wide balcony fronting their suite of rooms in an hotel of ideal prettiness upon a lake where every prospect pleased. On this blazing first of June, the quality of the lazy air compacted with scents of the horse-chestnut blooms in the great avenue running parallel with the water, reminded her of her far away home in Washington. She did not altogether wish to be reminded of Washington or of her home or its people. That morning, a certain cable message had come for Aunt Katrina, and following it a battle of words had passed between the two women. The struggle had left Margot sore and stirred to the core of her resistent heart. After luncheon, Mrs. Methuen had betaken herself to rest on the chaise-longue in her pleasant salon. The girl had stolen out on the balcony to look down upon the passing show in the garden beneath, and wonder where she might turn for aid and comfort in sore stress of mind.A fair scene lay before her, a festa of earth and sky was enacting! The whole flower-decked, palpitating world seemed to be offering herself to the sun god.The mountains across the lake wore the tint and texture of ripe, purple plums. The intermediate stretch of lake seen beyond the garden railing whereon were welded roses, cream, pink, blackish-red and crimson, was a plain of shimmering silver. The trim gravel walk along the edge of the water was shaded by alternate pollard planes and palm trees. Already, although luncheon was not long over, waiters were setting little tables up on the grass for the tea and the other mild liquid refreshments foreigners seem ever ready to imbibe.Up and down between the beds of flaring marguerites and myosotis, strolled the hotel guests, men in white trousers, blue sack coats and spotless panama hats, women for the most part in white frocks profusely embroidered. Some of them were dropping into iron chairs by the tea tables, lounging upon wicker seats under the great white pillared arcade over the hotel entrance, or hooding themselves under Bath chairs coquettishly lined with red or blue.Below the landing stairs, a little fleet of rowing

boats were assembling for the afternoon diversion of the guests--craft broad bottomed and safe of build, their stern seats cushioned in flowery chintz, gay awnings overhead, and the flag of his country conveniently ready to be run up astern for the benefit of any citizen of any nationality prepared to pay the price. Margot found herself vaguely watching the embarcation of a party of two in the jaunty steam launch belonging to the hotel--a honeymoon couple of the pattern so frequent and obvious on the Italian Lakes. Very young they were, very fluffy, doing their best to look indifferent to the prospect of an afternoon afloat in each other's company in this earthly paradise. As the maî"tre d'hôtel, bearing aloft a tray containing enough sticky confectioneries to have spread a table for St. Agnes' Eve, hurried down to the landing to put his dainties aboard the launch, a general smile overspread the faces of on-lookers. It was as if two children were going off for a picnic feast. But Margot did not smile. In her heart she was rather enjoying the little bride in her pink-frilled muslin hat, who looked so adorably happy in spite of her best efforts to the contrary.Over all this va-et-vient of cheerful summer folk, flared upon its staff the great banner of Italy, barred

with green and red and white, that kept guard over their landing. To-day, Margot felt out of tune with the charming spectacle so familiar to her eyes. They had come North from Sicily by automobile along the Eastern coast of Italy, visiting the less-frequented cities and localities of that region, stopping as they chose according to the fancy of a traveller jaded yet discriminating as was Mrs. Wilfred Methuen. During this time of prolonged enchantment including their stay in Venice, Margot had not once heard mention of her bête noire, the Washington Congressman. The old wearisome play of argument from the lips of her chaperon as to her duty in the matter of accepting so manifestly eligible an opportunity of bettering her own condition and the family's fortunes, had apparently died a natural death. The girl had breathed gloriously free. To-day, after the cablegram from McPhail had been placed in Mrs. Methuen's hands, the stroke of doom had sounded louder than ever in Margot's ears. To escape from the thoughts of it, she felt that she could no longer bear the imprisonment of the trim terrace with its balustrade of stone, its pots of plants and mosaic patterned floor, looking down upon all these conven-

tional people preoccupied with their petty attempts to make time fly.Fly! when every day would bring nearer the threatened arrival of McPhail!Slipping back into the darkened salon, stacked with June roses in every corner, she crept past her aunt still dozing on the chaise-longue, a French novel fallen from her relaxed grasp, her aristocratic profile gleaming whitely against a pillow of Bologna cut-work. How was it possible this fair delicate being could have shown such iron purpose, such dire tenacity in urging her niece to a loveless marriage? Scarcely daring to trust herself to look a second time at the mute destroyer of her peace, Margot picked up a garden hat and went on tiptoe out into the spacious corridor, down the wide marble stairs to the grounds.A former palace of that errant and ill-starred princess, Caroline of Brunswick and Queen of Britain who had here fought to failure part of her ignoble plan of life, was their present hostelry. In Margot's hand was the volume of old memoirs setting forth a chapter of the story. Poor high-born lady, who had devised this fairy haunt with its hanging gardens reaching to the skies, wherein she might be "no royalty, but only

Caroline, a happy, merry soul!" What had her marriage of ambition brought to her? What did riches and splendour mean to any one unless the magic awakening of a girl's soul came with them. If "Caroline" had loved a simple, honest gentleman, instead of bartering herself to a fopling prince for a chance at the crown of England, would shame and disaster have hounded her to an unhonoured grave?Even were conditions otherwise, Margot did not yet want to bind herself. She had but just begun to sip of the great sparkling cup of life with enjoyment and understanding. However much she might differ from the concrete worldly side of her aunt's views upon certain subjects, there was no denying Mrs. Wilfred Methuen's charm as a cultured comrade of travel. For the most part, Margot had enjoyed her thoroughly and learned of her infinitely. If they might only have gone on as they were together without the black projecting shadow of a "necessary" marriage falling across their path!So pondering, she pursued an aimless way first along the avenue, back and forth under the shade of great horse chestnuts starred with pyramidal blooms; then crossing a grassy meadow flaring with yellow satin but-

tercups and huge white marguerites, struck into the steep path ascending between stone troughs set in maidenhair and crimson roses wherein bright waters gurgle from the heights above. Mounting rapidly to the scaly old temple shrining a blackened image of the God of Strength, she passed out through a bosky bit of wood to the brink of the chasm in the hills, where a cascade moistens honey-sweetened air with perpetual freshness.Uttering an exclamation of relief at the delicious coolness of the spot, while tossing her hat into a clump of bracken, Miss Methuen dropped upon a stone bench overgrown with lichen, extending her arms in the full luxury of escape from tropic sunshine into this abode of leafy loveliness.In the dense verdure that surrounded her, she believed herself to be alone, but now saw, springing down from a rock above intending to pass her in the path, a young man whose eyes at once met hers with a glance of delighted recognition.Confused and puzzled, she bowed distantly. It was not until, with a deep, rather old-fashioned doffing of his straw hat, he had passed her by and ran quickly down

the hillside, that she recalled where she had met him last.It was in May of the year before, on her first appearance in society, at a garden party given by somebody at Chevy Chase, near Washington. He had been in company with some men of the Italian Embassy; they had come together accidentally in the vicinity of a good-natured, officious lady who always made it a point to name young people to each other whether they asked for the privilege or not. Mrs. Aspendale had presented him. Margot was not in the best of humours. She was realizing her own shabbiness of garb in a crowd of smart, self-assured people. The handsome foreigner had lingered beside her for a few moments, exchanging phrases of a banal character. She had been struck with the excellence of his English speech, with his marked beauty of face and form, the quiet distinction of his manner. Almost immediately, McPhail had interposed and carried her away to get strawberries and cream in the tea-room. She felt again her annoyance at McPhail's air of proprietorship on this occasion, her repulsion at the gaze of his bold black eyes, at his large red cheeks, at the gleaming teeth under a profuse black moustache--at everything about him,

in fact. It had even blotted out the impression of the charming new-comer, Count di Stelvio--! The name came back to her in a flash. That there was, back of him, some picturesque family history, she had heard the women around her saying, but its facts Margot had never ascertained. The rest of that wretched spring had been spent in eluding McPhail.Di Stelvio! What connection had this name with some romance of the neighbourhood of which their boatman had spoken in rowing them back and forth about the lake? Now that she beheld him in his native atmosphere, the man who bore it seemed to exact curiosity, nay vivid interest. She wished that he had lingered, had spoken a few words to her spite of foreign conventionalities. It was as if in exchanging glances with him a current of new and healthy interest had flowed into her life.Perhaps he was stopping at their hotel, and she would see him at table d'hÓte dinner, or afterwards in the corridors. It came consolingly into her mind that here at last was the sort of person Aunt Katrina would think it "worth while" to notice. For willing as Mrs. Methuen might be to receive into her family connection a man of McPhail's appearance and antecedents, she

was, in general, hypercritical concerning the strangers encountered along the way of travel.Margot arose up from her bench rested and alert. No longer did the air appear to be distressingly perfumed and relaxing. She forgot that she had that morning urged Aunt Katrina to push on at once to the cooler Engadine. In her renewed activity of spirit, Miss Methuen remembered they were lacking a panetone for tea in their salon at five o'clock. Now was the hour at which the bake shop in the neighbouring village might be counted upon to disgorge a fresh supply of these tempting loaves of rusk. She would find and notify her aunt's maid--Lydia was sure to be somewhere lounging and gossiping in the garden with other femmes de chambres of the hotel guests--that she herself would go in search of the dainty.Walking with a new spring in her steps, she came to where the lazy Lydia was sitting upon a shady bench with two demoiselles of her calling, giggling and stabbing strips of broderie Anglaise. The women arose at her approach, stood while she spoke to Lydia, and exchanged whispers as she moved away."I think she has consented," Lydia said, continuing a confidence previously begun. "She looks as if she

were going to have a great house, great riches, a fine place in the world, Worth and Paquin to dress her--Oh!""All that for only saying 'yes' to a fine man like the photograph you showed us on Madame Methuen's table," sighed Emma, an anemic Swede."I'd not have been so long saying it," pouted Rosalie, a dark little French person, like a dragon-fly; and then they passed into a more racy discussion of the private affairs of recently arrived guests of the hotel.When Miss Methuen emerged from the cool precincts of the grounds, it was to find herself directly in the main street of the village at their gates--a clean, cobble-stoned, narrow little street flanked by low plastered houses set in walled gardens overgrown with flowers, one half now in deep shadow, the other in blinding sunshine, its shop fronts, veiled in curtains of gray linen, behind which their proprietors sat or lounged in a state of suspended animation; the very dogs and cats lying prone, blinking at existence, during the hour of universal siesta.Not unfamiliar, certainly not unwelcome, were this young lady's face and figure to the street. To-day, in her frock of blue muslin made like a schoolgirl's, with

her frilled lingerie hat and the sheaf of wild flowers underneath one arm, she won from the drowsy trades-people glances even more approving than those they were wont habitually to bestow upon the predatory race from oversea that overruns their land, but always pays its way. Margot rather liked dawdling in the little shops along her route. There was generally something to purchase, something to practice her Italian upon, whether cakes, shoe strings, pins, alcohol for their spirit lamp, or cleaning fluid to take the spots out of her frocks--Lydia, like every self-respecting lady's maid had small needs innumerable. To-day, Margot chose first her panetone, fresh baked, crusty, currants dotting its brown dome at discreet intervals--saw it wrapped in a gilt stamped paper, tied with an azure string, and delivered into her white-gloved fingers; then turned in at the door of a certain shop of sorts, where as fate willed it, she was destined to a momentous meeting.It was a favorite spot of hers, this little, dusky, aromatic grocery, overflowing at its outlet like a horn of plenty with lettuce, artichokes, young onions, wood strawberries, nuts still in their verdant envelopes, radishes and bundles of asparagus the size of slate pencils. Amid the bins and jars and barrels of its dim interior

beneath a shelf of jars of archaic sweets, stood the dark-eyed padrona, now in confabulation about oil and semolina with a gentleman. As Margot stepped back beneath the door curtain to wait her turn, the padrona, espying her, smiled violently, tinkled her golden earbobs, and begged the young lady to come in. At the same moment, the customer in possession turned, and Margot beheld again Count Stelvio.This time, they bowed simultaneously, Stelvio smiling as he offered to cede to her his place before the counter. Margot persisting in her withdrawal, waited on the cobble-stones without. The padrona, proudly repeating in accents of deepest homage, a somewhat meagre order for sugar, oil, spices, spaghetti, and the like household necessaries, curtsied her customer away. As he passed Margot in going out she noticed that a donkey driver in the street pulled up his beast, to snatch off his cap before the Count, while the adjacent yokels and shopkeepers bestirred their lazy bones to look after and salute him reverentially."Now I did not know, in Washington, how perfectly handsome a man can be in Cernobbio," said the young lady to herself. "And how they all bow down to him! A prophet honoured in his own country, certainly."She was conscious of a flat feeling, perhaps one of pique, perhaps regret, that he had not sought to renew their acquaintance. At Chevy Chase he would not have avoided a girl, because she had no visible chaperon! Stupid, these foreign ways! There was no man at Villa d'Este hotel that could compare with him in good looks, and charm of bearing. Now that she had been abroad, she recognized his type. All over Italy she had seen him in pictures and on tapestries. He was the grand seigneur of the famous galleries, forever lording it within some antique frame in silks and velvets, in a crowded council of his peers, or riding, hawk on wrist, in the winding procession of a hunt across some faded wall hanging of priceless web. What though his present attire was only blue serge cut in modern fashion, his hat one of panama braid such as every commonplace man of her acquaintance was then wearing, his hair and moustache cropped in the trim pattern of to-day, none the less did he suggest a picturesque and immemorial past, having for its background historic Italy--beautiful, adorable Italy that possessed power to stir her blood and waken tender feelings in her heart, as did no other country she had visited!A poor gentleman--a modest householder she ad-

judged him, but one who in village estimation conferred honour where he passed. The padrona's brown face, while she had finished tying up for him a small parcel of coffee, that certes, had never known Arabia or even Cuba, was a study of satisfied pride and radiant admiration!"The Signorina has then known our Count di Stelvio?" she asked, with a gurgle like oil pouring from a flask."Si--once, for a moment, in America," explained Miss Methuen. "Is he--does he live in this neighbourhood?""In the neighbourhood?" repeated the groceress, with a little laugh of condescension. "Is it possible our boatmen have not pointed out to the Signorina the famous villa Far Niente that has been in the Count's family these many hundred years."Far Niente! Suddenly, out of a tangled web of recollection emerged the memory of the saddest, most lovely abode of man Margot had ever dreamed of. A villa, ancient, solitary, forsaken by the sun, lying low upon the lake beside a mighty chasm in the hills, down which forever leaped a boisterous waterfall--a haunt of sadness and depressing mystery, spite of its gardens

of roses and rhododendron, its mighty overshadowing trees and bosky hillsides."It has been pointed out to me," she said hastily trying to rehabilitate herself in the padrona's esteem. "But I believe no strangers are allowed to land there, now.""Not in the three years since the Count has been living at Far Niente--altogether, winter and summer, except the visit he made last year on business to America.""Winter and summer--Oh!" cried the girl shivering. "At midsummer, perhaps, for a month or so. But more--no one could endure such tragic isolation in winter.""Our great families do not think it a penance to live in the homes of their fathers and grandfathers, wherever they may be," said the woman with some sense of teaching a lesson where it might be needed. "In old days, to be sure, Far Niente was but a pleasure house, a summer pavilion, a whim of its first owners. They could go there to escape the blinding heat of their castles and country houses in the South. But, a few years back, our young Count had the misfortune to lose by fire, the grand old castle near Ferrara, where

he had grown up. Some of the beautiful things out of it were saved. Such books and jewelled cups and pictures, I believe, were never seen!""And are these treasures now at Far Niente?""Some of them," answered the padrona, hesitating and colouring like an autumn peach. "It is no secret that our Count's mother had wasted the chief part of his father's fortune left to her. It is a sad story. The Signorina will doubtless hear it some day. The object of Count Stelvio's visit to America was, as is well-known, to dispose of some old cups and vases and platters of great value inherited by him. He had no longer room for them," she added bridling. "And the greatest gem of his collection has remained. The Signorina has no doubt heard of the Stelvio Biberon?"The Signorina's face was a study of varied emotions. During the Signora's harangue, many things forgotten had come back to her, the most strange and marvellous of which was that the sale of a certain small but magnificent array of early Italian faience in Washington, the spring before, had resulted in its final installation upon the shelves of no less a personage than Congressman Angus McPhail. He, then, her detested, persistent, American lover was the owner of these waifs of

the Stelvio house furnishings of centuries agone! To her they had been offered in conjunction with McPhail's other assets of solvency. Wonderful, indeed!"The Stelvio Biberon," she answered, hastily. "Yes--no--I seem to recall--""It is one of the treasures of our neighbourhood," went on the padrona, importantly. "A drinking cup of perhaps a thousand years old, on which sits old Neptune, in pure gold, I have seen it, Signorina. The Count himself unlocked the casket that contains it, afterward ordering his housekeeper to serve me and my husband with a glass of vino d'Asti. He is always gracious is the Count, and much beloved by those who know him."The Stelvio Biberon! Margot without difficulty recalled the florid announcements in the newspapers of her native land, that Count Stelvio, then visiting America, was the possessor of this unique, almost priceless work of art. She remembered the speculations concerning its actual money value, the many overtures said to have been made to its owner to part with it, by museums, the statement that in this Biberon Count Stelvio held a little fortune in his grasp. Lastly, to Miss Methuen's mind arose the memory of Angus McPhail's rhapsodies over a curio that money could not

buy. To have it enshrined among the other exquisite gems of his little museum in Connecticut Avenue, he had declared that he would give any price, commit any extravagance of effort."A full litre, Signorina? And another paper of the biscuits the Signorina likes? They shall be in your rooms at the hotel, before a half hour has passed.""There is no other member of Count Stelvio's family living with him at Far Niente?" ventured Margot, as she laid down the price of her purchases."No, Signorina, for the good reason that he is the last of them. Some day, as I said, you will hear his story. It is a sad one. A basket of these fresh wood strawberries to take with your tea? They are as ripe and red as the Signorina's lips. Grazie, my boy shall carry them with the other parcels. Until I see you again, Signorina."Margot walked home under the chestnuts of the park with a quickened step, a heightened heart beat. The discomfort of being forced to think about McPhail was balanced and presently outweighed by the impossibility of forgetting Stelvio and his affairs.After tea for which half a dozen friends in the hotel dropped in, it was found the heat had sensibly

decreased. Mrs. Clandeboye, a chatty Englishwoman, even declared that on the water they would be quite deliciously cool. Mrs. Methuen must lend her Miss Methuen to go out in her boat.As they skimmed over the rippled surface of the lake, Mrs. Clandeboye talked on and ever: gossip of Rome and the Riviera, the preceding winter; on dits of the Engadine and the London season; things talked of in New York, and echoes from the colony at Cadenabbia, fell successively from her lips. Margot had but to sit with a listening expression, turning her thoughts whither they would roam. In that perfect evening hour, life on the lake was enchantment. The flowery shores, the wooded heights, the passing craft, were all invested with a soft beauty unspeakable. When the two stalwart boatmen shifted their course to take crosswise the waves of one of the fussy little steamers that in this mountain-locked expanse suffice to raise a considerable sea, she became aware of the close vicinity of another row-boat engaged executing the same manœuvre. It was a weather-worn old boat propelled by two young peasants dressed in a sort of faded livery, and the single passenger lifting his hat to Miss Methuen and her friend, disclosed for the third time that day,

the features of Count Stelvio. Margot, unnecessarily conscious as she felt--bowed in return, then looked away.A moment later, Stelvio's oarsmen had skilfully taken the lead of theirs, and in a few powerful strokes had left behind the daintily cushioned and beflagged pleasure craft--as marked a contrast with their own, shabby through age and service, as they, in their working clothes with the hotel boatmen in gala white and blue."Why, do you know Count Stelvio?" asked Mrs. Clandeboye hardly able to contain her eagerness until its object was out of hearing."A little. I met him last year in Washington," answered Margot, strangely unwilling to discuss the subject."That was when he went over to negotiate the sale of his wonderful faience to one of your dreadful nouveaux riches. I beg your pardon, but I've heard that this one was really so, you know. A great handsome beefy Congressman with a twang, some one said. I have quite forgot his name. Is it true they wear turn-over collars with white satin scarfs and a diamond pin with evening clothes, those officials? How de-

lightful now, to have met Stelvio! Countess Fleury, who is his neighbour on the lake, has promised to invite me some day when he comes to her. He's very shy and offish, and she's almost the only person that can get him to her house. They talk roses and vineyards, and compare their figs, you know. If he hadn't sold that faience, I suppose he'd have almost nothing to go on with, for of course he's dreadfully poor. What a perfectly beautiful face his is--like some one of those marbles at the Capitol in Rome, I forget which. Such a contrast in colouring to your peach-blossom skin and adorable red hair. I'd like to see you two together. Do you think it's possible, now he knows you are here, that he would call on Mrs. Methuen?""Not in the least possible," said Margot firmly. "I have seen him three times to-day, and he barely recognized me.""You don't say so?" exclaimed Mrs. Clandeboye, after she had heard the circumstances of their previous meetings. "Then you know nothing of his history?""Only what you have just told me.""Then listen, my dear, for it's really a romance. The di Stelvios as everybody knows, are a family of

fabulous antiquity, who have been connected in the past with great houses and performed all sorts of great deeds in the history of their country. Until three years ago, the present man was a bond slave to a mad mother with whom he lived in an old castle with one of those queer musical names--near Ferrara, I think. His youth was under a cloud, because it was generally believed that he had no legal right to his name or title. She, who alone had the proofs, would never understand that she should show them or yield them up to him. He served her, nevertheless, with the utmost devotion, until she set the castle on fire and died from the shock resulting. Just at the end, she became quite sane, and gave him the papers proving his legitimacy. She had frittered or given away to her priests all the fortune remaining after a stormy career, and the poor lad was obliged to remove to Far Niente, originally only a place of resort for the family in hottest weather. Here he lives all the year round, with two old house servants and the two peasant lads you saw rowing him. And yet, if he would part with the Stelvio Biberon--""I have heard of that," said Margot, interrupting her. She did not desire to hark back to the reputed

offers made for his treasure by the museums and Congressman McPhail."Of course, everybody thinks he had better have sold it long ago, but the thing seems to be a sort of household god with the Stelvios. The young Count saved it himself from the burning of the castle, after he'd saved his mother. The faience, a lot of old books that are considered enormously desirable by connoisseurs, some tapestries and the Biberon, were all removed to Far Niente, where they are now surrounded by mouldering old pictures and furniture, far gone in dry rot. No one sees them, for you know, one might as well attempt to pass Cerberus as that old man who keeps the gate on the water front, at Far Niente. No visitors are allowed there as at other show places on the lake, in the master's absence. The villa is alleged by the boatmen to be brimful of ghosts and traditions, and, certainly, the history of Stelvio's immediate predecessors is sufficiently gruesome to create an atmosphere of gloom."Pausing for breath, Mrs. Clandeboye resumed: "The Count, this young man's father, was a brilliant and much travelled personage, known in all the courts and societies of Europe. By ill luck, he fell deeply in

love with a beautiful woman of high rank whose husband was his intimate friend. It is said that Count Stelvio, when setting out to leave her, was followed by the lady, challenged by the husband whom he wounded in a duel, and ultimately retired with her to the castle near Ferrara. That a marriage between them took place after the husband's death was generally believed, but never declared by the couple, who lived for each other, forgotten by the world. It was their custom during the great heat of midsummer to go to his villa Far Niente, where the sun only strikes for an hour or two daily, so heavy the overhanging woods and cliffs. When the boy was about five years old, he saw his father drown while swimming with his mother in the lake below the balcony upon which open the windows of their drawing-room. After that, she never recovered her sanity until just before her death.""All this happened long ago?" asked the girl, drawing a long breath."Yes, for he must be five and twenty now. The poor young fellow's life has been spent between battling for his right to his name, and taking care of the demented mother. Since he has been established beyond question as his father's lawful heir, people have done

their best to get hold of him as a society lion, but in vain. He will have nothing to do with sensation hunters, lives his frugal life between Rome and Far Niente, and has no intimate friends. The country people hereabout idolize him as the last of his ancient line. His journey to America, undertaken at the instance of a friend of his family in the Italian embassy at Washington, is said to have stirred him to much more human interest, and he has been brighter ever since. But, at best, it's a doleful situation, isn't it? If the young man were not so divinely good-looking, it wouldn't seem so hard. He is the image of his beautiful mother, these boatmen will all tell you. She, it seems, is a fountain of eternal romance to their imaginative and sympathizing natures. They have a story that she is sometimes still seen swimming by moonlight, like a Loreley, her white arms thrown despairingly above her head. And it is told that now and again they espy a light burning in the shrine over her prie-Dieu at Far Niente, long after the other lights along the shore have been put out."The sun had forsaken the world below, and a delicious coolness fell around them. It was the Feast of the Assumption, and the bells of many little hamlets

along the shore on either side the lake began calling to evensong. Upon the white ribbon of the high road near by, passed a procession of villagers carrying a crucifix and singing. Obeying a sign from their employer, the boatmen rested oars beneath a wall dripping with purple wistaria, till it had passed. Above against a background of black-green cypresses, sprang two Japanese trees having stems and boughs of a vivid red-like coral. Everywhere in the grounds of the villa beneath whose walls they had taken refuge, blossomed roses, standard and clinging. Far away, up on the dusky mountain crest above, lights like stars were beginning to twinkle in humble little homes.Margot could not resist a glance in the direction where she knew Stelvio's house to be. No sight or sound of his boat was upon the waters. It was as if it had already passed into the shadows that never lift.CHAPTER III."OF course I have asked Stelvio," said Countess Fleury, who was pouring tea for a few friends in a bran new classic temple perched half way up the hillside dominating her beautiful Seventeenth Century villa just charmingly renovated with all requirements of Twentieth Century taste and luxury. "In the first place, because we are neighbours and have no end of common interests; and secondly, because I wanted to present him to my pretty countrywoman here, who has a rage for 'types,' and will accept nothing modern or commonplace in these surroundings.""Except a second cup of your delicious tea," answered Miss Methuen, hoping that her studied calm was not belied by the sudden rush of pleasurable expectation conveyed by Countess Fleury's words."The question is, will he come?" enquired Mrs. Clandeboye with effusion."For Stelvio, no woman can answer," said their hostess. "I only know that he often drops in upon me in the most delightfully informal fashion; but it is fair to say it's always when there's hardly anybody here. Knowing his objection to strangers, I went so far as to write him exactly how few of us would be drinking tea, to-day, and specifying names.""With evident success, Countess," said Mr. Lee, a pleasant Englishman, on his way home from his usual winter spent in Rome. He pointed down to the flowery plateau before the house where a servant was seen preceding Stelvio into a path leading up to where they were assembled. "Now which of us present must lay to himself--or herself--the flattering unction of having been the magnet to attract the recluse of Far Niente into mixed human companionship?""It is Countess Fleury who has but to command and all men bow," said one of that lady's courtiers."Indeed I think so," answered Mr. Lee. "I know that when Stelvio was in Rome this season, no one laid eyes upon him excepting his spiritual Fathers. The truth is," he added, dropping his voice to Miss Methuen's hearing only, "the poor chap was abominably handicapped in that expensive city by his paucity of

cash. The time has gone by when a wit proposed to make of Rome a hospital for decayed purses and discontented and disappointed agreeable people. What a confounded shame that matters aren't better equalized in this world! It would take so little--so very little according to the standard of yours and Countess Fleury's great money-spending country--to make that nice lad a normal and comfortable member of society.""Now I have hardly ever heard an Englishman speak about Americans," said Miss Methuen, "that he didn't manage to introduce some trenchant cut at our extravagance. Please understand that we're not all sowers of gold in foreign fields. Some of us are even obliged to consult ways and means, and can sympathize with the financial straits so frequently under discussion among you people over here.""You will hardly expect us to credit this of a lady in the train of Mrs. Methuen?" said Mr. Lee, mock heroically.In reality, he was not sorry the subject had taken this turn. The certainty of Miss Methuen's rare beauty and grace, had provoked more than a little speculation among the strangers surrounding them as to the un-

known quantity of her worldly wealth, which the sayings of both aunt and niece had left as yet unassured."It is so wretchedly commonplace--in or out of a modern novel--to be an American heiress," Margot answered, laughing. "Barring a few patent inconveniences, I am rather glad to be known as a person who can just afford her pins. In the blaze of my aunt's magnificence, I suppose I am sometimes liable to be misconstrued. But when I go home, again, to settle down to my natural inheritance as the youngest daughter of a large impecunious family, there will be only the memory of such illusions to inflate me."Mr. Lee did not know whether he was expected to laugh or to look sympathetic, and had succeeded in adjusting his features to a happy combination of the two, when the attention of everybody present was forcibly claimed by the arrival of Count Stelvio, who mounting the circular steps of the temple, made his way with perfect ease to the side of its high priestess whose hand he kissed beside her altar fire.Some wilful sprite inside of her, made Margot Methuen elect at this juncture to ask Mr. Lee if he would not take her to explore some interesting ruins reported to be in existence farther up the hill. The al-

ready belated tea-party was breaking up, some people from Bellagio and Cadenabbia had taken leave, and her departure from the group was thus effected without conveying an intention on her part. As she passed Countess Fleury in the cruel act of putting hot water into an exhausted and refrigerated tea-pot, that lady looked up, remonstrantly."Wait one moment, Miss Methuen. I want to make known to you my good neighbour, Count di Stelvio, who is only waiting to have this cup of tea, before he offers to show you and Mr. Lee all the mysteries of my landscape gardening, of which I am not a little proud. Or stay--since I heard Mr. Lee, not a half hour since, wondering if his strained ankle would allow him to mount as high as where we are now, perhaps I had better forbid him the indulgence altogether, and let Stelvio, alone, serve as your cicerone.""The Contessa knows that she has not yet made me a real tea drinker--" said Stelvio, eagerly, putting his cup down untouched."Very well, then. Go, without your tea, and with Miss Methuen, since I would not for the world have her miss the light on the upper hills at this moment," said his hostess."And I?" queried Mr. Lee, in an injured tone."You are to be consoled by a tête-à-tête with me," answered the Countess, rising and abandoning her dismantled shrine to some footmen waiting at a little distance off. "We will sit in the pergola yonder, and talk of books, since you always give me the latest news of the ones that will sufficiently entertain and not thoroughly demoralize me; and let other, whole people, climb whither they will. For I will own to you that I was guilty yesterday of the foolish act of walking through my rose-garden in too tight a pair of shoes, and am to-day in penance for my vanity.""If you had not mentioned that you wear a shoe one could never have seen it," said Mr. Lee, gallantly. Countess Fleury was telling him that both he and she were too old for such nonsense, when Margot Methuen, without time to explain her previous acquaintance with the guest last to arrive, found herself hurried away with Stelvio through an alley of blended rose-blooms into a steep path leading up the mountain side.How passing strange she felt it--this whirl of Fate's wheel that had thrown them again into each other's company! For since the week before, when she had first beheld Stelvio in the Villa d'Este gardens, the

personality of this young man, so alien to her thoughts and habit of life of every day, had continually possessed and absorbed her imagination.Whatever Stelvio lacked, it was not straightforward simplicity. He reverted at once to their previous meetings, begging that the padrona of the little shop should not be trusted as the historian of his virtues. Margot blushed. She saw that he had heard from the good groceress of their conversation concerning him. Just how much he had been told of it, she relied upon her own powers of intuition to presently find out."You know, then, that the Signora could not withhold her pride in communicating to a mere republican Americano, the fact that her shop was patronized by native nobility?""Poor soul! It is well for her that there are a few of the other kind to keep her out of bankruptcy," he said, laughing. "I understood, naturally, that it was only Miss Methuen's kind interest in our neighbourhood and its landmarks and relics, that led her to have patience with the padrona's talk of me."Margot felt relieved. She was able to drop into an impersonal chat about the subject thus suggested, and, insensibly, the two drifted into as friendly and out-

spoken an exchange of ideas as if America, not Italy, were the scene of their first acquaintanceship. She found Stelvio even younger than herself in matters of mere worldly knowledge. He had lived apart in a realm of shadows self-devoted to an heroic task, his companions priests and books, during the years when most men she had known were recklessly sowing what their after years would reap. Probably no young woman before herself had ever entered with him upon a common territory of feeling and opinion. To her surprise and pleasure, she soon found that she had been remembered by him since the afternoon at Chevy Chase Club, even to the recording of insignificant items of their encounter. As they walked on, her singular tremor in his vicinity subsided, and she was able to feel once more natural and at ease. By the time they had attained the altitude indicated by Stelvio as needful to secure the full effect of the wonderful view, she felt they might have been friends of years.Under a sky in itself a vision of rose and gold, they paused to look down upon a wide expanse of wood-crowned heights and gleaming water. The sunset light that fell over them was a bath of glory. Far below, upon the level of the lake, all was in purple shadow.

Along the shores the stately villas encompassed by their gardens of delight, humble hamlet and farm-house set in orchard or vineyard, were fast blending in a common veil of evening silence and mystery. They two alone, seemed to stand upon the brilliant summit of the world.Stelvio, pointing out here a campanile, there a cluster of red-tiled roofs and chimneys, told her with a poet's tenderness some story or legend that clung around it. The only house of which he spoke no word, was his own Far Niente, lying crouched on the water's edge over beside that eerie black cleft in the hills down which the unseen cataract fell plunging, its reddish pink walls faintly gleaming in the dusk. She did not dare speak to him of it, to utter the usual banalities of a gushing girl to the owner of a celebrated and picturesque mansion. Possibly Stelvio appreciated this fact, and was grateful for her reserve. Certainly his talk played around his desolate old homestead without ever touching there; and Margot's eyes continued to rest upon it furtively, her thoughts to weave around it a hundred tender and sentimental fancies for which her common sense told her there was no possible excuse."The lake is a fairy-tale," she said, finally. "I seek for words to express its perfection of prettiness,

and fall back upon this phrase--a completed fairy tale.""Ah! but vice isn't always punished, nor virtue rewarded with us," he answered. "Nor do we always end with marriage and a honeymoon jaunt through space, in a chariot to which white doves are harnessed by blue ribbons. And I'm painfully certain the majority of us do not 'live happy ever after,'" he ended with a half sigh."Oh! but nobody looks for that," she exclaimed somewhat sharply. In return he glanced at her in surprise.She stood upon a projecting crag, the bronze hair that drifted back above her clear young forehead catching and holding the sunshine like a nimbus. The face beneath it, while dowered by nature with the glamour of beauty in earliest maidenhood, wore the expression of one who had been and was still face to face with the momentous issues of a woman's destiny. It was evident that the child of a year ago, whom he had remembered as an ideal of the Age of Innocence, had, through some trenchant ordeal, become transformed into a woman thrilling with remonstrance against the invasion of her dearest rights."Perhaps not," he said, lightly. "But in our country, we are accustomed to take things more tranquilly than in yours. Married people live together in what you might call humdrum fashion, and whether or not they are congenial at the start, gradually get resigned to the yoke that binds them.""As if one could ever 'get resigned!'" she cried, with a gesture of repulsion. "But there, that is enough of a tiresome subject. If it isn't rude, will you let me ask how you come to speak English as well--oh! really better than I do?"Stelvio laughed."Simply because my tutor during many years of boyhood, was a highly educated English monk who had taken up his abode in Italy, and preferred it to any spot on earth.""That accounts for your beautiful pure enunciation of his tongue. How it makes one lament the slipshod speech of so many young men in our own country! I remember when I met you at Chevy Chase, I had just been talking to an American University graduate, a young millionaire who answered 'Yer,' for yes, and 'guessed' at every other word. When I made a remark that he agreed with, he said 'That's right;' or

'Sure!' The contrast with your--a foreigner's English--struck me tremendously at the time.""Perhaps if I had had his millions--and his bringing up, I might have erred likewise," said Stelvio, smiling. "Still, I am flattered that you were even so far impressed by me. When I bounded down upon you the other day in Villa d'Este gardens, I was so surprised as to be rude, I fear.""Not rude, but I thought you might have stopped to speak a word of greeting.""Miss Methuen must remember that, with us, a man does not approach a young lady of his world when she is without a chaperon. The honest truth is that I almost believed you to be a vision. I was startled, may I say confused--because--""Well, we are on American territory at Countess Fleury's; please go on. Why was I such a bogy to frighten you away?""Because I had but a moment before been thinking of your face, and wishing again to see it."Margot blushed vividly. She could not believe her ears. But there were Stelvio's honest eyes looking full into hers. She found no room to doubt him."You were thinking of me! How very extraordinary!""And when you lifted that curtain and stepped inside the grocer's shop--still alone, so that I had no excuse to recall myself to you, there was nothing for me but flight. After that, how tantalizing that I should see you in a boat so near mine on the lake! We might have easily exchanged speech, save that I did not know the lady who accompanied you. And when the Contessa's little note came telling me you were to be of her party at tea in the Temple of Friendship to-day, can you imagine a more cruel blow than that my lawyer from Milan should have selected this afternoon to arrive for an 'important discussion' of business affairs? Until we had thoroughly threshed out the subject he came upon, I could by no means get rid of him. I was as eager as a schoolboy, and, I am afraid, treated the old fellow to more than a glimpse of my impatience. Especially as I failed to be convinced by his eloquence or to make up my mind to sell myself for thirty pieces of silver. But we won't talk about that. It is sufficient that I have met you again, that here, there is no unpleasantly self-assertive Congressman to come be-

tween us and whisk you off to have strawberries and cream--"She uttered a little cry of pleasure like a child's. "You even remember that?""How should I forget it? If I told you that the circumstance had coloured my estimate of a certain proposal submitted to me by my excellent friend from Milan this very day--?"A light broke upon Margot. She felt certain that it was McPhail's desire at all costs to possess the Stelvio Biberon that had inspired the visit in question. A great disgust came over her. She wanted to protect Stelvio against she knew not what."If you noticed so much at Chevy Chase, perhaps you will also recall that I was angry, ill-mannered, that the interruption you speak of was an annoyance," she stammered."Of course it was," responded Stelvio, cheerfully. "The man was not fit to carry you away. No more than he seems to me fit to own something of mine he is doing his best to bargain for. But let us not speak of him again. This is the hour for noble inspiring thoughts, and who knows how soon again I may have the privilege of your companionship unbroken--""You two are not to think you have pre-empted this point of view!" broke in Mrs. Clandeboye, who, accompanied by a nondescript young man, at this moment appeared on the path below them. "Count Stelvio will pardon me, I hope, but I have come to tell Miss Methuen that it is high time for us to be going back to our hotel. Our launch is waiting, and no doubt Mrs. Methuen is wondering why we are delayed. But really it's been too beautiful to leave."Stelvio bowed, acquiescing, but as they all four went down the hill, the Englishwoman leading with the Count, Margot could not but observe that it was as if a mask of dull indifference had descended upon his face, in response to Mrs. Clandeboye's vivacious talk. His eyes were no longer brilliant, luminous. His whole bearing was that of a man who is living down a melancholy past."I have had another cable," said Mrs. Methuen brightly, as her niece, carrying a bouquet of Countess Fleury's renowned roses, came into the salon an hour later.Margot felt the glow fade from her face, the joy from her heart. She had steamed down the lake in a tremor of delicious feeling, ever and again lifting the roses to

her hot cheeks in a vain attempt to cool them. She saw that her aunt was cool, keen, determined as Mrs. Wilfred Methuen knew how to be, when she had set her mind upon winning an object. For the life of her she could not speak."It is from Gibraltar. Our good friend, Mr. McPhail, is actually upon his way to Genoa, and will arrive here in a week's time. You see how generously he overlooks your previous treatment of him.""He is generous to himself--" began the girl stormily."Do not interrupt me, if you please. Until I was certain that our friend was on the way, I did not care to speak to you of certain matters contained in his last letter to me.""Nothing that you or he could say, Aunt Katrina, could make the smallest change in my dislike for him," protested she. "If he comes here, I will shut myself in my room till he has gone.""Margot!"There was real anger in Mrs. Wilfred Methuen's ordinarily languid and indifferent eyes. She was dressing for dinner when the girl returned, and had sent curious Lydia out of the room. A long chain of ame-

thysts that she was in the act of throwing around her neck, slipped from her fingers and fell in a little glistening purple heap upon the carpet. In stooping to pick it up, Margot had time to stay the angry retort that sprung upon her lips."Let me put it on, Aunt Katrina. It goes so perfectly with that mauve chiffon. You will be, as always, the smartest, youngest-looking matron at table d'hôte. Now, don't be vexed with me. If I have heard right, yours was a love match with Uncle Wilfred. You must understand that no girl can force herself to overcome a positive repulsion for a man--Oh! it is horrible that he should be coming here to spoil my idyl, my perfect dream of summer happiness.""I think, my dear, that a girl in your position has no right to turn her back upon the one visible opportunity to lift herself and her family out of the truly miserable position in which my brother-in-law's ill-judged love of speculation has plunged them--""Don't say that--never say that," exclaimed Margot, softening as she always did at mention of her father. "We none of us hold him responsible. After all, it was his own patrimony to do as he pleased with. We receive all we have through his daily toil. Oh! if you

knew how sometimes I hate myself for living in luxury and enjoying life as I do with you, while he--""He enjoys it through you, my child," said her aunt, more gently than before."I believe he does," said Margot, wiping away a few honest tears. "My mother says he has a map of Europe that he studies every evening, besides reading every book he can get from the Book-Club that bears upon the places we've been to. After all, I don't think he'd care to do what we've done. If he has any dream of earthly joy, it's of going back some day to live at Harmony Hall. That, indeed--but poor dear, it can never, never be. Oh! I'd give worlds if he might do so.""You need not give worlds, Margot," said Mrs. Methuen. "But there, I won't talk to you about it tonight.""Aunt Katrina, you know something--your face looks so mysterious. Don't keep me in suspense. But it can't be. Nothing short of a happy miracle could bring about his getting back Harmony Hall."As she spoke the girl's face was illuminated. The lines that distress for the daily wherewithal of living had marked so deeply on that dear absent countenance,

seemed to her imagination to be erased, the stoop gone from his office-bowed shoulders, in the fond dream she had evoked. It must be that some of the old investments had come out well, or perhaps Aunt Katrina herself had been the good fairy to buy back Harmony Hall, and let her father have the use of it for life. But even as she searched Mrs. Methuen's eyes for confirmation of her hopes, Katrina saw them droop before her ardent young gaze. A cloud came between Margot and her sun."Aunt Katrina! It has nothing to do with--with Mr. McPhail?" she faltered in accents of bitter disappointment."My dear child, we'll be late for dinner if you do not dress at once.""I shall go in as I am. Surely my best embroidered muslin--""Then you must call Lydia to me. I need her at once. No, I positively won't say another word on the subject, to-night. To-morrow, we may take it up again."The air that came in over the sun-baked mosaic of the terrace outside their window, was passing hot, yet Margot shivered."Surely you haven't let yourself take cold," remonstrated her aunt. "Now, my dear, put on a more cheerful countenance, and let us talk of something pleasant. Miss Elgin, who came back from Countess Fleury's an hour ago, says you had Count Stelvio for a sensation. Is he really so wonderfully handsome as they say? And did you find him interesting? People with dramatic stories behind them so rarely come up to expectation. He is not a Twentieth Century Robinson Crusoe returned to civilization? Now, I'm ready, without Lydia after all. Let us go down. That hat with the blue hortensias is wonderfully becoming to you, child. I almost think you are looking your best this evening. But do tell me about Count Stelvio.""Count Stelvio is quite as good-looking, quite as interesting as described. But you forget. I told you that I had met him last May in Washington. He has asked, if he may pay his compliments to you, Aunt Katrina, and I said I felt sure you would be glad to receive his call.""I shall be pleased to meet him, certainly," answered her aunt, who was nodding to acquaintances as they passed along the long corridor to the salle-à-manger, and did not notice the sudden new kindling of her

charge's spirits. "I wish it would enter Stelvio's head to invite us to visit him in return. Mr. Lee tells me there are some treasures of art to be seen at Far Niente, but that nobody ever gets in there.""I can hardly think that invitation would 'enter into Count Stelvio's head,'" said Margot, dreamily. Her dashed hopes about her father were already mingling with happier thoughts, as she unfolded her napkin and broke off a bit of roll. Mrs. Methuen, taking quiet note of this lightning change of mood, wondered if Margot's experience in the great outer world were not really beginning to teach her common sense, at last?CHAPTER IV.THE wonderful summer days trooped on joyously like a procession of Botticelli's nymphs. Margot would not admit to herself what magic was at work in keying her spirits to a pitch they had never before reached during her travels with her aunt. Nothing more was said about McPhail's visit, and--if occasionally, a shade of anxiety came over her because Aunt Katrina had ominously ceased all allusion to the detested American wooer--in such beautiful weather, in such a world of bloom and sunshine it was not possible to dwell upon disagreeable things, so long as she did not see or hear them! Nor had further reference been made to the prospect held for a moment before her dazzled eyes, of lifting the life burden from her father's shoulders. She almost thought it had been a dream that Aunt Katrina had ever promised to tell her how this blessed task could be accomplished; if not a dream of her own, at least a delusion of Aunt Katrina's, who when she

was set upon having her own way, often cleverly persuaded herself that facts may be disestablished!Count Stelvio, having been duly presented as a caller in Mrs. Methuen's salon, came frankly and frequently. Aunt Katrina, artistic to her finger tips, seemed fascinated by his youthful beauty, his engaging manners, his fitness to his frame.During the midday hours, when a golden haze of beat lay upon all things living, substituting torpor for exertion, the ladies kept behind double blinds, in the cool darkness of flower-laden rooms. In the late afternoon, they made many excursions, chiefly by water, since to drive with horses at Lake Como means joggling along a hard, burning high road in a velvet-lined landau, conducted by a theatrical personage in a coat of many colours and many buttons, who at every opportunity, blows an ear-piercing blast upon a curly brass horn; and their heavy touring-car seemed to lack proportion with the miniature beauties of this landscape.At night, again, they would go out in the launch Mrs. Methuen had now hired for her own personal use; cutting the silver waters of the lake, gazing up at the dark shoulders of the mountains reared against their starry background--watching the foam bells clash together in

their wake--or listening, in silence too full for words, to the music floating out to them across the rose-gardens of some lighted villa.In a short time, the appearance of young Stelvio at the gatherings of residents on the lake who exchanged civilities chiefly of an aquatic sort, had ceased to be commented upon as a novelty. Margot, through Countess Fleury, had come to be known by the desirable entertainers, and now found herself daily meeting him. As it had begun to be understood among neighbourhood gossips that Miss Methuen had no fortune, and was entirely dependent upon the good graces of a fairly youthful and well-preserved relative-in-law, much quiet sympathy was expressed for the young man's unfortunate debut in the tender passion attributed to him: Countess Fleury who perhaps more than anyone else regretted the circumstance of his infatuation for the fair Washingtonian, declared that she washed her hands of the whole affair; having brought the two together to gratify her own aesthetic sense of a perfect harmony in contrasted colouring, without imagining that Stelvio was fool enough to play with his only chance of rehabilitating his shattered fortunes, when she had distinctly told him of a Chicago heiress coming to visit her during the

autumn season. What more the countess might have said, was temporarily put out of her head by the arrival of a young artist from Paris, summoned by telegraph to redecorate the long gallery of her château, who proving to be unusually good-looking and well-mannered, was adopted by the charming lady as a favourite of the hour, Stelvio for the moment dropping out of place.Mrs. Clandeboye and Mr. Lee, still lingering on at Villa d'Este, were often included in the hospitalities of Mrs. Methuen's launch parties, and sometimes exchanged comments on the progress of affairs."I can't understand it in the least;" the Englishwoman said. "They must both know, and the aunt certainly knows, that the thing is out of the question.""My own opinion is there is somebody in their own country," answered Mr. Lee, sapiently. "Somebody fatiguingly rich and uninteresting like so many of their men. La Belle Demoiselle will go back home to marry him, and in the meantime the aunt will not interfere with this idyl which keeps her charge harmlessly amused.""What a horribly cold-blooded way to look at it," cried Mrs. Clandeboye, who herself matrimonially disillusioned and accustomed to travel on the Continent

while her liege lord hugged his ancestral acres in Hertfordshire, could not easily be shocked. "But you are so clever, Mr. Lee, I wonder if you are not right. If the girl has to marry money, which the aunt seems to expect--""In these days, the wheels positively won't go round without a great lot of it, will they?" asked Mr. Lee."Oh! never," said the lady, fervently. "As I was saying, if Margot is bound to be bored to extinction for the rest of her existence, it seems cruel to cut her off from this good little time at Como. And I'll own I've been selfishly hoping to profit by the affair, to the extent of an invitation to visit Far Niente. I went so far yesterday as to tell Stelvio, in her presence, that she and I were both dying to see the gardens, the Biberon, and the books.""You did?" exclaimed the gentleman with sparkling eyes. "And with what success?""Stelvio, who has always the air of an Edgar of Ravenswood, turned red, then pale, looked at Margot, then at me, then at her again. She, too, blushed, but I am glad to say, stood by me very prettily. She said that Far Niente always seemed to her the one sealed page in the perfect poem of the Lake. "It is a very

ragged page, Miss Methuen. Blurred and shabby and blotted with sad hieroglyphs, but always open to you and your friends, if you deign to look at it," said Edgardo, as if he were laying it at her feet. And then, just as we had got to the crucial point as it were, what do you suppose that provoking girl did? Drew off coldly, declaring that nothing was farther from her thoughts than invading his privacy, and he said no more. And so, I am as remote as ever from seeing the inside of the mysterious mansion.""I could wish for a glimpse of certain early editions I know to be in his hands," said Mr. Lee, pensively. "But if one meets a man, day after day, as we do, and he never says a word leading up to an invitation, what is one to do?""I honestly believe Stelvio is afraid to show Miss Methuen the extent of his poverty, poor man!" exclaimed Mrs. Clandeboye. "Fancy inviting such a girl to go to housekeeping among broken-nosed statues in a mouldy grotto underneath a waterfall!""It is a bad place for those bindings," pursued Mr. Lee, who thought very little of girls and their requirements when there was question of precious books.Countess Fleury, in the first interval of tiring of her

young artist, asked them all to dinner at the château. Mr. Lee and Mrs. Clandeboye were sitting on the terrace having their coffee and cigarettes, while from the drawing-room floated out the strains of Schumann's Traumerei agreeably played upon the cello by the Frenchman to the accompaniment on the piano of their versatile hostess. During this interlude Margot Methuen and later, Stelvio, left the group around the performers and went over to a window opening upon the garden to look out into dewy vistas where countless roses slumbered beneath the stars, and near by, a nightingale sang in a thicket of rhododendron."One could count the oranges in that tree," exclaimed Margot, under her breath. "They look, in this light from inside, as if carved in amber against the jade green of the foliage. How intensely beautiful the night is! How restful, how uplifting!""I am thinking, perhaps, less of the night upon the lake, to which I am well accustomed in all its phases," answered Stelvio, "than of the rare luck of being here with you in a half American house, where we may stand apart in a window and talk, without committing a crime against the convenances. For I have something--a great favour to ask of you, Miss Methuen.""What can it be!" exclaimed Margot, quivering a little in spite of herself. "Perhaps, before you ask it, Count Stelvio, you had better give me a hint in what direction the favour lies.""That direction," said the young man, pointing across to the shore opposite, where in the centre of a glimmering mass of pale-tinted walls, beneath clustered foliage, a single light burned in the casement of an upper window, sending down a pencil of radiance into the dark expanse of water underneath."You said, yesterday, words that have been haunting me and delighting me ever since--beautiful words, tender words--that Far Niente had seemed to you the one sealed page in the perfect poem of the Lake. How could I suppose you would care to turn that page--to set foot in my poor barrack of a home? Now, I want to ask if your aunt and you--and perhaps Mrs. Clandeboye and Mr. Lee--will not do me the honour of taking breakfast with me, there?"Margot's breath came more easily. She had feared something far more difficult to answer."For the others, I can say I know they will consider it a high compliment to be asked," she exclaimed, warmly. "And for myself, the only drawback to my

pleasure in accepting is the thought that I've perhaps driven you to inviting us.""When you come, you will understand why I hesitated. It is all hopelessly gone to seed and shabby. But since you have told me of your own old family home on the Potomac, and of how you love it, even in decay--""So well, that I would risk almost any rash deed to have it again in my father's possession. I don't care the least whether it is shabby and run-down. I consider you blest in owning your home, and not having to think of it as in the hands of vulgar interlopers.""That is really what has given me courage to lay bare the deficiencies of Far Niente before your gaze and Mrs. Methuen's and I'll not deny I have another motive, also.""Another motive?" she repeated, uncomfortably, feeling the soft glow of his eyes upon her. It was not often the two let such emotions come to the surface of their intercourse."Ah! well, that will keep--must keep," he said, "until a later day. Just now, let us discuss dates. Will Thursday suit you to break bread with me? No, Thursday, I must go to Milan to meet an American on

business. Why not to-morrow, if you have nothing better to do?""Ask Mrs. Clandeboye and Mr. Lee, and I will bind myself to bring my aunt," she said, gaily. "Don't fear our not all rising to the chance, like greedy fish to a tempting fly.""Stelvio, Stelvio! Where are you?" called Countess Fleury. "Now you must positively come and sing for us."Stelvio, generally averse to displaying this rare accomplishment of his, for a wonder consented, and came forth from his window shelter like a lamb. Everybody looked, as they felt, delighted. It was not only that he possessed a strong and vigorous tenor voice so well trained as to carry him far above the fast thinning ranks of competent amateurs, but that he was capable of throwing into it the intense human and emotional element that goes straight to the hearts of listening man and woman, transpiercing them with a tender rapture.The very fact that Stelvio had seated himself at the piano, sufficed to bring Countess Fleury's dinner guests trooping in like the children at the call of the Pied

Piper, from the nooks and corners outside whither they had scattered."Oh! yes, there is nothing like Stelvio's singing," said the Countess, when he had finished and people cooed their satisfaction at the treat. The young Frenchman, in the act of fetching her a glass of lemonade of which beverage the chatelaine consumed large quantities in and out of season, was received with an absentminded smile. His Traumerei was played and over. Stelvio's "Uno furtiva lagrima," was yet to be sung.And when the glorious voice, schooled to carry a heart-break in each note, arose on this thrilling air and smote the evening silence, no mortal listener could have resisted him. Men bent their heads in envious submission to his rulership over women's hearts. Women could hardly wait for him to end it, in their desire to avow themselves his subjects. Margot Methuen, believing that she was unobserved, had slipped outside the long window and stood alone on the terrace steeped in the starlight and delicious thoughts. Under the influence of the hour, the night, the sound of his melting voice, her heart had become as wax within her. She knew now that she loved him, that at a word from him she would

go away and share his poverty, his lonely life, his desolated home.The song ended. Stelvio abruptly arose from the piano, and strode through the group of people who surrounded him clamouring for "just one more." He saw Margot taking flight at his approach down an alley of roses grown over a trellis, and stopped short upon the threshold. She, realizing that flight meant confession, returned slowly to meet him. When they were together, he perceived that in her eyes were tears."I--I--have made you weep!" he exclaimed, incoherently--"When I would give the whole world to cause you happiness."For a brief moment, their young hearts came perilously close together in one of those sweet silences in which, as the Russian proverb says, "one may hear the trail of one's good angel's wing." Margot, woman-like, was the first to recover herself."You have already given me great happiness," she said, steadily and gently. "First, by your perfect singing, and next, that we are to visit your home to-morrow.""Stelvio!" called Countess Fleury, fluttering the rare laces made for her dainty self at Burano, out in

search of them. "I cannot consent--I really can't--to your tantalizing my guests like this. You must come back and give us that thing from Pagliacci. I know you. You are just in the mood to do your best to-night." But Stelvio was mutinous until Margot's eyes looked beseechingly into his."Yes, do, Count Stelvio!" she exclaimed. "I agree with Countess Fleury. You will do your best with it."And Stelvio sang. When he had finished, while people sat in charmed silence, he again abruptly left the room. There was literally nothing but for the evening to break up. A calling for wraps and boat-cloaks ensued, servants skurried down to the water-steps with lanterns, illuminated boats were brought into line until the water, all around the landing was punctured with long dazzling spirals of many colours, shrouded forms placed themselves one after the other into the jaunty crafts that successively glided out into the lake!As Margot followed Mrs. Clandeboye to their launch, a man's shadow was projected upon the space of light between two reflector lanterns placed on either side the landing stage. A warm strong hand came out of jasmine-scented darkness to grasp hers, and assist her down

the steps. For a moment, she let her fingers lie within his happily. All seemed well with the world and right with her, so long as the current of their two young lives pulsed together. Night--here charged with colour, sweet rippling sound, exquisite fragrance--had closed around them. All hateful images and jarring thoughts were banished. The tremor produced by his passionate voice still rang in her veins like quicksilver!Then resolutely, she loosed her hand from his, and sprang into the launch."À demain!" she cried, in a joyous voice."À demain!" he echoed, and the launch was off upon the dark and silent stream. Even Mrs. Clandeboye remained under the spell of their late experience. Without words, the two women lay back on their cushions and let themselves be carried swiftly through the gloom. As they were passing Villa Far Niente the voice of their boatman broke the magic spell."Look, Signorina!" he said in his queer hoarse whisper. "Yonder, in Count Stelvio's chamber, the lamp is still burning before his mother's crucifix. Some say it's because her soul is not at rest. Chi lo sa? I give you what we people talk about in our homes on winter evenings when the tourists are gone, and the pleasure boats lie up in dry-dock. Chi lo sa!"CHAPTER V.MARGOT found Aunt Katrina sitting up in bed to receive her. The headache that had kept Mrs. Methuen from dining with Countess Fleury had apparently vanished. In her pink peignoir, with a scarf of old Malines lace draped about her head, her eyes bright and alerts her face wreathed in smiles, the lady looked and felt thirty. Naturally, she was prepared to treat even a younger, prettier woman with consideration."Well, my dear, was it pleasant?" she began, cheerfully. "Lydia, you may go now, but first twist a bit of pink paper over that electric bulb, and put my glass of eau de fleur d'oranger beside me on the table de nuit. Sit there, in the fauteuil near the foot of the bed, Margot, where I can see you. That frock Cento turned you out in twenty-four hours in Rome, is a distinct success. I never saw you look nicer.""I can return the compliment, Aunt Katrina," said Margot, dropping into a chair by the open window,

rather than the one designated. "You don't mind if I stay here where the breeze from the water reaches me? I can't tell you how beautifully Count Stelvio has been singing. I longed for you to hear him. And now for a surprise. He has asked us--you, if you will be so good--Mrs. Clandeboye, Mr. Lee and myself--to breakfast with him to-morrow at twelve, at Far Niente!""No?" exclaimed Mrs. Methuen, sitting bolt upright in her pleased surprise. "How did it ever come about? I hope you accepted for me. I hear that in addition to the watches and finger rings, he has a lot of old lace the museums in Paris have been doing all they could to secure. One would do anything for early Venetian lace. Poor fellow! I only trust that to provide food for us, he may not be compelled to cook his falcon, like the young man in what's-his-name's poem.""There will at least be an omelette and some wood-strawberries," cried Margot, with nevertheless a pang at heart."Why doesn't he go upon the stage and make a fortune like Jean de Rescké?" pursued her aunt. "I am sure Conried would be enchanted to engage him for the Metropolitan Opera House, and all the women in

New York would go wild over his voice and looks. Fancy having a new tenor with an actual waist and a 'straight front'! It really keeps me uncomfortable, when Stelvio is about, thinking how poor he is--living from hand to mouth with no prospects, and too proud or too obstinate to sell his works of art. A voice like his is a gold mine in these days. But if he won't, he won't, I suppose, and the next best thing is for him to marry money. Countess Fleury tells me she knows he will have to come to that. She manages cleverly, there is that to be said for her. Just now she is quite satisfied to let Stelvio remain as he is, her own particular pet object of sympathy. She really wouldn't part with him for worlds, though she thinks she is going to marry him to that little fat Conners girl from Chicago we saw at the dance at our Ambassador's in Rome--(As long as she is broad, that girl, and perfectly insignificant! If she were strung with diamonds, I wouldn't have Miss Conners for a gift!) Now, you, on the other hand--""Yes, I!" said Margot, lazily. She was too happy to-night to mind anything, and Aunt Katrina when in the vein, was sufficiently amusing."You do not excite in Countess Fleury the smallest

apprehension. She is quite willing for you to play with Count Stelvio, as you have been doing--""Because?" asked the girl, in the same dreamy tone."Because she knows perfectly well that he knows it can be nothing else but play. He has in fact told her so.""Good heavens, is that possible?" cried Margot, stung out of her apathy, and springing to her feet."I don't mean in so many words, of course. Stelvio is a gentleman. He only let Annie Fleury understand that he fully realized the madness it would be for him to fall in love with you. But as you have frequently told me you are fancy free, and have no wish to marry any one, until you have seen the world a little more, it can luckily make no difference to you."Margot, in the darkness of her window retreat, hung her head guiltily. At that moment, turning aside to gaze into the garden, she saw passing under a cluster of electric lights erected upon the summit of an iron pillar on the walk nearest the water, the form of the subject of their discussion! She had not been mistaken, then, in thinking that Stelvio's boat had followed theirs to the hotel!Stelvio was alone, smoking as he strode down the path to be lost in the shadowy grove beyond. But there, a few seconds later, she beheld the glowing tip of a cigar turn in the direction of her window, then remain stationary. A bounding joy passed into her heart, her veins ran quicksilver with delight. And it was he whom Aunt Katrina thought "made no difference" to her!"Three ladies and a gentleman?" grumbled old Assunta, once Stelvio's nurse, now his housekeeper. "And where do you think the food is coming from, unless the good Lord rains it down from heaven which he has not yet seen fit to do for the Stelvio family.""I have been out this morning and caught these," her master answered, joyfully displaying a fine string of fish. "Fillet them, Assunta dear, as you can do it, and make a sauce tartare. Begin with an omelette 'aux fines herbes,' of course, or use mushrooms, that is better. Then--""Then?" echoed Assunta, transfixing him with a scornful eye."Then," boldly went on the Count. "What more

delicious than 'petits poussins'--little chickens that have never known the stress and strain of life?""My chickens!" shrieked Assunta. "My little treasures, my own dear children one might say. Oh! Signor Guido, I'd not have believed this, even of you!""Only six of them--" coaxed the Count "I will go without adult fowls for a month to come, if you consent.""To take them so young,--as one would say, unspotted by the world," wailed Assunta. "When, if they attain their full growth, they will go twice as far toward feeding you. Don't ask me, Signor Guido. I can't do it--I can't."There were tears in the red-rimmed topaz eyes set deep in her brown wrinkled face."Six 'poussins,' roasted," pursued the Count, resolutely. "A dish of gniocchi, the like of which these forestieri will never have tasted--the true Castel Stelvio gniocchi, Assunta, your father's, our late honored chef's, secret recipe.""That I can do, none better!" she said, straightening up."With the 'poussins,' a salad from our garden; and in its right place, a little dish of asparagus. For

a sweet whatever you like, and for dessert a dish of wood strawberries that I engaged little Pietro, the shepherd-lad, to pick for me, this morning.""It shall be as you will," murmured the old woman, conquered by his indomitable purpose and making haste to retire crab-like from the scene."And, Assunta, the best glass and china, you will understand, set upon the old cloth of Florentine lace and linen work. I will see to the flowers. Tell that limping old husband of yours he must brush up his livery. I'm afraid it is rather bad.""If Guiseppe could stand always in a corner with his face to the wall," responded the housekeeper, grimly jocose, "the livery might pass, since behind, it is less threadbare. Il Signor Conte remembers that of knives we have but four of which the porcelain handles do not come apart from the silver blades?""Give those to my guests, and put one of the broken ones by my plate.""And napkins--gran Dio, when I remember the contents of the Signora's, your gracious mother's, linen chests that were burned with Castel Stelvio--! There are almost no napkins through which you may not poke your fingers!""It matters not--let them be clean, that's all. These friends of mine are coming to take me as I am. Among them, Assunta, is a young lady--a very particular young lady!""Mother of God, is it that?" exclaimed the old woman electrically--"A great American lady, with gold running out of her pockets? One who will build up again Castel Stelvio--oh! Signor Guido, tell me this is so?"The brilliant joy of his eyes had penetrated her dulled understanding. She was dashed to earth from her flight of fancy by a veil that came over her young master's orbs, turning them to the tint and texture of marron velvet."Don't talk nonsense, Assunta!" he said, sharply. "Take these fish and get off to your kitchen. And mind, I look to you for the honor of Villa Far Niente.""Six of my baby chickens," mused the crone as she retired carrying her prize. "Madre di Dio, that is too much to ask. Five now, one apiece for each of the greedy strangers, one for Guido I might consent to. They would never notice while they were talking, that the platter went off quite empty. Five, even, is a great number. That lad Guido, is young and strong and

vigorous, he would be none the worse for going without. He could make it up on gniocchi, of which I will fill a large dish. If I can get Guiseppe to understand that he is to pass our young master quickly, as if the chicken had been offered and was refused! Four chickens--that is a sufficiency for the forestieri and four they shall have, not another blessed little creature shall be sacrificed. Now, I must send up the hill for the herd's wife to come down and help me. She will be well paid with a bunch of onions and young carrots from the garden. I must take time too to sew the braid upon the lapels of Guiseppe's livery coat. Lucky that yesterday I washed and starched his other shirt. Four--yes, four! Never, never, six!"Mrs. Methuen, Mrs. Clandeboye and Margot, sat in their boat at the foot of water-steps green with the ooze of ages, while Mr. Lee, with agility born of a bookman's fond anticipation, skipped up to tug at the handle of a jingling bell hanging beside the lovely scroll work of an iron grille set in the wall arising from the lake. Over the summit of the wall above their heads foamed roses. In the heart of the little grotto seen through the grille waved a mass of luxuriant

maidenhair. The hillside behind and around the desolate old weather-scaled mansion was clothed in glorious beech and chestnut trees. In the terraced garden to one side, sprang a marvel of flowers and leafage with clumps of rhododendrons and red camellia springing from amid their shed petals as from islands of rosy snow. In this witchery of early summer foliage and bloom, with the joyous thunder of the cataract sounding ever in the ear, the swift rush of its subterranean river racing to the lake beneath a stone archway in the foundations of the house, a chorus of bird songs from every flowery thicket, even Far Niente wore a happy and welcoming aspect."But oh! think of it in autumn, when the leaves are dropping, and it rains as it can rain on this dear lake!" exclaimed Mrs. Clandeboye, shivering. Mrs. Methuen's gesture of distaste confirmed her verdict. Margot, on the contrary, saw nothing, felt nothing but her own heart beats of passionate interest in the approach to Stelvio's home.A very ancient, cross and sunburnt visage looked down over the wall, then disappeared, and Guiseppe, in his faded and mended livery of grey and canary with the Stelvio arms upon its buttons, came clumping

down to open the grille. His bossy back, as he tottered ahead of them on the return up a flight of pebbled steps supported by cross pieces of stone and sprouting with green things undisturbed, expressed distinct disapproval of their intrusion. For Guiseppe held in the locked places of his proud old spirit, an invincible belief in the glory of the Stelvio race that for five centuries had ridden on the crest of the wave in Italian history. He considered that no outsiders, least of all English and Americans, had a right to see a Stelvio in decay. He had been tormented enough by tourists of their stripe coming there and trying to buy an entrance to his master's home. Nevertheless, since the young Count had willed this piteous exposition of their fallen fortunes, it was Guiseppe's part but to obey.Margot, last to ascend the steps, and lingering for a charmed glance into a grotto with dripping lilies and maidenhair gemmed with diamond drops from the fountain it enshrined, now found her hand clasped by Stelvio's, his eager eyes fixed on hers with honest rapture. The others, who had already been received by him had passed on, into the cortile."For one horrible moment, I thought you had not come," he whispered. "I was never so disappointed in

my life. Your being here is really all that gives me courage to go on with it. When I remember parties that I have been with to visit a bachelor's domain! The astonishment of the women that mere man can be so comfortable and luxurious, without one of them to look after him. The little flattering cries and gushing praises of its ornaments and conveniences! If you had done me the honour to visit me at Castel Stelvio, you'd have found it perched upon a precipice that fell away six hundred feet below, with arcades and loggia, campanile and outside stairways, sculptured lions and griffins, tapestried halls and all the rest of it! But poor Far Niente has no architectural features to recommend it, and is desperately shabby at the best.""Don't say another disparaging word!" exclaimed the girl, as they came up with the rest of the party. "And remember, that to-day I am determined to be happy and pleased with everything I see!"Stelvio flashed upon her a radiant look of gratitude. As they followed him through the bare mouldering rooms, with their faded frescoes and portraits of black-a-vised ancestors whose frames were ranged under high dim ceilings touched with half obliterated gilding, he seemed to her an image of immortal youth that time

nor chance can ever mar. In the chief salon their host paused hesitantly to let them glance in passing at the dusty mirrors and chandeliers of Venetian glass, the tattered satin of divans and fauteuils, the cracked and tuneless grand piano, the rigid rows of high-backed chairs, the tasteless ornaments."This is by rights, our room of state," he said, with easy grace, "but I am quite conscious that most ladies would gladly dispense with the ceremony of being received in it to hurry on to a more habitable spot.""Not till you've allowed me a glimpse at this quite too perfect "Bonheur du jour;" exclaimed Mrs. Clandeboye, who "knew" old furniture. She had paused beside a desk of rare French craftsmanship of the time of the Grand Monarque, calling Mrs. Methuen and Mr. Lee to admire it with her. Margot, meanwhile, had her attention riveted by a small exquisitely finished portrait in oils, of a young woman in Turkish costume seated at a tambour frame; painted from a corner, evidently, of the room in which they now were, since the window nearest them reappeared in the background of the picture, also an old Venetian marriage chest still standing there. Even the worn rug upon

which the girl stood was seen in the picture, from which she looked towards Stelvio, questioningly."It is amateur work, but extremely well done," he said. "The thing was in fact painted by my father of--of my mother, some years before my birth."A tinge of red had come into his face. Margot endeavoured to ignore it."The Countess Stelvio must have been a most beautiful woman," she said lightly. "What excited my curiosity was the costume.""A reproduction of a Bartolozzi print they both admired, I believe, dating from the days when Eastern garb was affected by Occidental beauties. You will see she had the perfect profile for the pose. He delighted in drawing and painting her in as many characters as Romney did Lady Hamilton. There was a small room full of these studies and sketches destroyed in the fire at Castel Stelvio. To the very last, she retained that classical outline of feature-- Now, if Mrs. Clandeboye has had enough of my old writing desk, shall we go across the court into the more inhabited part of the house?"Through an antechamber, between rows of carved walnut chairs draped in dingy holland, they, crossed

into a court paved and lined with cracked and seamy marbles, and decorated with nymphs and dryads shivering in moss-grown niches. From here over a balustrade in the rear, they looked down into the moist greenery fringing a mysterious spring ever bubbling and gushing, rising and falling, with the tides of the lake, and serving to feed the mimic river that flowed beneath the house.In the library beyond, a large panelled chamber with deeply-embrasured windows, were assembled around a faded Persian rug, a few comfortable bits of furniture. A couple of dogs lying upon a wolf skin before a couch, a small piano, books upon the shelves, a writing table littered with papers and current periodicals of Italy, France, England and America, with an odour of tobacco over all, lent the human touch so sadly lacking elsewhere in the big bare dwelling.Mrs. Methuen, whose enthusiasm for the purely picturesque was already on the wane in face of the spiritual depression she had passed through in a brief space of time, cheered visibly. She let Stelvio instal her in a fauteuil covered with new crimson leather, and looked around her with a sigh of relief."I permitted myself the luxury of that arm-

chair!!!" confided Stelvio, to Margot. "When I returned from America with the spoils of one of your national legislators in my pocket. It is probable that Mrs. Clandeboye disapproves of its modernity at Villa Far Niente, but when I sit for long hours reading here alone, I have reason to bless the absent shades of the purchaser of my Gubbio faience. By-the-way, he was the same oppressively prosperous-looking individual who took you away from me at Chevy Chase. Not content with that, he now pursues me with offers for my Biberon, and seems not to understand that I can maintain any objection to parting with it in the face of his liberal increase of terms with each demand. It is, in fact, he who has asked me to meet him at my lawyer's in Milan, to-morrow."Every vestige of blood left Margot's face. She looked at him in wild alarm."In Milan? to-morrow? Oh! then he is really coming here?" she faltered."Miss Methuen! Margot!" said Stelvio, hurriedly. "Do not turn toward the others. They are busy just now looking at those antique musical instruments on the piano. Come out with me on this bal-

cony and see the view I have kept for you for the last."Margot followed, her feet weighed as with lead. They passed out upon a narrow ledge of stone railed in with iron, to stand amid the mist and thunder of the great chute of crystal and silver that plunged through the gorge beside them. Here under the interlacing boughs of mighty beeches and chestnuts, they looked upon a long enchanting vista of blooming hills and mist-wreathed mountains arising from reaches of blue water flecked with sun save where it shaded to emerald beneath the foliage of the shores. From one end of the shelf that held them a narrow stairway of stone embedded in moss and maidenhair led up the mountain-side till it was lost in greenery. Everywhere was seen the moist shining of glorious verdure, and a chill as of winter was exhaled from the sunless cleft.In the extraordinary beauty and witchery of these surroundings, Margot could forget even McPhail and all his works. Nature laid hold of her, banishing fear and care. Stelvio breathed more free."There! You are yourself again. If we had only time before luncheon to explore together that little green ladder of steps, that when I was a child always

seemed to me to be leading to the stars! To-day my theology has changed.""In what detail?" she asked, laughing."Possibly that I am satisfied Heaven is here below," he said, in a low fervent tone."That's unfair, Count Stelvio! I never looked for mere pretty speeches from you. Don't destroy my illusions, now, when everything else seems perfect.""The Signor Count is served," came in a mournful croak at Stelvio's elbow. Within the window stood old Guiseppe, bearing ineffaceably written upon his countenance his sense of mortification that after having so recently appeared in the character of door-porter, he should be now compelled to assume that of maître d'hôtel and that, with no line of liveried footmen to stand behind him awaiting the passage of the guests.Stelvio smiled in boyish fashion. Margot smiled with him."Poor old boy, he is overweighted with our family importance," said the young man. "At this moment, he would give worlds to have you think a chef and his scullions were at work in the kitchen, instead of his own crusty spouse, Assunta, assisted by the herd's wife from up the hill. I am only hoping Assunta will keep

her temper long enough to execute her two special works of art, a mushroom omelette and her prize dish of gniocchi. If she should fail in either--!""If she does, you and I will talk so hard and fast nobody can hear himself think!" laughed Margot. For the moment, she was sharing all with him, a delightful and exhilarating experience.Mrs. Methuen had reached that stage of a dowager's experience when the question of food can either make or mar her agreeability, when Stelvio offered her his arm. The others following without ceremony, they went into a dark old dining-room, with panels and furniture of nobly carved walnut, a fine painted ceiling, some fruit pieces and a picture of snarling dogs upon the walls, with an array of rare porcelain upon its sideboard, to reveal which the light of day penetrated reluctantly through the mist of the cascade."I'll be hanged if I can see where he keeps it?" Mr. Lee had discontentedly whispered to Mrs. Clandeboye before they left the library."What? The breakfast?""No. The Biberon! If by any chance it should be locked away, and he does not offer to show it to us! No sign have I seen of anything approaching to it. I

am beginning to feel goose flesh all over me with fear of a disappointment!A moment later, as the guests seated themselves in the ponderous high-backed chairs grouped about a table draped with a filmy network of Venetian lace and linen bearing strange heraldic animals upon its transparent square, Mr. Lee could not repress an exclamation of delight. For there in the centre of the board, occupying a modest pedestal of crimson velvet around which roses lay loose upon the cloth, stood the wonder--the famous Stelvio Biberon!A quaint sea-monster carved in rock crystal was the precious drinking-cup, banded and mounted in enamelled gold and gems, his head forming the spout, two jewelled wings sweeping back from the protruding neck! On the golden handle surmounting his upper half was an admirably graceful little figure of Neptune, bestriding a dolphin brandishing his jewelled trident above a base of waves patterned upon gold. The perfect art of the thing, its rare craftsmanship, struck every eye with ravishment!"After this," said Mrs. Methuen, when their chorus of praises had died down, "one doesn't need mere mortal food. Nevertheless," (helping herself to a good

portion of the mushroom omelette) "one must appreciate art in all its branches. Count Stelvio, my compliments upon your chef."Margot found herself indulging in a highly proprietary sense of relief. It was perfect, so far, their little banquet, the food, the wine, the snowy damask of the worn napkins, the circle of antique opal Venetian glasses, around each lovely plate, the vermeil-handled knives, all a service for royalty! Then, what monarch could have set before them a choicer bit of decoration than the unrivalled Biberon? Her eyes flashed upon Stelvio's approval, pride, a sort of intoxicating joint satisfaction. He, lifted to a seventh heaven by her smile, glanced radiantly back. It would henceforth matter not in the least to him that everything else in his establishment was green moulded, given over to dry rot, disconsolate in appearance. So long as his sovereign lady had come to him in this joyous temper, deigning such gracious approval of his poor efforts to entertain her fittingly, minor considerations had no weight. He felt as if the sun, absent from Far Niente that day, had suddenly burst in at every window glorifying the sad old house. He forgot his accustomed part in life as the survivor of bitter tragedy, one who from earliest years had lain

down and risen with sorrow. His spirits rose, his gaiety became contagious, and everybody did their best to second him.In her second course of "frittura" Assunta, after the fashion of her country had assembled a variety of edible specimens of nature unknown to the outsider. Fish, artichokes, semolina, what-not, all cut into small pieces and fried to a golden mean of excellence--presented their flavours in turn to the palate of the eater; a dish worthy to precede the "Gniocchi" next to come, of which the recipe had been handed down to her by Assunta's father, the lamented chef once serving in the kitchen of a Stelvio Cardinal.After these dainties had been tasted, exclaimed over, eaten and summoned back again, finally vanishing to be received in ruins by their flattered creator, so pleased was Assunta with Guiseppe's report from the approving guests, that she almost relented in a scheme she had silently, resolutely concocted for the assertion of her sovereign will over her young master, and the protection of her cherished poultry yard. One hesitant, so-to-speak remorseful glance, she bestowed upon the dish then upon the serving table ready to be carried in. But it was too late to change. Nestling lovingly to-

gether upon their platter of old "faience;" browned and tender, appetising to an anchorite, lay four perfectly roasted adolescent chickens. Four only, no more. The other portions upon the dish were the members of a mature fowl skilfully disguised in a grove of parsley!"No, for certain, it will never be noticed by the foreign gentry. They will help themselves to one of my little ones, each in order, then when Signor Guido's turn comes, he will take what remains and no one will be the wiser," she had said to her scandalized husband, who man-like, could see no virtue in economy pushed to this extremity. In vain he had fumed. There was no time, no material for a change. Guiseppe could but trot forward presenting his platter with a crimson face at the left elbow of the lady upon his master's right. To the old servitor, cursing within him his wife's folly, it seemed that the seigneurs of five centuries of Stelvios were dishonoured and belittled by her action.All went well until the last visible "poussin" was offered to the English gentleman. Poor Mr. Lee, absorbed in a discussion with Count Stelvio concerning a book promised to be shown him after luncheon--nothing less indeed than a splendid specimen of a Marguerite de Valois binding, in olive morocco richly

tooled with marguerites and fleur-de-lys--did not at first observe the dish proffered by the scowling old servitor. When Stelvio, with a smile called his guest's attention to it, Mr. Lee turned abruptly, dropped off his eye-glasses, and fumbling blindly in the dish with spoon and fork, unearthed and helped himself to one of the fossil specimens bedded beneath the parsley.Stelvio, who had noticed no deficiency took the only remaining little chicken, and not until he had received a despairing jog on the arm from Guiseppe, became conscious of poor Mr. Lee's hopeless struggles with the tough portion upon his plate."But that bit is simply uneatable, Mr. Lee!" cried the host gaily. "Allow me," and he deftly transferred his share to his neighbour's plate. Margot, across the table saw the little comedy and laughed back at him. Mrs. Clandeboye, who sat on Stelvio's left, saw nothing. She was too busily engaged in cutting up her own delicious allotment of the feast.Guiseppe's old knees knocked together as he hastened to the side table after the salad bowl. He felt that a blight had come over his career. There was his young master, sawing away at the dreadful thigh of a gutta percha fowl, in the full face of the forestieri--without

apology, apparently without shame. Another circumstance weighed on the old man's mind. Stelvio had forgotten that the infirm knife of the four vermeil-handled ones remaining to them, had been put at his plate. There was brief delay in the crash of the impending crisis. Stelvio's blade promptly parted company with its handle, flying sidewise to break one of the few rare Venetian hock glasses (pale green with crystal spirals) deluging Mrs. Clandeboye's plate with wine and splinters, and finally landing in the lady's lap!It was all very well for it Signor Conte to spring up from his plate with a thousand protestations of regret, to kneel at the lady's side, and with his own napkin remove the traces of the mishap, thought old Guiseppe. If wishes could have pierced the heart, his master's would have suffered then. The offensive part of it to Guiseppe was the laughter of that heartless American meess, whom he could not in any sense approve of, since the boatman of Villa d'Este had informed him in a whispered colloquy at the grille, that the bellissima Signorina was no heiress like the rest of her compatriots, but only the companion of the rich widow his employer (Guiseppe had even looked twice
Margot amused herself by strewing the petals of the costly roses
upon the water in their wake. -- Page 185Illustration included in Harrison's The
Count and the Congressman.
at the widow reluctantly deciding that she was a little past the age!) When Stelvio followed up his enormity by shouting to Guiseppe to fetch him another knife, the old servant gazed at him reproachfully. Bring on one of the plebeian knives used every day he would not, were he shot for it! He stood stock-still, his salad bowl in hand, his wits deserting him."Oh! might I have one leaf more of that perfect salad?" cried Margot, unconscious of the old man's enmity to her. The tide was turned, the meal proceeded to its end. The guests could not have divined that to pay for the hot-house grapes and forced peaches served in a basket of silver-gilt, Stelvio would have to go without cigars for a fortnight!Mrs. Methuen, feeling at peace with the world, sat back in Stelvio's new crimson leather chair, sipping her coffee from a wee cup of gold, chiselled after a model of Benvenuto Cellini's, by one of that doughty goldsmith's pupils. Beside her, on a small table, stood a queer old coffer of tortoise-shell inlaid with silver. Opposite, Mrs. Clandeboye had drawn up a chair and was eyeing the coffer eagerly.Mr. Lee, who did not smoke, could hardly restrain

his patience after luncheon, until Stelvio taking pity on him, had conducted the ardent gentleman to a boule cabinet in a far corner of the room. Here, the Count, after unlocking the silk-lined glass doors, had exposed to the connoisseur's ravished view two or three shelves full of treasures before which the Englishman's heart did silent homage. From that moment until recalled to life by main force, Mr. Lee would be dead to his surroundings. The two ladies who remained sitting on either side of the tortoise-shell coffer were less actively but as thoroughly aroused to curiosity. Stelvio, returning to them, had taken out a silver circle strung with keys, and selecting the smallest one opened the little chest. Its contents revealed a number of exquisitely shaped shagreen cases, each in itself a work of art, and each containing an antique watch or finger ring of unique beauty and workmanship."Oh! Oh!" breathed Mrs. Clandeboye. "The Hôtel de Cluny collection has nothing so good. We may actually touch and handle these marvels?""Until you tire of it," said Stelvio, smiling at her awe-struck rapture.Margot, standing beside them, looked and enjoyed awhile, then yielding to Stelvio's compelling eyes and

voice, accompanied him out into the gardens. After all, thought she, was it not her last chance to be alone with him in unconstrained intercourse? Strive as she might against it, the dark cloud of McPhail's arrival was gathering upon her mental horizon. After to-day, during the brief time that remained before her aunt's projected removal to the Engadine, there would be nothing but strife and stress in avoiding her persistent suitor.To go out alone with Stelvio into these beautiful covetable gardens she had so often viewed from the water!"A little while, only a little while to be happy in his company," she kept repeating to herself. "And then I awake from an impossible dream and become myself again."CHAPTER VI.MARGOT and Stelvio stood in a grassy glade on the outskirts of the Far Niente gardens. Leaving behind the thickets wherein rhododendron massed its crimson, pink, white and sulphur-tinted bloom; where oranges hung like burnished gold, and red camellias glowed, where acacia and banksia twined their flowery garlands everywhere; where roses ran up tall tree trunks, throwing back branches starred with countless vivid blossoms--they had come into this sweet and solitary spot near the water's edge. The only tenants beside themselves were a marble hermes, the worse for time and moss, but smiling eternally between mottled tree boles under his umbrella of tender foliage--and a sunbeam, that defying the ban placed by nature upon his kind elsewhere at Far Niente, peeped through the trees to rest upon the young girl's radiant face.Stelvio saw with a fearsome joy that she was happy beyond all his imaginings of her. So long had he re-

mained under the ban of his own estimate of himself, it had not literally occurred to the poor boy that she could love him as he loved her.To the moment of his meeting with Margot Methuen, Guido di Stelvio had not dreamed of love or marriage for himself. Staggering beneath the cross of a great sorrow, a greater fear, he had grown up to manhood. His patience, tenderness and forbearance with the poor stricken mother who had imposed this blight upon him, were beyond all praise. Throughout this hard bitter time, the priest who had trained and educated him, who better than anyone living sympathised with him and believed that his rights would one day be established, had instilled upon him the folly, the useless sacrifice of indulgence in earthly passion; trying to lift his soul to the altitude of pure religion where Father Anselmo himself had climbed upon the ruins of a dead past.When the climax was reached that had brought to Countess Stelvio a brief period of sanity following her mad act of setting fire to their ancestral home, the poor lady came too late into a clear comprehension of the wrong she had wrought upon her son. The papers that proved his legitimacy, long cunningly hidden by the mad woman, were produced by her in the presence

of Father Anselmo and a notary from the neighbouring town. Guido's pardon, pathetically implored, was granted to her but a few hours before her death. When he went from that intensely painful scene, leaving his dying mother alone with the priest, Guido for the first time in his life, had lifted his head proudly to the light of stars. A swirl of new thoughts, new hopes and ambitions, filled his mind. No longer nameless, but the rightful heir of a proud old title! No longer outside the pale of young men of his own tastes and education but safely established in the social stratum to which he had been born! When Father Anselmo had finally come out to find him, the boy, with flushed cheeks and eyes brilliant as with fever, was walking back and forth upon the parapet of the only surviving habitable wing of Castel Stelvio. It had cost the good Father many pangs to have to take that moment to announce to the young Count that his mother had just passed away!Reinstated beyond question in the eyes of the world into his father's high social position, Guido found but a poor remnant of money coming to him of all their bygone wealth. A man without near ties or intimacies he continued to live almost as much to himself as he

had done previously. But Father Anselmo had to acknowledge that whatever career awaited his pupil, it would never be that of a Churchman. His youth, his beauty, his romantic story, not to say that his rare voice was a talisman to unlock most hearts, made Stelvio more than welcome in society, which reached out its myriad arms in his direction with varying success. The voyage to America, undertaken at the instance of a friend who believed it would serve as a needed tonic to his mind, had effected much in arousing him to new zest in life, and a broader understanding of ambition. After it, he began to read voraciously upon subjects of vital contemporaneous interest, and to write essays and monographs which were at once received favourably by the public. Until the coming of Margot Methuen to stir the calm waters of his existence, he was happier than he had ever been before. The calm retreat of Far Niente, with his few devoted servants and an occasional visit from Father Anselmo, proved an ideal atmosphere for the fostering of his new employment. If, at times, the memory of the fresh young beauty he had seen for a moment in Washington, flashed over him irresistibly, Stelvio accepted it as his inspiration, never dreaming that he was to meet her again in the flesh,

and to have his pulses stirred by her into a young man's passion. But the unexpected had occurred and triumphed! Since their meeting at Villa d'Este, he had lived for little else but the moments he spent with her. Nearer and nearer had come the vertiginous possibility that she could care for him. Since Guido had visited America, his ideas on many points had modified, and he could now picture a Count and Countess di Stelvio living upon the work of the husband's brain, she happy in home and family without feeling belittled that all came to them in payment of his toil. He knew that this was the case with numbers of Margot's friends married and living in a small way around her in Washington. To-day when he had seen her installed in his ruined home, brightening it beyond all dreaming, and sharing the ups and downs of his poor housekeeping as if she too had a stake in it, the tumult in his veins increased to a riot of delightful temptation!Margot stood with her back against a tree bole, the sunlight falling in chequers over her diaphanous white broideries. The roses Stelvio had picked and laid beside her plate at luncheon were in her belt. The gleam of dark magnolias, the lustre of an enormous copper beech, almonds and fig trees, banksias and azaleas were

behind her. A perfect scene, a propitious hour in which to let the words that thrilled within him find their vent. And yet, in his own house, on his own territory, how dared he speak to her of love? Even facile America might not extend a sheltering arm over a transgression such as this!Margot, on her side, as they had roamed through the lovely neglected garden, and along the verdurous footpath of the mountain side that led to where they halted for a rest, felt as if they two had been flying hand-in-hand from the disagreeables of earth. Aunt Katrina, with her dreadful background of McPhail; Mrs. Clandeboye, unhappy at heart, artificial even in her enthusiasms; dry-as-dust Mr. Lee, who she knew merely politely tolerated her and her aunt as "those Yankees one meets everywhere, you know,"--how delicious to get away from them into the open with Stelvio, the embodiment of her own epoch of existence! It was so good to be young, to be strong and vigorous, to have one's own hair and teeth intact as she and Stelvio had, to be able to laugh together at nothing, to defy the far-away darkness of the future. For the moment, while she saw him as beautiful and shapely as a young god in his niche of verdure, the horrid thought came to torment

her of how McPhail would look under similar conditions. She beheld a vision of the Congressman's fat middle-aged prosperity, his too-new clothes, his too protuberant waistcoat, the high colour, the bristling black moustache, his self-satisfied smile--in Stelvio's place--and uttered an ejaculation, half pain, half anger!"What is it?" Guido exclaimed anxiously. "You are suffering?""A mere nothing," she replied, controlling herself promptly. "One of those shivers that come in the midst of perfect happiness, when as our old darkies say, 'dar's some one a trompin' on your grave.'""Don't speak of such dismal things, please. Let's hold on to perfect happiness! I couldn't have imagined my luncheon party, with its necessary drawbacks, could have been such a success. After this, I shall walk about with my head in the air, and consider myself on the level with Countess Fleury as an entertainer.""Charming as she is, I'm glad you didn't ask the Countess to meet us to-day. I've a painful conviction that she is already tired of me, and is looking for

someone to fill my place. And I distinctly see that she doesn't approve of your being with me, alone.""Dear good friend and cleverest of women!" cried Stelvio, "She is really all unselfishness when it comes to advancing the interests of a protégé--""Then you admit that I am considered a detrimental," cried Margot, mockingly."But Countess Fleury is really--as I was going to say when you interrupted me so maliciously--a very obstinate woman when she takes a wrong idea into her head.""Better and better! You are so absolutely truthful, you can't for the life of you deny that she wants to keep us apart. That she will be relieved when Aunt Katrina--who, by the way--is a match for her in the same view of things--takes me away to Maloja, next week. Ah! well. We shall go, we shall be succeeded, next autumn, by some other people whom Countess Fleury will invite to fill up the chinks of her dinners and luncheons--we shall be as forgotten as the track of yonder steamboat on the lake!"She spoke half jestingly, half in earnest, but the catch in her breath as she ended, gave her hearer a throb of rapturous pain."You do not seem to remember that Maloja is at no great distance from Lake Como," he said, tremulously. "If I could only be sure that Madame Methuen would not resent my following you there.""Oh! why should we spoil this hour?" she exclaimed. "Talk as we may around the subject of our friendship, we can't hide from ourselves that it is under the ban of people who sit and look on at it dispassionately--that it has got to end soon, and you will stay here and I will go back to America to live as Mr. Lee says we do, 'absolutely without an atmosphere and without a background.'""Does not your land of freedom teach you the lesson that every man and woman born has the right to choose a career and to mould a future according to the inspiration of heart and intelligence?""Why do we always drift this way?" she cried impatiently."Then I will alter the question, and ask you if you like my Italy?""Like it?" answered Margot. "That I do. I seem to have dreamed before seeing them, of every campanile rising out of triple arches above a red-tiled roof; every spreading vine and olive grove, every mouldering old

castle on the heights with its trefoil windows and arcades and loggias where the only living things in sight are the orange trees upon the terraces. The plains and mountains, the whole tender atmosphere of the past that veils its beautiful decay--have given me a sensation of delight and sympathy in Italy that I can't describe to you.""Well answered!" cried Stelvio, his eyes deepening with feeling. "If you have that sense of personal relation to our landscape, think what it is to me--flesh, blood and religion--everything! Nevertheless, I can think of an emergency under which I would give all up and journey to live in a far foreign land, and try to wrest a livelihood from aliens.""No, no. Don't step out of your frame, please," said Margot, trying to speak lightly. "Even Mrs. Clandeboye says you are, so perfectly harmonious to your surroundings.""Don't quote that faded London fine lady to me now, I beg. It is enough that you believe that I am better here. I have actually made a beginning in literature that gives me more than encouragement. If only--""You will write me next year that you have suc-

ceeded splendidly, I know. You must not stay here at Far Niente alone, though. You must go to one of your large cities and surround yourself with people. Your passion for your country should not remain a sentiment, but be an inspiration? Let other craftsmen emigrate, you will surely do better on your own territory.""You think so? That agrees well with my wishes. There are so many of our nation living upon yours, just now. It would be refreshing to remain at home.""Besides, what you call poverty does not seem to tell here, as with us, in America. Ours is bald and crude and totally unlovely. Under the weight of it, and in the face of such tremendous wealth and display elsewhere among one's acquaintances, one feels like creeping on the earth, not walking erect. Here, on the contrary, it is no reproach, no drawback. Everything is veiled in a tender mist of bygones.""You are too good to say as much after just having witnessed the deficiencies of Far Niente." he said, laughing."It was a feast for a king," she answered. "And who but you could have crowned it with the peerless Biberon? Now do you not think my aunt and Mrs. Clandeboye will be wondering where I am? I am

almost certain, too, that I caught a glimpse between the trees, of a boat directing its course toward your landing--there may be visitors--""I never have visitors," said Stelvio, shaking his handsome head. As she spoke of going, a cold hand seemed to clutch at his heart-strings. The old sad look came back into his eyes. His boyish gaiety had vanished."Oh! not yet; not yet!" he pleaded, coming closer to her.Poor Stelvio was tried beyond his strength. The hour was there, the woman, the opportunity. Never had she looked to him so exquisite. Her kind words, her sweet understanding of his needs, her praise of his beloved country, had been fuel to his flame. After all, she was an American and accustomed, perhaps, (though he devoutly hoped not!) to have a man's love declared to her directly, not through her parents."I did not mean to speak!" he said brokenly. "Even now, I hardly know what to say--but--but you must know I love you--with my whole heart, for my whole life, I love you!"Margot had honestly meant not to let it come to this.

His impetuosity frightened while it charmed her. She drew away from him sharply, going over to stand beneath the marble Hermes, and putting out her hand with a restraining gesture."No--no--you must not," she breathed, rather than spoke."You mean because I am on my own ground--that there are no formalities--it could never be that you would fancy I lacked respect.""Not that. With us, as you know, a girl may hear for herself, and answer for herself but--" she found it hopeless to say more."Don't mind. Whatever it is, forgive me," he cried fervently. "Now that I've spoken the words can no more come back to me than water can run uphill. Only tell me that you've felt from the first that I worshipped you--why, Margot, you were born for me!"Her eyes fell before his masterful ones. She tried to control her panting voice to rebuke him further."Oh! it can't be, don't you see--Even if I did--""If you did--you do, you do. I can see it in every line of your beautiful face. Your eyes can't hide it. You do--you do! To say otherwise would be a lie

to your best self. And since this is so, what does anything else matter in the world?""It can't be. It can't, I tell you," she cried desperately."Because I am so poor?""Because I am so poor," she interrupted."Do you think I care if you come to me without a sou? Ah! never in this world. I am American enough for that. And if you are mine--""Please don't say such things. How can I make you understand? It is not for myself only--My family--they are in need, I have no right to leave them and distress them by doing this.""I see. I would not be acceptable to them and to Madame Methuen, your aunt. I ought to have realized how I must seem in the light of a parti--and that such a Countess Stelvio as I can present to the world you live in, would be a farce.""That is worse than anything," she cried passionately. "You hurt me dreadfully by saying it.""It is only too true. Looked at in the plain daylight of facts, I am a poor stick of a lover. But I am young, I am strong, I have made a beginning--If your family have not set their standard too high--"Margot, to whom the image of McPhail arose annoyingly, uttered an exclamation of distaste. Stelvio saw that he had touched a sensitive point."There is someone, then--someone to whom they expect to give you?" he exclaimed with a darkening brow. "Why was I so blind as not to see it before?""Whatever anyone expects," she interrupted, proudly, "I am free as air.""Ah! thank God for that," he exclaimed. "I could not have it in my thoughts of you that during this time when our two hearts were pulsing toward each other steadily, there had been another man who had any rights however small, over you.""I think you should know," she went on, blushing crimson, "that there is someone whom they want me to marry--who has it in his power to do for all of us what would lighten our burdens infinitely. But I can never bear to think of him!"Her childlike naïveté touched and pleased her moody hearer to a smile. Already the rainbow of hope had begun to grow dim in Stelvio's zenith. He saw at a glance what was before him, but it appeared to him that he could move a rock of Gibraltar to secure her.For a few moments, neither spoke. Stelvio was re-

volving in his mind a scheme that had occurred to him. Margot had given herself over to honest despair. At her age, molehills became mountains at a minute's notice. To have this joy brought so near, and snatched away so utterly! She felt that until she could better control her face and feelings, it was impossible to go back into the house.While the old old sorrow of parting was rending these two young hearts, Hermes smiled on, faintly, inscrutably. In his time he had seen so many vows exchanged, had heard the words "never" "forever" taken in vain so repeatedly! And yet, year after year, the sun went on trickling in through a canopy of leaves to warm him, the nightingales sang ever, the rhododendrons put on their panoply of flowers around his ancient frame--with him nothing altered. Hermes must be pardoned, for a slight incredulity regarding human vows!"Now, we can wait no longer," said the girl, finally. "They will be wanting to leave, I know. Let all this be as if it had not been spoken between us.""You do not know me if you think I will give up, now," he answered, with a new look of resolve upon his face. "Until I have accomplished what will help

me to go before your people and ask for you with a clearer conscience, I will submit to any restriction you may put upon me. But you have not done with me yet, I'll promise you."A wild heart beat impeded her utterance.So absorbed were both in reading in each other's eyes what was forbidden to speech, they did not hear footsteps approaching through the green maze of shrubbery, leading into their illumined glade."One thing at least is certain," said Margot, smiling happily. "There is nothing or nobody who can prevent our remaining friends."Two shadows fell across the slab of sunshine at Hermes' feet. To Margot's inexpressible astonishment, she beheld advancing toward them, hats in hand, two men, the first being a stranger whom she did not identify--the second embodying the unwelcome apparition of Mr. Angus McPhail."A thousand pardons, Signor Count!" said the older of the new arrivals. "Understanding from Guiseppe that your guests were about to leave, I brought Mr. McPhail here to wait until you were disengaged.""Mr. McPhail is welcome to Villa Far Niente," said Count Stelvio, shaking hands formally. "I pre-

sume that I need not present him to my guest, his countrywoman? Miss Methuen has been good enough to allow me to show her our gardens, before returning with her aunt to their hotel."Margot hardly heard his further introduction of the lawyer, Count Stelvio's over-zealous man of affairs who had brought about this climax. To good old Signor Barrera, who from his boyhood had held in inherited affection, the fortunes, good and evil, of the Stelvio family, the occasion was one that demanded chiefly the earliest possible removal of the interrupting presence of a mere visiting young lady. He had that day elicited from McPhail an offer so much in excess of any previously made for the coveted Biberon, that to a concrete mind like Signor Barrera's, only a madman would hold back from it. For the sum thus to be secured to his client would, not alone put him on his feet financially, but well invested, would bring in a yearly income more than sufficient for Stelvio's modest needs. Not for years had Signor Barrera looked so cheerful, so much like the angel of good tidings in a rusty frock coat and a brilliantly spotted blue necktie with flowing ends!The lawyer had been annoyed upon landing to find

his client preoccupied with guests. He had lost no time in bringing the would-be purchaser directly to the spot where he could view the coveted treasure and close the transaction with its owner. Of all days for Stelvio to have visitors!Signor Barrera was too much preoccupied by his own eager anxieties to observe anything unusual in the manner of his American client toward the Italian one at the moment of their coming together. He did not see the flash of suspicion in McPhail's bold black eyes succeeding his look of astonished pleasure that had fallen upon Margot Methuen's radiant youth and beauty enshrined in the Stelvio garden. Still less did Signor Barrera take note of the girl's sudden pallor, the hunted look upon her face as she coldly placed her finger-tips in McPhail's broad right hand in greeting.Stelvio, vexed beyond measure at the interruption, excused himself to the new-comers, promising to rejoin them shortly, and conducted Miss Methuen into the house. It was not until some time after his luncheon guests were safely installed in their boat and waving back to him from the water, that he could control himself to return to the Court of Hermes, and request Barrera and McPhail to come into his library.CHAPTER VII.MARGOT, who on the return from the luncheon at Villa Far Niente, had shut herself in her own room ostensibly for a rest before tea, rejoiced that by a happy accident, Aunt Katrina had not become aware of the arrival at Count Stelvio's domicile of Mr. McPhail in company with the man of law, nor of her encounter with them in the garden. She had kept her own counsel, feeling that the crash of events was close enough at hand without her precipitating it. She could not bring herself to mention the hated name of her American suitor, or to meet the torrent of discussion the announcement of the incident would let loose. With Stelvio's withering roses pressed close to her cheeks, she lay for a while upon the chaise-longue trying to live over every minute of that exquisite golden half hour spent with him in the Court of Hermes. Into her life, her veins, her hopes, had passed irrevocably the sweet overmastering influence of a pure first love.

Never again, let the world wag as it might, could she feel such tender yet conflicting emotion. For him, she was ready to do great deeds, sacrifice herself utterly, that she might brighten his hitherto sad life. It had been only a glimpse that she had caught, standing there beside him in the green dell where he had declared his love, of the world of mutual love and youthful passion. She, herself, had shut its door in her own face, and yet the remembrance of it was now the most thrillingly sweet of her whole young life. She gloried in the way he had met her objections, had promised to surmount them, to conquer the poverty of their common estate to win her. How this was to be brought about, she would not trouble herself to think. Enough that her beautiful Stelvio had promised to make her his.So companioned by bright dreams, she passed the hour of siesta, and hastily making ready when she found it was already past five o'clock, went into the salon.For a wonder, Mrs. Methuen, who was punctuality itself when the time for tea drew near, had no word of chiding. On the contrary, wreathed in smiles, the lady sat mounting guard over a stupendous specimen of Como florists' art--a corbeille of varied blossoms, all large and brilliant, springing from golden wicker work,

and tied at intervals with aggressive bows of pink satin ribbon."For you!" nodded Aunt Katrina, pointing to the envelope wired to the topmost spray of this Eiffel Tower of floral decoration. "Hurry and see who has sent it, dear, though I fancy it conies from the same source as that superb basket of fruit on the side table which I found awaiting me. There is only one friend of ours, here, who could be counted upon to do things on such a splendidly American scale."Margot's face, her form, her distasteful survey of the big bouquet struck her aunt unpleasantly."Well, aren't you going to read the card?" said Mrs. Methuen, sharply. "One would think the giver had taken a liberty, instead of paying you a handsome compliment.""The card may wait till I've made the tea," said the girl with unusual spirit, proceeding to light the lamp under the kettle into which their waiter had just poured a jug of hot water. "The toast, please, Pietro. It is a shame to have kept you waiting, Aunt Katrina, when I know how dependent you are upon your tea. And after that long row home in the hot sun, too--your poor head--""Never mind my poor head, thank you," answered her aunt, distinctly. "It is quite capable of taking care of itself for the present. I see that you know whose arrival has taken place during our absence today from Villa d'Este. No doubt you, too, have had a few lines from our good friend, Mr. McPhail, to say that he had gone away from the hotel on a little matter of business, but would ask for a place at our table at dinner, this evening?""There was so much chat in the boat coming home between Mrs. Clandeboye and Mr. Lee about the curios and books at Far Niente, I had no opportunity to tell you, that I had met Mr. McPhail and a lawyer from Milan who had accompanied him, in the garden, just as I was coming indoors to join you," said the girl indifferently."McPhail? In the garden at Far Niente?" exclaimed her surprised aunt. "Of course it was the Biberon he was after. I really never saw any man so determined to get anything he sets his heart upon. An admirable quality, I always think, when the object is a worthy one. And he is generally successful, one observes. You saw him, and spoke to him? How very

odd, and how pleased he must have been. What did he say?""It was for the briefest of moments--he coming, I going, and he had no chance to say anything," answered Margot, carrying over to her aunt the fragrant cup of tea made from their own private stores--infallibly successful in putting Mrs. Methuen's spirits up when they showed signs of a decrease."Thanks, dear. That looks delicious. Come, Margot, child, don't be so offish with me, but tell me that you intend to receive our visitor graciously, and help me to make his stay near us a success. Think how loyal he has been, how devoted in spite of your rebuffs, what an immense opportunity he places in your hands of bringing prosperity and happiness to your family.""Ah! dearest Aunt Katrina, don't play upon the same old string, if you love me," interrupted the girl mutinously. To-day, she felt courage for anything. "And as to this portentous basket of flowers, you know in your heart you detest big bows of ribbon tied in the midst of poor wired and stiffened roses--millinery crowding out nature! There is but one person they could typify--big, oversmart, self-assertive! Take them, Aunt Katrina, I renounce my claim."So saying, Miss Methuen, with a spot like a red rose petal in either cheek, a pair of eyes of the blue of steel, and lips tightly compressed, proceeded to relieve her feelings by detaching the envelope wired to the flowers, rending it asunder, card and all, and tossing it, unlooked at, into the waste-paper basket.Aunt Katrina, divided between her desire to convey instant sharp reproval, and her intuitive perception that it would be better to deal gently with her niece's present dangerous state of mind, compromised by an uncertainly nervous laugh. Girls, she argued, had been known so to apparently dismiss the pretensions of men whom they were on the actual point of accepting. Seeing McPhail unexpectedly, realizing that a crisis was at hand in her affairs, had, no doubt, (and not unnaturally) over-excited Margot's nervous system."Well, dear, be as cruel as you please to the poor man's card, so long as you treat him civilly, and try to make the evening pleasant to him. Do you know, I feel as if I had been in the pages of some quaint old book, to-day? Stelvio's house, so dreary and God-forsaken, those exquisite treasures he produced, the blooming gardens, and such a luncheon! Barring the episode of the 'poussins' falling short in number, and the

tragedy of the broken-handled knife with the old servant glowering in the background, that luncheon was perfection. I wonder what he pays his chef. Nothing a month, probably, for I'm told he has nothing to live upon. Did you hear Mr. Lee say that he knows at least two virtuosi in London, who would be ready to tear him limb from limb through envy because he had sat at table with the Stelvio Biberon? If it ever went to auction at Christie's, and the dealers began bidding against each other for it, our poor Count Guido would be enriched for life. But then, why should that be needful, when here is McPhail waiting to purchase it, out-of-hand? Mr. Lee says he knows, for a fact, that only the strongest of influences that could possibly be brought to bear upon Stelvio would induce him to part with it; indeed there is really nothing Mr. Lee could think of--Why, Margot, you are bewitched, this evening! You must be still under the influence of that gruesome villa, that to me seems only a place where a guilty spirit might take refuge to hide remorse."But Margot, unable to keep her chair, had arisen and made her escape out upon the terrace, Mrs. Methuen looking after her suspiciously, and with tightened lips.In a flash, with her aunt's words, had come to the

girl a recognition of the method by which Stelvio must have been intending to supply the lamentable deficiencies of his purse in claiming her for his bride. A thrill of sympathy for him, of pride in his self-sacrifice ran through her. Yet at the same time, she felt that she must protest against his surrender of the last relic of supreme value coming to him from his proud old family. How should she reach him with this protest? Already after a few hours' interval the scene in the Court of Hermes had begun to assume the fainter lights of a dying sunset, and to seem incredible. Had she imagined those glowing words and looks of her young lover, her own unintended confession of love for him in return? When he had said that she was born for him, and her lips and cheeks and eyes confirmed it, was it not a dream, a delusion of her own loving heart? During the brief subsequent talk with Aunt Katrina, things had arisen up that seemed like lions in their path. She saw a sad vision of her family at home, in the withering heat of a Washington summer. Her mother's last letter had reluctantly admitted to Margot that things were going worse instead of better in their household. There had been money troubles. One of the "boys," her sons, established in a Western city, had

been ill, and a considerable sum had had to be squeezed out of the meagre family fund, to pay his bills. Maud and Jessy, who were always saying they would find something to do to meet their own share of expenses, had had no luck. "Everything was so full," no chance in any direction for them. Julia, the youngest of the three Misses Methuen, had seemed about to make a match with a young man she had met in Fauquier the previous summer, but it had fallen through. The young man proved too poor, and had been obliged to tell Julia there was no hope for them, so the engagement was definitely off. Julia's temper, in consequence, Mrs. Methuen need not tell Margot, was something truly dreadful. They were all trying to raise funds to send the poor girl to a friend "up the country" in Virginia, to give her a little change. The friend had cows, and could at least furnish Julia with fresh milk to drink, for she was looking all skin and bone--! The last of Mrs. Methuen's griefs and cares, the one that had cut Margot deepest, had been embodied in a chance phrase about her father. He was "not at all well, and when at home had given up reading his newspaper, sitting moody and silent for hours on the back steps."Just why such a depressing image of her most beloved

parent should choose this especial moment to rise up and blot out Stelvio in the Court of Hermes, who can tell? Margot was now again in her favorite spot, leaning over the broad marble balustrade of the terrace, looking down at the fairy panorama of the garden on the lake. In her smartly made cream frock with its profuse laces, with her rippling ruddy hair coifed admirably, to a casual observer she suggested one of the favoured of fortune of the earth. She was rare, fine, exquisitely finished, perfectly fitted to her surroundings. And the very knowledge of her own niceties and luxuries in contrast with what she had left behind, was now oppressing her with sudden sorrow and remorse.Mr Angus McPhail who had engaged a room for himself on a line with these occupied by the Methuens, happened just then to walk towards his window and look out, while in the act of tying his evening necktie. He had not ventured to present himself in the salon of his friends immediately on his return to their hotel. Something told him it would be better to show no sign of undue haste to meet Margot again. The glance she had bestowed upon him in Stelvio's garden, after so many months of separation, had revealed the lack of

change in her mental attitude to Angus. He was unpleasantly conscious that in the girl's rapid growth in worldly knowledge and experience since their parting, her judgment of men must have materially matured. And in the twinkling of an eye, while yet her chill fingers rested within his, and when she had swept away from him with the mien of an offended young goddess, he had detected in her a new comprehension of how far and in what he fell beneath her present standard of a gentleman. It irked him, it maddened him, but the spirit that had carried Angus McPhail from poor beginnings to his present fame and fortune in his own land, tided him over the first disagreeable moment. A little later, he had forgotten even Margot Methuen in the keen rapture of a connoisseur over the marvellous Biberon exhibited at his request by Count Stelvio. When he had actually seen the perfect object of his hopes in its dusky setting of an old cabinet lined with faded green on one side of the great carved dining-room wherein no ray of sunshine ever slanted, amid the ceaseless drip and turmoil of the waterfall just without, a resolve took shape in his heart that if it cost a fortune to possess it, he would continue to bid higher, till even stubborn Count Stelvio could not resist him.To his surprise and delight, the young owner of the Biberon no longer held back from consideration of his offers. Signor Barrera, who had come over to Como bearing what he fancied to be the last word of an infatuated collector (in the case of Mr. McPhail proving personally satisfied with the purchase) was astonished to have his slow diplomatic phrases concerning the transaction taken from his lips, the affair "rushed" in true American fashion."It's simply glorious, Count," exclaimed the Congressman. "And if I may have your Biberon to take away with me when I leave Como, I stand ready to pay for it in cold cash, the sum of--"Signor Barrera pricked up his ears nervously. Oh! these Yankees! he thought, his disapproval mingled with admiration, the attitude it may be said of old Europe in general toward the race of Jonathan.But when the figures of the purchaser's offer were finally breathed upon his ear, the lawyer stood back amazed, enchanted. Here, at last, was Guido di Stelvio's opportunity of a lifetime! If the obstinate lad could only see it as did his senior, the lifelong friend and servitor of his hapless family!To Barrera's further surprise, the young Count was

plainly in a receptive state of mind. For the first time in the lawyer's memory, Stelvio failed to wear the look of angry annoyance customary to him upon the slightest mention of the sale of the Biberon. Nay, more, he for the moment, made no answer, only turning a trifle paler as he looked past his two guests out into the turbulent torrent that dashed headlong under the green tangle of the chestnut boughs near the dim window panes.McPhail, whose knowledge of men here stood him in good stead, did not by a word add to his proposition. He remained quiet, self-contained, masterful, a little excited himself by the magnitude of his proposed expenditure, but on the whole enjoying the situation.Between the three men, upon the brown polished surface of the old carved walnut dining-table where it had been set the better to view its beauties from all points, stood the Biberon. From the polished crystal of the unclassified monster's surface glinted little tempting lights. The enamel and jewels of its decoration shone bravely from the polishing Stelvio's own hands had bestowed upon them in honour of his sovereign lady's visit. Over all, the blond Neptune balanced his gold

trident, bestriding his scarlet and emerald dolphin with a look of conscious hauteur.Before giving his answer, the young Count walked across to the window and stood silently. Signor Barrera could hear his own big old family watch tick against his anxiously beating heart, during this interval. But he had not long to wait. Stelvio, borrowing something of the American's sturdy calm over this large bargain, came back to them at once."I accept your offer," he said firmly. "It is so generous a one, Mr. McPhail, that I would not have you think my momentary hesitation proceeded from any want of understanding and appreciation of the extent of it.""Nothing of the sort, I assure you," protested McPhail cordially. "I am under no delusions about the situation. It is your family heirloom, an art treasure of magnitude that you have many times refused to sell. I hear of it, want it for my own modest collection, cross the big pond to get a peep at it, and having done so, feel that if it's humanly possible, the thing must pass to me. Now that you've been good enough to gratify my wish, I can only thank you, and leave our friend Barrera to do the rest. That's all, I believe, Signor

Barrera. We don't need to intrude upon Count Stelvio's time any longer, eh? Most interesting place this of yours, Count Stelvio. If you come again to Washington, you must be sure to let me know. I have several rather good bits to show you in Connecticut Avenue."The visitors took their leave, Stelvio escorting them to the water-steps with a world of old-fashioned courtesy. When they were well out upon the lake, the owner of Far Niente went back into the great dreamy room full of shadows, that contained the Biberon, his no more, and dropping into a chair by the table where remained the crystal monster, gazed at it with a new sensation of gratitude. No longer did he lament his sacrifice! All now was for the brighter side of life and beautiful Margot!McPhail, who, it must be owned, came rather well out of the affair of his important purchase, saw Signor Barrera off in the bus from Villa d'Este to catch the evening train to Milan, then went to his own room, considerably elated. He considered that to get what one wants above all things inanimate--a possession till now obstinately refused to him--was to pave the way to other victories over resistent Fate. His encounter with

Margot, while disconcerting to his vanity, could not subdue his powerful will. If he joined these ladies, as Mrs. Methuen's letter to Genoa had suggested, on their approaching journey to the Engadine, there would be ample opportunity to press his suit in a quiet, persistent way. He might even project for them a preliminary excursion somewhere. He knew very well through further advices from Margot's aunt, that his hope lay in time, in devotion, above all in what he had done, and could do for the girl's family. Since his re-opening of his campaign thro' the dejected personality of Margot's mother, he had been able to accomplish many things that inclined that poor lady favourably toward him. Mrs. Augustin Methuen had, indeed, never dared tell her husband and daughters what a skilful web McPhail had woven around her.His wily offer to their family of a free residence at their own old home, Harmony Hall (now in his possession), during the summer months, had been flatteringly conveyed to her husband, and flatly refused by Augustin Methuen. Unless they could afford to pay full rent for the place to the owner, a Methuen could not consent to reside there. So stern had been the dictum on this subject of the head of the family, that his

wife trembled at the recollection of her own audacity in proposing it. McPhail had been denounced as an "impertinent pretender" and a "crass vulgarian," upon whom they had no possible claim any more than he had upon their friendship. The frightened woman saw that she had stirred into new life the old grievance existing since the day when for a brief time McPhail had been partner with her husband in the mining venture that had ended so disastrously for the poor gentleman. McPhail, rich enough to hazard money here and there, had showed nothing to the world of the non-success of this incidental enterprise. Methuen, on the contrary, had staggered under it, had well-nigh gone down altogether. The offer at this late day to give a Methuen the shelter of his own beloved and bitterly lamented lost home, now owned and supported by the solvent Congressman, seemed to him only second in impudence to McPhail's proposal to marry his lovely young Margot.Yes--things were not going well at home. As Margot stood there looking at the sunset sky from the terrace of Villa d'Este, she little imagined that McPhail's gaze was upon her, that her beauty was intoxicating him with a new resolve to make her his. He longed for the moments to hurry on that he might present himself at their

salon door to escort the ladies in to dinner. Flushed with his conquest of the Biberon, he believed himself invincible.Still less did Margot suspect that her emotion at the mention of Stelvio's name had awakened in Mrs. Methuen's quick-witted apprehension, a pretty fair understanding of what must have passed between the young people in the garden, while she had sat drowsing in the Count's comfortable chair, over a lapful of old rings and watches. The chaperon blamed herself, was annoyed at the mischief evidently done, yet in her plenitude of power over the girl's movements, did not consider that mischief irrevocable. With McPhail's help, she could no doubt devise some definite interruption to the dangerous intercourse between two penniless sentimentalists, each of whom stood in the other's light.CHAPTER VIII.WHEN Guiseppe, on going into his young master's room the morning after the great event of a breakfast party at Far Niente, found the Count ill and feverish, inclined to cling to his pillow, instead of being alert and calling out for his cold bath, the sour-visaged old servitor showed but little sympathy. It was doubtless an attack of influenza, such as Signor Guido had contracted at a cheap hotel in Rome the winter before, that had already come back more than once; or at most a touch of the sun. The patient would not die of it; and for the present the illness would clearly interrupt the dangerous intercourse between himself and the American Mees, a consummation devoutly to be wished, thought Guiseppe and his wife.The crabbed old fellow had transmitted orders to the boatmen to be in readiness to convey their master to Villa d'Este at the earliest available hour this morning. He was cognizant of the long tête-à-tête between the young people in the garden. He knew full well that

something far out of the common had occurred to Count Stelvio during the afternoon. The visit of Signor Barrera and the strange gentleman had of course meant nothing more than the oft repeated offer and refusal, in which Guiseppe rejoiced as a triumphant illustration of fine old Stelvio pride before the world. The husband and wife had heard the Count walking up and down his library till a late hour of the night. Following this, he had gone out alone upon the lake, and remained dear knows how long, when he should have been getting sound and honest sleep. Guiseppe had little patience with such pranks, when their object was a signorina who would bring no gold to the family coffers. He therefore now paid small heed to his master's grumblings and lamentations over his own disabilities, but opened the shutters, pottered over the clothes and bath as usual, then went out and sent Assunta in his place.The old woman, who had ministered to her Guido throughout mumps and measles and the full list of childhood's evils, could not forbear a little of the cosseting of old when she found her misguided darling tossing and miserable upon his couch. Her rough old hand with its fingers like nutmeg graters, rested for a moment with loving touch upon his head to test the extent

of its stored caloric. She straightened his tossed linen, made him comfortable in sundry trifling ways--went off to return with the lemonade he craved, and finally stood at the foot of his bed with folded hands, looking down upon him with grim approval. She rather liked a spell of invalidism in her boy, did Assunta, since it surrendered bound and helpless into her hands, the Samson she adored."You do make a fellow comfortable," admitted the sufferer finally. "Now, trot away, old lady, and come back to get me out of bed on the stroke of twelve. Have an egg, some toast and a cup of chocolate ready when I come down, and tell the men to be ready at the water-steps--this is a headache!" he interrupted himself, falling back upon his pillow with a grimace of sharp pain."Not an egg do you eat, nor a step do you walk across this floor, till your fever goes," said the inexorable Assunta."But I must, I tell you, I must," cried Guido. "It is of the first importance.""The first importance is that you do not go out in the sun. Why, what a figure would you cut among the forestieri at Villa d'Este, even if you could stand, with such aching in your head.""Who said anything about Villa d'Este?" said he, angrily. "As usual, you take liberties.""There, there, abuse me as you will, my son," said the old nurse, tenderly. "Only go to sleep while I sit by you."And presently, Guido slept. Slept long past the hour when he had promised Margot to present himself to her aunt; on and on, till his fever lessened, and he awoke refreshed to behold the stars looking in at the casement of his bare melancholy chamber, of which the chief furnishings were a prie-Dieu, a big English bath tub, and a huge carved four-poster bed, draped with antique Florentine silk embroidered with the Stelvio coat-of-arms.His first impulse, upon ascertaining the undue length of his slumbers, was to abuse Assunta; but the old woman having been near at hand all day, now kept herself cleverly out of sight. Beside him, on a little stand with his lemonade, was a waxen twisted night-light burning with a faint glimmer, and underneath this lay a note addressed to him.Grasping it eagerly, Stelvio sat up in bed. His brain clear of the sudden fever engendered by the reckless exposure of the previous night, he realized that he

had not only lost a precious day and failed in his appointment with Miss Methuen, but that he had done so in what must have seemed a singularly discourteous fashion. How like her angelic goodness to write to him. Quick as stout arms could speed his boat, his men should bear back to her an answer conveying his explanations of his plight. Was ever the mishap of illness so unwelcome to a man? And now, another long night must pass before he could have the excuse of seeking her presence, and telling her that all obstacles were removed from between them. Not for a moment had he regretted the Biberon, or the fact that on the morrow experts were coming from Milan to pack and remove it for transportation to America. What were mere gold and gems and crystal beside the living, breathing presence in his life of the woman he adored? He gloried in the surrender of his family treasure, that he might lay its price at her dear feet. Now, at last, he could face her people with head erect, praying for the boon of her companionship throughout his life, that he meant, with this beginning, to build up into one worthy of himself, of her, and of the old traditions of his race.With these thoughts, sweet, proud and eager, thronging upon his brain, Stelvio made haste to light a candle

for the better decipherment of his precious missive. And this is what rewarded him:"When you did not come this morning," Margot wrote, "and when I did not hear from you, I felt sure you too had come to a realising sense of the mistake we both made yesterday. I do not doubt you, I will never cease to think kindly of you, but after we parted it was borne in upon me painfully that we had better never meet again than plunge deeper into the sadness and sorrow awaiting us and others whom I forgot for a moment--but not too long. How shall I express my regret that I had no more self-control than to let matters go so far? Please forgive my share of it, as I shall yours! I hardly know what I am writing in the confusion around me. My aunt has suddenly decided to accept the invitation of a friend for a motor party to Venice, and when we return to Como, it will be to go directly to Maloja. All is packing and talking around me, and we leave in a few minutes. I seem to be swept up and carried away by some wind of Destiny more powerful than my will. Whatever you do, don't remember me unkindly, and whether or not we meet again, believe in my faithful friendship. M. M."Assunta, unable to bear the dread silence in Stelvio's room following his discovery of the letter, crept in from the dressing-room, where she had been hiding behind a moth-eaten portière of Oriental web. She found her boy stretched sidewise upon his bed, his face buried in his pillow. Her prayers to him to eat, to drink, to answer her, were unheeded. Roughly, imperiously he bade her leave him to himself, and she fled scared and conscious-stricken to the kitchen, where Guiseppe sat bunched in a corner, gobbling from an earthenware bowl his supper of white beans with oil and garlic dear to his ancient soul."He has had a blow!" she exclaimed, in piteous accents. "Something dreadful has happened, I know not what. A plague upon the Americans, say I. They have brought ill-luck to Villa Far Niente and our master.""How do you know the Americans are at fault?" queried her lord, phlegmatically going on with his repast."What, you can eat, you care nothing when I tell you that my boy is in black trouble?""At my age one has seen so many in trouble, and if

they live they generally get over it," he answered, with a shrug."But I cannot see him suffer, I tell you. It was I who took the accursed note from the messenger, none other than Stephano from the hotel, who told me it had been put into his hands by the young lady that breakfasted here with a fine buonmano for himself.""And if she will have none of our master (may the devil fly away with her), is it not because of your parsimony with the chickens yesterday; the shame you brought upon our house? But what matter the means, if the end only is attained, of separating them? To marry the like of that, would be beggary for our Count and perhaps for a brood to come. Young people who want to do such things should be locked up in a house of fools, I'm thinking.""Listen, Guiseppe," whispered the crone, with an awe-stricken look upon her face. "Since yesterday afternoon, I have kept a secret from you. To-morrow you will have to know it. Our master is no longer poor. Don't ask me how I became possessed of this information--""No need to. You were at your old trick of putting an ear to the key-hole while Signor Barrera and the

strange gentleman talked to the Signor Count in the dining-room. But I am not anxious to hear your fancies. It is the same old story. These shopkeepers from America are trying to buy our Biberon, and they go away disappointed. Always the same, I tell you. We do not sell.""We do sell, I tell you, old croaker! I was in the pantry putting away the best glass and china, and in spite of myself, I heard what Signor Barrera said to our master in departing. He spoke in our own tongue, and I could not mistake. His voice shook with pleasure when he said that, to-morrow, the best packer in Milan would arrive at Far Niente, to prepare the Biberon for its long journey, oversea. He congratulated the boy upon having made so splendid a bargain for it. He said that henceforward we should be rich. Rich, think of it, Guiseppe! No debts, no care for food and clothes, the roofs mended, fires all over the villa. Why, what's come to you, husband? Are you, as well as the lad on his bed upstairs, struck with--""To the fiend with your chattering tongue!" interrupted the old servant, rising furiously and letting fall his bowl of beans to crash on the stone floor. For the moment he was terrible in his towering wrath and pain.

Then, as Assunta fled before him, he sank again upon his stool by the table, buried his head in his hands, and like his master, hid the sorrow of his face from human view."I have always heard of these grand seigneur doings of your rich Americans, but never before experienced them," said Mrs. Clandeboye, leaning with Mrs. Methuen over the balcony of their hotel in Venice, the day following the scenes just recorded as taking place at Villa Far Niente. "And I little thought when I met your Mr. McPhail at Homburg last summer, that I should be motoring with him from Como to Mestre and accepting his magnificent hospitality for a stay of three days at this hotel. Last time I was here I was bargaining with the proprietor for a room on the third floor, with a rat-hole for my maid. I came and went and got into my gondola without creating the least sensation. Here we are now in the Royal suite, with red satin and gilt furniture all over the place. Every time I walk through the hall, gold-banded caps fly off and uniformed beings bow down before me. No table d'hôte dishes containing the legs of chickens in cold gravy, are offered at my elbow. These daintily spread tables in

a private room, with fresh flowers at each plate, and everything one wants, come as if by magic. Really, my dear lady, I'm immensely grateful to you for giving me a share of the experience. I well know I do not owe it to my own surpassing charms. The good man is just mad about your niece, and to get her here, made up his party of those who were at hand, meaning myself, Mr. Lee, and Countess Fleury's little man from the Beaux Arts. Two motor cars, the piano nobile of the hotel, all this splendour--it is beyond belief. But what I do wonder at, is that you did not ask for an invitation for our beautiful Stelvio instead of the little decorator, who is, after all, rather dull.""You remember, it was an impromptu. Mr. McPhail invited those at table with him, quite off-hand--" said Mrs. Methuen with a nervous little laugh."And Stelvio did not happen to be there. I understand," answered Mrs. Clandeboye, with rather too bright a smile of acquiescence."There come the music-boats, and peace is flown from the evening hour," exclaimed her companion."It would have been a good thing for Stelvio to be with us," pursued her Englishwoman reflectively. "He might have ended by striking a bargain with our host.

I wonder now the most McPhail ever offered him for the Biberon?""Mr. McPhail has not taken me into his confidence," said Mrs. Methuen stiffly. She was beginning to feel indeed pushed to the wall."I thought they always mentioned the dollars first in America," answered Mrs. Clandeboye. "Certainly it is no affair of mine, or of yours either apparently, still less of the fair Margot's. Girls are very odd. If any one had told me that the glorified young creature who came in from the garden with Stelvio that day after luncheon, would content herself to-day with going to the Frari in a gondola with that--but what am I saying? It is the hardest thing in the world, isn't it, to remember to be grateful to one of those Universal Providers, like our host?""Of course you know Mr. Lee is of the party to the Frari," said Mrs. Methuen, sharply. "I should never think of permitting my niece--""Of course, dear, I'm a brute, and even if Mr. Lee does fall into a brown study before every blackened old Madonna in every church, and forget there's any other being living but himself, that's no sign Mr. McPhail would consider it an opportunity--there, they are com-

ing in to the steps at this moment. They've actually brought Mr. Lee away from his black Madonnas. I'm glad, as we're to dine early and go out again on the water. Really, now, looking down on him from a balcony, and in this light, I don't consider Mr. McPhail ill-looking. If he could only be brought a little more into bounds, so to speak--I can't express it, but I'm sure you feel what I mean."Mrs. Methuen, turning back with her companion to welcome the returning members of the party, thought she had seldom had so disagreeable an half-hour. The terrible plain speaking of the modern Englishwoman of fashion was never less to her taste than now. Perhaps it cut deeper in that she recognized its truth.Margot, personally, had had little to complain of in McPhail's attitude towards her since his arrival. He was, as far as externals went, a changed being, giving no indication of the sentimental aspirations of bygone days, quiet, considerate and agreeable as she had never found him. He had so far--until this expedition to the Frari with Mr. Lee, made no attempt to see her apart from the others. The first dreaded encounter with him had passed unemotionally. He had not sought to renew their previous relations, even in petty things. In

the breathing space thus afforded her, she had a delightful feeling that perhaps he now wanted no more than her friendship; this, she would make an heroic effort to bestow upon him, in view of her mother's letter detailing the kindnesses by which he had striven to alleviate the hardships of Mrs. Augustin Methuen's present lot in life. It had been a pleasure to hear from him of the progress of the improvements now going on at Harmony Hall. Every trifle she had ever commented on concerning her childhood's home was remembered by him, and emphasised in his plan of restoration. He had brought out the plans to show her, together with a blue print of the proposed additions that were to make the old house a perfect example of early Colonial architecture. There was even a pretty photograph of the renewed garden with its box-edged walks and clumps of queer peacocks and animals in trimmed box as she had once adored them before they had bulged beyond the lines of veri-similitude. Its little fountain shot up in the centre a jet d'eau visible in the picture. She had gazed at this in fascinated silence, then uttered a long sigh of satisfaction.Mr. Lee, had he known that in the dusky corner of the Frari, the two Americans were talking about

whether to mass foxgloves or hollyhocks in the beds under the library-window, instead of doing their duty by the tombs of the Doges all around them, would have been perhaps justly condemnatory of their frivolity. But he knew nothing until forcibly wrenched away from a favorite Bellini by the necessity of closing the church; and on their way back, sustained a monologue concerning Italian mortuary art, which at least saved Miss Methuen from the necessity of general conversation.For at heart, Margot was sad and sore, and the pleasant thoughts of the revival of her old home had not long power to keep up her spirits. That Stelvio had not come to her in the morning after their virtual avowal of love each for the other had been a keen blow. The letter she had sent him out of her deeply wounded heart, although written in haste, was what she knew she ought to have said to him, and she must not now repent it. Although she did not, as she had said, "doubt" her lover, the refrigerating effect of silence and absence, confirmed her belief that he knew he must go no further. Yes, they had made a terrible mistake. She had taken the initiative in telling him so, which in some degree salved her sense of mortification at his attitude. For foolish, reckless, unthinking though a man may be, in letting

his passion for a woman get the better of cold common sense, the woman always wants to feel that he is ready to stand by his folly. The little burst of weakness that ended her letter, had come in spite of her. She hardly realised the force of it. She had written at hot speed, and after sending away her missive, felt that a great gulf separated her from the idyl of Far Niente garden and the lake. At such a crisis, the proposal of McPhail that they should accompany him to Venice, had been welcomed, albeit mournfully. She had determined to go cheerfully, to keep up a brave front, exerting herself to be agreeable to all around her, behaving in short, as any well-bred, high-mettled girl should do under the circumstances. The only thing that could afford her real pleasure in return came, as has been said, through McPhail's talk of her family at home and the revival of bygones at dear Harmony Hall--hers no more, hers never to be, but still of supreme interest to her loving imagination.A few letters, forwarded from Villa d'Este, were presented to their party as they went in to dinner in the private room reserved by McPhail for his party. There was among those handed to Mrs. Methuen, one which that lady took care to put at the bottom of her little pile

she negligently laid near her wine glasses on the table, beneath the gold meshed bag containing her handkerchief and money for distribution at the floating concert to come in the Grand Canal. It was in truth one of those letters a wise chaperon would give anything to have had lost by the way in coming. She had in scrutinising the envelope addressed to her niece seen that it came from Stelvio, and was probably destined to work havoc in her present scheme of entertainment and distraction for Margot. Since Margot could not appropriate its contents here at table, her aunt decided not to excite her by putting it into her hands until the close of the evening on their return from the water. To divert suspicion from her plan, she passed over to her niece another, an American letter directed to Margot in the handwriting of one of her sisters, which Margot received with a smile of thanks and tucked into her belt ribbon to be read at leisure. Well she knew the quality of those profuse epistles in which Maud and Jessy and Julia loved to spread their meagre intellectual quality over many sheets of thin cheap paper for the benefit of their youngest sister, "travelling in Europe with our aunt, Mrs. Wilfred Methuen, and having the loveliest time!" as they loved to speak of her. And yet in these feeble

paragraphs of personal items concerning uninteresting people, there was a certain Pepysian flavour, not unacceptable to the absent rover. She liked to hear about the new frock Jessy had contrived out of Maud's discarded last summer crépon, trimmed with lace begged from mother's chest of drawers. She was interested in knowing how many evenings of the week Mr. Anstruther called upon the family without ever yet having shown any sign of preference for one young lady over the other. The welfare of the kitten, the cook, the hopes and fears of the sisters concerning their summer outing, the numerous on dits of Washington gossip, all had a certain interest because of their connection with her home.But to-night, Margot did not feel attuned to these artless chronicles, wanted nothing that would draw her away from the absorbing interest of her constantly thronging thoughts of Stelvio. During dinner her longing to see or hear from him increased to an alarming extent. She, who had thought herself admirably in check, became feverish with restless desire to know what he had thought of her note; whether he was prepared to accept it as a final farewell as her tone had indicated to him he might appropriately do. She wished she had

not been so positive, so explicit. She repented especially the words "we had better never meet again than plunge deeper into the sadness and sorrow awaiting us and others." A literal man, or a sensitive man (which Stelvio certainly was) would abide by that suggestion. And again, in ending, she had hinted that they might "never meet again." Fatal phrase! What had possessed her to repeat it? Once, surely, was enough! She knew now, just how much of her readiness to renounce him eternally was due to pique because he had not come or sent that morning. The memory of his words, his looks, the love-light in his glorious dark eyes thrilled her anew, and she felt that she had let herself act too harshly. All she could hope and pray was that on their return by way of Como, she might have another glimpse of him, and, in plain words, "give herself another chance."In this mood, she threw herself into the talk at table, was livelier and wittier than usual, looked as beautiful as any of the golden-locked Dogaressas who ever trailed their damask robes over the immemorial marbles of near-by pavements, and succeeded in thoroughly bewitching the giver of the feast out of what constraint he had put upon himself. To her surprise and disap-

proval, Mr. McPhail manoeuvred his way into the gondola of which she and Mrs. Clandeboye took possession, when they all came down presently to go out on the Canal.Margot, in her vexation, decided she had had enough of her attempt at reform in her treatment of the honourable Angus. She was wickedly inclined to say something irrevocably wounding, that would let him find this out, and, if possible, alienate him permanently. But Mrs. Clandeboye's chatter allowed her no opportunity, and by and by, as their gondola formed into line and passing around by the Piazzetta, glided beneath the Bridge of Sighs into the witchery of unknown piccole canale, the girl gave up her truculent resolve, and abandoned herself to the soothing influence of the hour and scene.CHAPTER IX."As I was telling Mrs. Methuen," said Mrs. Clandeboye, who had made up her practical mind to get something substantial out of this adventure with rich Americans, "it is a revelation to me how easily and delightfully your countrymen entertain. One sits upon a magic carpet and is whisked to the ends of the earth--""Anything less like the magic carpet than a motor car, I can't imagine," interposed Margot, "and I am sure the princes of the Arabian Nights never sniffed petrol.""Mr. McPhail knows how to cast an illusion over the prosaic part of everything," exclaimed the lady, smoothly. "All I can say, if this party of his be an example of the way they do things in your wonderful country, I am more than ever anxious to go there. Perhaps, some day, if the Fates are kind, I shall find myself in your Capital. Ermyntrude Cecil, one of my

dearest friends, was in the Embassy there, and she was always urging me to run over and judge it for myself. But unfortunately, we poor English can't indulge our longings to see the world like you lucky people. I really think I should be born anew, if I could get out of the London grind for one season, and broaden my horizon by a glimpse of America.""Since Mrs. Cecil is no longer in Washington, perhaps you will allow me to show it to you," said McPhail, promptly. "My house is very much at your service.""You are not in earnest? How quite too kind. Some day, when my ship comes in, I may arrange to sail in it, across the Atlantic, westward. No doubt, there will be a charming mistress of your mansion to welcome this wanderer? At any rate, I shall be boasting everywhere that I have had an enchanting invitation to visit Washington from one of its nation's rulers, and every one will envy me. Lady Bell went out last year, you know, with her husband, as the guests of your grand seigneur, Mr. Johnson, and deciding at the last moment that he would not take them in his yacht, he sent it over empty, and engaged passage for their party in one of the new monster ships where one has no excuse for being sea-sick. A perfect journey, and

when they arrived, the yacht took them off at quarantine, and they spent the summer cruising along the coast, from New York to New London, Newport, Bar Harbour, and all those interesting places. Lady Bell said it was too wonderful, also their visit afterwards at his country place on Long Island, where everything was sumptuous and the mosquitoes as big as robins. . . . How lovely it is, passing under these bridges with the light twinkling in arabesques beneath their arches, and the townspeople passing over them exactly like the opera. After a while one gets rather used to the smell of side-canals, I think. Miss Methuen has gone into a trance, hasn't she?""Not too much so to lose the point of Mrs. Clandeboye's sprightly conversation," said Margot, arousing herself with an impatient movement. She felt that to be a little spiteful would requite her for losing the seductive charm of their passage through dim waterways. Oh! had it but been Stelvio instead of her present comrades, to share with her this unravelling of the poetic mystery of Venice after dark of a summer's night.Mrs. Clandeboye laughed. She was not easily affronted. "You too may be in Washington when I make

my visit, dear," she said lightly. "So I shall look to you to bear witness that Mr. McPhail has charged himself with my entertainment.""By that time, I shall have gone out as a governess," answered Miss Methuen. "You know I am studying French and Italian daily, and Heaven has granted me a somewhat mathematical mind. My good father, whose daily diversion used to be teaching me Latin at odd hours, has sufficiently equipped me with that language to confer it upon any ignorant small person who falls into my clutches. So, I'm afraid, Mrs. Clandeboye, I shall be quite out of your circle when you visit Mr. McPhail in Connecticut Avenue."McPhail, conscious of mortal pangs at this announcement which, however lightly made, he felt was intended to cover a deliberate intention, could not keep out of his voice a tremor of wounded feeling, in reply."I fancy Mrs. Wilfred Methuen, not to mention your father and mother, will have something to say to that, Miss Margot."If one thing more than another in Angus grated upon our young lady, it was his method of styling her "Miss Margot.""Oh! I fancy not," she answered icily. "You seem

to forget that Aunt Katrina has a niece of her very own--a delightful and superior Miss Minnie Fothergill from Boston--whom she is to take to live with her after this year, and who is to inherit all her fortune.""Good gracious, what a calamity!" said Mrs. Clandeboye. "I have seen the young lady's photograph. Poor Mrs. Wilfred Methuen! Poor you!""I have met Miss Fothergill," added McPhail, wofully. "A crank about higher education, and as ugly as they make them, worse luck. Also a political reformer according to her lights. She was staying at Senator Glenn's last winter, and positively froze out their dinners and At-Homes. The question was, why Minnie? Short for Minerva, I suppose. Lectured every public man she got hold of, about his duty to his constituents and country, and all the women about their relations to society and children. No wonder Mrs. Methuen has put off the evil day of having Miss Minnie Fothergill till the last possible minute.""I believe she was bequeathed to Aunt Katrina by her sister in her will," said Margot, unable to resist a smile. "The bequest to take effect when Minnie reaches the age of twenty-five. Till then, she is to have full scope for the development of her soul-

wings, whatever they may be. You see, Aunt Katrina's sister was a sentimentalist of an advanced sort, but, unlike her daughter, a very pretty woman always praised and petted. For the present, Miss Fothergill is living the life of a bachelor maid in Boston in the family of a German professor and his wife, whom she met during her college course. Next year, by promise to her mother, she and Aunt Katrina have engaged to come together and form one establishment. Then, as you may see, my time is over, and I step down and out. Dear Aunt Katrina has given me a glimpse of Paradise, and I shall carry the remembrance of it all my life. How can I but be grateful to her, even if I am trying sometimes.""If I were you, I could never speak of it so philosophically," cried Mrs. Clandeboye. To her, the revelation of affairs between Margot and her aunt was truly lamentable. She had always looked upon the girl as the ultimate heir of Mrs. Methuen's liberal income, her Paris gowns and jewels, her power to move about the world at will, ordering the best of everything; and in secret, could not understand the older woman's evident anxiety to establish Margot in marriage with a roturier like McPhail. The image of that impending

Miss Minnie Fothergill suddenly loomed large in explanation of Margot's repeated declarations of her own impecunious estate in life. It was really distressing!"You seem astonished," answered Margot, placidly. "But you know I always told you how it is with me. I am only Cinderella in fine clothes, waiting for the clock to strike midnight, when I shall go scampering down the stairs to obscurity and rags.""But the Prince, my dear! The Prince who will go on searching until he finds you, and fetch you back away from the horrid little pupils. You make no account of him?"Mrs. Clandeboye spoke airily, but in her heart, she was thinking "if ever a man looked like a fairy prince, it is Count Guido di Stelvio. If the signs don't deceive me, she is madly in love with him. Now, if the aunt fails them, if she can't even give the girl a dowry, that affair is more than ever hopelessly out of the question. Margot knows it, she is certain also that this big, beefy Crœsus opposite us in the gondola is only waiting for her to take him, and yet she won't look at him. Ah well. If she knew as much as I do about the length

of time love lasts, maybe she'd think better of McPhail!"McPhail at this juncture, had lost his false show of indifference and equanimity. He did not care whether or no the scheming Englishwoman, as ready to put her hand in his pocket as to stab him with polite insolence, heard what he had to say."You will never go out as governess!" he exclaimed in a passionate whisper, "never, by Heaven!""Speaking of polite avocations for ladies of high degree," interposed Mrs. Clandeboye, who did not want the expedition spoiled by an outburst of inconvenient emotion, "I ran to-day upon a charming countrywoman of yours whom we all knew at Homburg last season. She is stopping at the Grand, in charge of an American heiress, Miss Conners of Chicago, the girl Countess Fleury destines for our handsome friend Stelvio; and by the way, they are going on to visit the Countess now. It seems the papa in Chicago has put up some stupendous sum to pay the expenses of the summer abroad, as well as giving the chaperon a handsome salary. Not a bad idea, is it? I met them on the steps of San Giorgio, but merely shook hands with her, and had a look at the heiress, a dreadfully fat

common little thing that no title or position could ever make over into a lady. Such a contrast to her slim and stately comrade! Certainly, Miss Carteret has the grand air, and is a beauty still, quite like one of us, not an American at all.""Miss Carteret!" exclaimed McPhail, the blood rushing to his face unseen in the dusk about them."Miss Betty Carteret! Now I remember, you were a good deal with her party, last summer. I did not mention I was your guest in Venice. In fact I was fully taken up with wondering whether, if my cash gives out entirely before long, I also might not get a rich American to take about. But when I saw Miss Conners face-to-face, and heard her R's, I simply decided that I could not--a crust and a cup of tea at home, and trying my luck at bridge in my friends' houses, would be better far. What an irony of life that such as Miss Carteret should be carrying the money bags Miss Conners owns!""It must have been a sudden determination," said McPhail, lighting a cigarette, "since I had the pleasure of Miss Carteret's company at one of my dinners shortly before I left home, and she then said nothing of the plan.""Such plans are always decided upon suddenly, or not at all," said Mrs. Clandeboye. She, like Margot, had noted in the striking of his match upon the box, the dark flush that overspread his face, the troubled frown that gathered upon his brow. "What a pity I did not tell her you were here, Mr. McPhail. It would have been so pleasant meeting an old friend. And I dare say Miss Methuen knows her too, since they both come from Washington?""Very slightly," said Margot, "Miss Betty Carteret is of course a household word in Washington, and the old Southern families take great pride in her beauty and past belleship. But she was long before my time.""How cruelly girls say those obvious things!" exclaimed Mrs. Clandeboye. "I suppose you will be looking the lady up, to-morrow, Mr. McPhail. It would really be a charity to give her a little variety upon the society of Miss Conners and their courier. No, positively, I won't personally conduct heiresses. Let us talk of something pleasanter. Here we are, out in the Grand Canal, again, I shall fill my lungs with a purer air."They had shot dextrously around the sharp corner of a palace wall blocking their passage to all appearance,

and now emerged under a canopy of starry blue into the glory of the noble waterway on either side of which keep watch the dim dwellings whence light and life seem to flee away after nightfall save for the portal lamps that dip their long shafts into the canal. Gone was the stir and traffic of the day, absent the fussy little passenger boats, all was rest, beauty, poetry, the past renewed; the fullest, highest appeal of Venice to the senses of the onlooker assumed its sway!Upon even our ill-assorted three in the McPhail gondola, the spell descended, and for a while silence reigned. Margot, well pleased to be left to her meditations, amused herself by strewing the petals of the costly roses McPhail had laid by her plate at dinner upon the water in their wake. McPhail, annoyed by her attitude in the talk to-night, more stirred than he chose to admit to himself by the vision of Betty Carteret at Venice, was glad of an opportunity to regain control of his feelings. He had not the best of tempers, and his present humility of spirit was not warranted to last forever. The little period of drawing together between Margot and himself over the restoration of Harmony Hall had been skilfully planned by him, and the result had proved gratifying. It was more

than exasperating to hear his fair tyrant talk within a few hours afterwards of a future for herself that cast him to the winds together with Harmony Hall and all his other possessions and possibilities. Worse than all, he knew the girl to be capable of carrying out her threat of seeking a paid situation. It was surely vexing enough that Betty Carteret had done this deed, refusing to be content with sharing the modest home and competence of her mother in Washington. He would probably be running into Betty, dramatic situations might develop, Margot might become aware of certain things he had no desire for her to know just yet, and the plague of it all was that he had invited his guests to remain over another day in Venice!"Here we are among the gondolas around the singing boats," said Mrs. Clandeboye, whom nothing but want of funds was ever known to ruffle. "Pray tell Giovanni to push in somewhere and let us listen for awhile. There seems to be unusual excitement in the vicinity of that queer dark-looking boat with the two green lanterns. Some one on it that they want to hear again, evidently, has just done singing. I hope it is a new tenor or baritone whose voice is not strained by roaring in the night air, as they do here.""I have heard of one of the big opera singers doing that for charity to his old friend and comrade ill at home, with bronchitis," said McPhail, "and they say gold and silver rained into the bag handed around among the gondolas.""Oh! did he? I like that!" exclaimed Margot, with more enthusiasm than she had shown the speaker for an hour."The artist was probably out of an engagement, or had made a fiasco in his last new role," commented Mrs. Clandeboye.The gondolier, obedient to direction from his employer manœuvred them into place between two other craft lying motionless, their ferrae gleaming overhead, their occupants, muffled and whispering, lending themselves to the poetic mystery of the hour and scene. An audible exclamation in Mrs. Clandeboye's low sweet voice brought to her from the gondola on her side, a greeting. Following her surprised identification of two friends, a man and a woman, she at once plunged with them into a close low-toned conversation, excluding McPhail and Miss Methuen. Hardly had this incident occurred when McPhail, in the middle seat, found his own attention claimed by the detached member of a

party of three ladies, placed like himself, with her back to the gondolier a little apart from the others."Please don't appear to notice me," came softly out of the darkness. "I saw you as you passed in under the lantern of the next gondola. What a meeting-place, and what a heavenly night!""I have just heard that you are here," he answered in a tone from which he could not banish a painful want of alacrity. "But why am I forbidden to say how do you do to you, openly?""Only because they, my charge and her mother who has come to join us for a few days before sailing for America, would be eager to make your acquaintance. They are deep, just at present, in the discussion of gowns ordered for the young lady at Callot Soeurs, and have forgotten that I exist. Oh! Mac, but it's dreadful! Hush! Look away for a moment. Yes, Miss Conners, I have no doubt the things from Paris will arrive before we leave for Countess Fleury's. I will write to-morrow certainly, and telegraph too, if you think so. Now they have begun again to bicker about trifles, I am free again. I don't want to bother you. I won't ask you to come and see me. I heard who are in your party, and I understand. I wish you all joy

and success in the new life. I recognized her, too. She is not thinking of you now, though, so you need not fear.""There is nothing settled, I am not afraid," he answered nettled by her tone.For Margot was indeed a thousand leagues distant from him in thought. She had turned away her graceful head and was lost in yearning reverie. Oh! to see Stelvio, was the burden of her thoughts. In this absorption, she did not observe a new stir in the region of the mysterious boat sending down its spirals of quivering emerald into the stream. She was recalled to the present by the musicians aboard of it striking the preliminary chords of the well-remembered "Una furtiva lagrime," than which no air was more intimately associated with her lover. All talk from the other boats ceased instantly, all heads were turned in rapt attention as the voice of an unseen man broke into the opening phrase of this infinitely wailing and appealing song.An electric thrill ran through Margot! She sat upright trembling, yearning; not because it carried her back to the summer night on the flowery terrace above Lake Como where she had first heard Stelvio sing, but

because, unless her ears tricked her, this was Stelvio singing now! Stelvio and none other! As she listened, Margot forced herself to sit as if turned to stone. So tumultuous her feeling, she dared not look a second time at the masked boat. Every note seemed to her imagination to be addressed to her reproachfully. When the song ended, and a storm of hand-clapping and vivas greeted the singer from the gondolas now gathered to form a shadowy bridge across the canal, Mrs. Clandeboye turned toward her companions."Wasn't it adorable? My friends say they hear from their gondolier it is a tenor in training for the opera at Milan, who is amusing himself in this way. All the other singers on the boats have gone into eclipse, you see, and betaken themselves far up the Canal. He had sung once before we came, but no one has caught even a glimpse of him. The odd part of it is, his voice reminds me of some one's, I can't think whose, but then I don't pretend to be a musical virtuoso. We have had no such treat, Miss Methuen, since the night Count Stelvio sang for us at Countess Fleury's. There! that is what this man brings back to me--Stelvio! Strange there should be two voices so much alike--both with

the violin quality--both going straight to the heartstrings and twanging on them without mercy. Even I felt ready to cry over him! It just shows what we said about Stelvio was true. He could do anything with a great audience. And instead, family pride keeps him shut up in that dreadfully dreary old villa, hugging his curios and his Biberon--""Hush!" said someone from a near-by gondola. He is going to sing again."This time it was something, to their surprise, in English. Simple words, a simple melody, phrased as only a true artist can do it, to make every word and shade of meaning tell. Better than all, the song lacked that Italian mispronunciation of the mother-tongue so often marring the performance of trained professionals of Anglo-Saxon origin."Time flies. The swift hours hurry byAnd speed us on to untried ways;New seasons ripen, perish, die,And yet love stays."Time flies. In vain our prayers, our tearsWe cannot tempt him to delays;Down to the past he bears the years,And yet love stays."Time flies. He steals our pulsing youthHe robs us of our care-free daysHe takes away our trust and truth.And yet love stays!""'Takes away our trust and truth.' Ah! it is not Time that has done him this wrong, but I!" said the girl within herself. Her fingers interlaced, she leaned forward, the hot blood dyeing her cheeks and lips in a crimson flood, a whirlwind of emotion sweeping over her brain. To hear him, to know that his soul was calling out to her, that he had followed her for this, and yet remain silent as a graven image, how could she bear it? The recollection of the moment when the supremest charm life holds was extended to her, when she had almost snatched, then let it go, was overpowering. Was all her life henceforth to be darkened because of that foolish letter she had written? How might she undo the effect of it? How bring him back to her--how, indeed?"Yes, Mrs. Clandeboye," she answered, finally becoming aware that the lady had addressed her and was waiting for an answer."I only said I supposed the collection-bag will now be handed around among the gondolas, and nobody will

begrudge what they put in it. A very ingenious method of filling empty pockets, our budding Caruso has fallen upon. Probably he gambled and dissipated away his last lira, poor wretch, before he dropped to this!""How can you--" began the girl flaming with wrath, then choking herself into silence. She wanted to say "how dare you?""Mrs. Clandeboye's theory seems to me unhappily the correct one," added McPhail, feeling in the darkness for his gold. To his relief, the gondola containing Miss Carteret had stolen out of the ranks after the last song, her patroness avowing that she "felt her neuralgia coming on." He could afford to be generous.While Margot was trying to master her indignation, the boat with the green lanterns still showing no sign of life aboard save for the two oarsmen who picked their way silently among the gondolas, proceeded also to take its departure from the flotilla, disappearing almost immediately in the gloom of a side-canal."No collection!" exclaimed Mrs. Clandeboye. "Wonders will never cease. Just when we were all prepared to squander our cash after our emotions. It is really very odd. If ever I see Count Stelvio again, I mean to ask him if he has a twin brother with a twin

voice to his somewhere adrift on the stream of life. It must be a family trait of theirs to refuse contributions to their impecunious condition, judging at least from Mr. McPhail's non-success in obtaining the coveted Biberon.""In my opinion, Count Stelvio is to be admired for preferring to hold to the traditions of his family, rather than barter them in a mere mercantile transaction," said Margot, stung by the light contempt in the Englishwoman's tone."I am sorry to dispel a romantic illusion," answered McPhail, deliberately. "But I fear Count Stelvio has found it impossible to live up to his high ideals, since three days ago he accepted my price for the Biberon which has already started on its voyage to America."Margot started as if she had been shot."And you never told us!" cried Mrs. Clandeboye, "There is something in men after all. How grand and proud you must be feeling, and as to Count Stelvio, that accounts for our not seeing him again. He is no doubt in mourning for his loss. But pray, how did you ever manage to succeed?""It is only another illustration of the patent fact

that all comes to him who knows how to wait," said McPhail, with a certain triumph in his tone. It appeared to him indeed that everything considered, he was coming out of this dubious evening better than he had supposed!CHAPTER X.LONG after the rest of the hotel guests had put out the lights of their respective floors; when the last music boat had ceased its distracting repetition of "Non ver," "Funiculi, Funicula," and the rest of them; when the glorious majesty of night had been left to reign undisturbed over the darkly flowing tides of the water city, a poor sorrowing young girl sat at her high casement looking out upon slumbering Venice. Never, if she lived to a green old age, could Margot Methuen forget the vigil of that night! For it is to youth, after all, that sorrow and disappointment loom largest in this world. In later years, human nature knows what to expect of its fellow beings and of the decrees of Destiny. The blow falls, the iron sears deeply, but life is inexorable and must be lived. What one has had and may have no more, passes to join the great procession of accomplished joys; it is of what is left that

experience sets to work reforming and recasting remnants into the semblance of the heart's desire.Margot in her present distress, saw comfort nowhere and asked for none. For upon reaching her bedroom after the exciting experience of hearing Stelvio sing upon the Grand Canal, she had found on her dressing table the letter addressed by him to her aunt's care, and sitting under the meagre light of an electric bulb suspended by the management of the hotel far beyond likelihood of illuminating aught below, read it with breathless eagerness. In a few words, Stelvio told her of the sudden illness that had kept him from her side; of his grief and bitter disappointment that she had given him no chance to explain himself; of his resistance of the immediate temptation to follow her and offer these facts in person; and, finally--to her complete despair--of his acceptance of her farewell."What you have decreed as to our separation," the letter ran, "I have no alternative but to accept with the best grace I can muster. Nothing would make me bring distress upon you and those you love, by a selfish insistence upon my love for you. To think that through me, whichever way you turn shows only misery, would be always a source of self-reproach. If, since we parted,

circumstances have so shaped themselves that I am now in a position to offer you a lot more worthy of you than before, I still see that it is one your family would consider far below your deserts or their expectations. In our country I think people consider more than with you those who have given them birth, and I sympathise with your high sense of duty to your parents. Never, never would I ask you to sacrifice them to me. On the contrary, I can bid you go back to be their joy and comfort, forgetting one who grieves that his love has given you such pain. I should be a poor sort of fellow if I could not bear this blow, and you must think of me as standing up after it and going back to my life-work with no ill-feeling or vain regret. Least of all could I fail to think of you as other than my friend."But before you pass from my life, I am going to indulge in a last weakness. I shall accompany this letter to Venice, hang around your hotel till I have one more look at you, and then--do something foolish, reckless, I know not what, to put myself in touch with you, without actually speaking. I must make you feel for or with me just once more. It seems so blank and wretched to part forever, without one last thrill of the feeling we had for each other during the blest half

hour in the Court of Hermes. . . . After that, I go, I give you up, yet long as you may live, you will never have had any one to love you better. I kiss your wonderful little white hands, though I may never kiss your face."His name followed, fearlessly signed in full. Margot knew what method he had fallen upon, poor boy, to let song speak to her heart from his! And now he was gone, there was no dignified method of recalling him, their break was utter, final! She wondered, leaning from her window under the starlight where in this lovely floating city he slept that night? She longed to send her spirit out to meet his and mingle with it. She wished they might have died together rather than live separate. Margot, in short, committed all the extravagances of imagination of which a baffled first love is capable, and then, poor child, towards morning consented to take her very real suffering to bed.She had not yet undressed, and in the act of unfastening her belt let fall from it the letter from her sister in America forgotten during these hours of distress. Self-reproached for her neglect, Margot stooped to pick up poor Jessy's missive, feeling little in tune with its probable contents. To her surprise, the en-

velope proved to have been addressed, only, by Jessy, the enclosure of eight closely written pages, being in her mother's slanting Italian hand, almost unreadable by the present light. Margot, with feelings that may be imagined, succeeded in deciphering what follows here:"Oh! my darling child, my sweetest little one, what have I got to write you? You know your father's habit of looking over my letters to you and adding a postscript for himself. To avoid this, I am writing on Jessy's table in her room, and she will forward it, though you wouldn't believe we have come to such a dreadful state of things that even a five-cent stamp has to be considered amongst us. Yes, we are as poor as the poorest, and the most wretched part of all is that Doctor Wiles who has just seen dearest papa, tells me and the girls that unless he stops office work for a while, he will break down utterly, and be an invalid for the rest of his life. I have cried until I am sick. None of us dare tell dear papa, and we've begged the doctor not to do so until we can think what to do. For his salary, small as it is, is all that stands between us and starvation. Dr. Wiles says if papa can be sent away to the country till the hot weather passes, eat good food and sleep unbrokenly, he has a chance of es-

caping an immediate collapse. But I see and know better than any doctor could tell me that what he needs is to give up the office permanently, though that, he declares he can never, never do, and prefers to die in harness. Oh! my child, how often do I wish now that poor papa had been guided by my advice, and had never gone into those dreadful speculations in mining-stock that ate up all our patrimony! When I think what a blessed comfort even a little of that money would bring us now! But he won't even let me mention the subject; it seems to have the strangest effect of exciting him to anger against me and everybody; especially against our good friend Mr. McPhail, whom I must say, Margot, has been everything that is delicate and considerate to me. I really can't understand dearest papa's unkind attitude toward Mr. McPhail. You may be sure I haven't ventured to tell him the numberless generous things McPhail has done for us, but there is one, my precious child, I shall have to confess to you. Blame me if you must, but pity and pardon your poor unhappy mother. When we were so dreadfully behindhand last month, what with your brother's illness and all that, I let Mr. McPhail lend me some money, expecting to repay it by degrees. Margot, if you will be-

lieve me, what is left of that money is what we are living upon now! Poor papa, as you know, always gives me his salary when he draws it at the end of the month, and he does not dream how long it must be before we can possibly get back to living upon that small sum even as poorly as before. The bills had simply piled up, and I dared not let him see them. Some of them had to be paid at once and others still hang on. But for our kind noble friend, we should be in the extreme of misery. And when I think that Harmony Hall with the servants and horses is waiting for us, not a soul to enjoy it, and that our being there would be a protection to the place, and your father could oversee the farm work, exactly what he loves to do, and be out all day in the fresh air, do you wonder that I cry out to you to try and help us? Do try and think more patiently and kindly of the man who has so long loved you. Don't think me an unnatural mother, my precious child. You are my last born, my very dearest, and I do want one of you, at least, to be spared all the miseries of poverty like ours. Mr. McPhail told me, before he left, that he was going to ask you again, and begged me to speak a good word for him. A son could not have been gentler, more devoted, and I believe he would make you a

splendid husband. Oh! Margot, when you have seen life as I have, you will know that almost no woman living ever gets all she expects in marriage. She is bound to be disillusioned, disappointed, somewhere. One has to look at a man as he is, with all his faults and shortcomings and virtues and attractions heaped together, and decide whether to bear with him or let everything go to wreck by fighting against him. The love part of it, the girl's dream of being a queen, an idol, lasts so short a time in most cases! With you I believe it would be a different tale. Angus McPhail worships the ground you tread on, he is prepared to do everything to make you happy, and his first wish, after that, is to relieve your father's distressing situation, by placing him in charge of Harmony Hall and the estate as manager, with a salary of the most liberal description. It is you only who could win your father to take this offer, not from Mr. McPhail's but from your own hand. McPhail proposes to settle the estate upon you as a marriage gift, to do with as you please."So far as this Margot had deciphered her mother's pinched and painful scrawl. At this point she let it

fall, and burst into bitter weeping, the first tears she had shed during the whole of that piteous night!And then Margot went back to her open window, and leaning out, gazed at the wondrous beauty of the scene, till a pink light came upon the horizon over beyond the Campanile on Isola S. Georgio, and the gondoliers at the station near the hotel, awoke up and began to quarrel with each other fearfully over their preparations for the day. Worn out with fatigue and resolution, the girl withdrew from her post, and betook herself to bed.It was eleven o'clock of a brilliant June morning when her aunt's maid Lydia came in with a cup of chocolate and a roll."I have been twice before, Miss Methuen," the woman said, "but you were so sound asleep, Mrs. Methuen told me not to arouse you. Mrs. Methuen wishes me to say that they are starting at a little before twelve for Chioggia, where they are to take luncheon in the open air. There's to be a motor boat to take you, and oh if you please, miss, Mr. McPhail's valet has just handed me this little parcel for you, there's a card inside.""You may put the parcel on my dressing table, Lydia," responded Margot, without visible emotion.

"And the tray with my chocolate here beside the bed. I shall need nothing more."The maid did as she was bid, going out disappointed. The whole party was accustomed to look for dazzling surprises in the lightest act of their Monte Christo host, and Lydia did long to see inside that parcel!Of the suite retained by McPhail for his guests' accommodation, Margot's room was the one boasting of most comfort and elegance. When she now passed into her luxurious modern salle de bain with its marble fittings, a stabbing thought came to her of the family at home in their cramped quarters waiting turns for the use of a worn old zinc-lined tub. She could even see the pattern of the threadbare crash towel assigned to each person, as it flopped upon its nail driven into the shabby tiled paper of the bathroom!Until nearly ready to go out, she did not open McPhail's parcel. It proved to contain a small square box covered with pale rose-coloured moiré antique, a trifle of the variety that brings to the eyes of a happy wholesome young girl the light of anticipatory rapture. Margot hesitated, sighed, then opened it. There upon its rose velvet background, lay a square purse of golden meshes, its intersections set with emeralds, the chain to

suspend it around the neck a miracle of Venetian craftsmanship in emeralds and pearls. For a moment Margot's face lit with the pleasure of surveying the exquisite thing, which she remembered to have seen in a jeweller's window in the Piazza, the day before. (Mrs. Clandeboye had said in commenting upon it, that it was fit for a bridal present to a queen!)Then her eye fell upon the giver's card, upon which he had pencilled a few words, begging her to wear this trifle for his sake, in token that she had at least learned to look more kindly upon his efforts to give her pleasure. A vivid blush ran up into the roots of her hair, as with a desperate effort at self-mastery, she took the chain and threw it over her shoulders.Lydia had to return, bearing Mrs. Methuen's request that their young lady would hurry, since all of the others were assembled and awaiting her in the lower ball of the hotel. Margot, who wore that day a thin white muslin covered with a light tracery of embroidery (one of Aunt Katrina's aesthetic contributions to her wardrobe which that beauty-loving lady could never hope to duplicate with similarly pleasing results in the case of her legitimate heir, Miss Minnie Fothergill!)

hastily put on a large pale green hat of Neapolitan straw wreathed with white roses, which, set aslant according to capricious fashion upon the splendid waves of her ruddy hair, added the exact touch of style and colour needful to intensify her radiancy of young beauty. No trace of her lonely vigil marred her blooming cheeks and lips. Her head was carried high, a spark of proud resolve gleamed in her eye. Only a closer, more accurate observer than any likely to look upon her face that day would have said that she had grown older in a night.Unfurling a large white frilled parasol, she took her place with intrepidity in the line of guests waiting on the steps to dispose of themselves in the gondolas that were to conduct the party to the place of rendezvous at the Piazzetta. To her lot in transit fell the companionship of her aunt and M. Amadou, the young French artist provided to meet their need of "an extra man" through the flagging interest of his welcome patroness, Countess Fleury. McPhail, last to embark in the gondola where sat his own man-servant keeping guard over sundry hampers and boxes of tempting exterior, together with wraps and parasols, had bestowed upon the lady of his love as she appeared among them

a single all-comprehending glance. When he espied the ripple and glitter of his emerald chain blending with the transparent laces and embroideries that but half veiled her beautiful neck, his face kindled with a rapture that to do him justice, was almost humble. She had given him the tips of a long white glove as she stepped in to her place, and he was astonished at her cool and collected speech."I will take another time to thank you for your lovely present," she said. "And what a perfect day you have secured for us! Bright--but not too bright. Cool, too, with that heavenly breeze from the Adriatic! Please forgive me, Aunt Katrina, for keeping you all waiting."In her relief at finding herself alone with her aunt and young Monsieur Amadou, the evil day of further re-encounter with her host ever so little postponed, Margot chatted incessantly, with a charm and vivacity that bowled over the susceptible Amadou and astonished Mrs. Methuen. Now, for the first time, upon lifting her lorgnon to survey the animated scene as they approached the Piazzetta, the lady beheld around Margot's neck the badge of her changed relation to McPhail. She had been told by him of the tentative gift, and had

warned him that it would probably be returned without a moment's consideration. That she beheld the costly trifle now actually worn by Margot, revealed to her a new and startling chapter of her niece's life story. Quickly connecting this circumstance with the two letters Margot had received overnight, she felt assured that the one from Stelvio had embodied his final farewell, while that from the girl's sister must have precipitated her determination to come to the relief of her distressed family.It must not be supposed that Mrs. Wilfred Methuen was without natural feeling in her relation to the case. She had taken Margot as an experiment, and had long realized the woful contrast of the existence awaiting her on the inevitable return to her father's home. Had it been possible, how gladly would she have transferred to this charming and beautiful young person the gifts of fortune awaiting Miss Minnie Fothergill, who, it must be owned, did not in the least delight or satisfy her aunt. As a provision for Margot's future, the idea of the marriage with McPhail had been swallowed--nay gulped--by Mrs. Methuen as an unpalatable but very necessary pill. She could only hope that the man's genuine devotion to her niece, his large generosity to

her family would in the end atone for his other less desirable qualities as a husband. The episode with Count Stelvio upon which she had hardly, at first, bestowed serious thought, had in the last few days, loomed large and ominous before her mental gaze. And now, the sight of Margot appearing upon this brilliant summer day in fullest beauty and apparent good spirits with a token so patent of her determination to accept her American suitor, brought a confusion, not altogether pleasing, to Aunt Katrina's busy brain.The expression of McPhail's face, as he helped them ashore at the steps of the Piazzetta, went far to convince her that Margot had already revealed to him this signal mark of her resolve to favour him. He was proud, joyous, and yet so much in check that Mrs. Methuen thought he had never appeared to so great advantage. He made no attempt to emphasize his desire that Margot should reign as the chief lady of his party, letting her pass ahead in company with Monsieur Amadou, whilst he himself lingered looking over the lagune as if awaiting some one else."Aren't we all here?" said Mrs. Methuen. "I thought our gondola was the last.""I have been fortunate enough to secure an addi-
Margot, pale and sad, came into the room holding out her hand to
him in shy greeting. -- Page 295Illustration included in Harrison's The
Count and the Congressman.
tion to our number," answered McPhail, "in the persons of two American ladies, Miss Carteret of Washington, and her charge, Miss Conners.""The young person Countess Fleury designs for Count Stelvio," interposed Mrs. Clandeboye who was standing near. "And as Miss Conners and her chaperon are now on their way to visit our clever friend, who knows what may come out of her diplomacy? But imagine the Chicago maiden under the mouldering roof of Far Niente. All of her dollars could not make it a tolerable shelter for her.""I have a surprise for you," said Amadou. "This morning early, I went to the station to meet a friend from Paris, and whom should I see getting into the train for Milan but Count Stelvio himself? He looked pale and ill, and as if he wanted greetings from nobody, so I did not let him see that I saw him. Heavens what a head that man carries on his shoulders. Perfection in line and poise and tinting! It will be a very lucky Mlle Conners who gets such a return for her American gold. As a decorative object in a home, his value is equal to that of his own Biberon.""Now, Mr. McPhail's Biberon," said Mrs. Clandeboye nodding gaily toward their host. "But Stelvio

in Venice--? It must then have been he--but no, impossible, he would never--listen, Mrs. Methuen and Margot, our Italian Edgar of Ravenswood has actually been here overnight! Shabby fellow, not to give us a call in passing. Put the fact of his presence in Venice beside our fancy that it was his voice that enraptured the listeners on the Canal last night, and what is the result? That last song was a wail that has ever since been ringing in my ears.""You aren't well?" asked McPhail of Margot who had turned away her head. So far was he from suspecting in this poverty-stricken foreigner a rival to his own solid U. S. attractions, that it did not occur to him to connect her sudden pallor with the mention of Stelvio's name."Oh! yes, I am well. I mean to thoroughly enjoy our day," she protested gaily as many a woman has done before her, with a gnawing pain hidden in her heart. "And so this is the Rosa Maria awaiting us? What a miracle of spotless decks and shining brass-work, and the little sailors look as if they were dressed to sell at a bazaar. Mayn't I step aboard, please, or must we wait ashore for Miss Carteret?""You shall be first to take possession," he answered,

charmed with her graciousness. She let him conduct her down the steps, and about the jaunty craft, finally installing herself in a wicker chair under the awning of green and white, he in his snowy ducks and straw hat standing to survey her with rapturous approval in his gaze."She has made up her mind, poor dear," thought Mrs. Methuen, taking in this little scene from her position on the quay. "I wish it could have been Jessy (who would have jumped at him!) or either of the others. Why has he persisted in wanting Margot, and Margot only! If men only realized what they get in marrying beauties. The whole world puts her first and thinks it fair game to make him fall behind. Whereas a nice, plain, thankful, adoring wife--but Jessy--no, I couldn't have stood Jessy. Vapid, commonplace, shreds and patches in her clothes and talk.--Even Minnie Fothergill has ideas--!""I have not dared let you see how happy it has made me that you wear my poor little present," McPhail was saying under his breath to Margot.Margot started. While he had, been answering her questions about the boat, the distance to Chioggia, and the like, in her mind had been echoing the tender sweet-

ness of the refrain in Stelvio's voice. "And yet Love stays!"She had tried to fancy Angus McPhail committing the rash and reckless act of sending his songs afar on the wing of brooding night in the trust that they might meet Love's ear--and had failed, signally."I--I--wanted to please you," she said faltering. "You see they have written me from home all that you are to them, and I couldn't rest till I had in part discharged the obligation to those I love.""Again and again have I told you there could be no sense of obligation if you felt to me as I do to you," he began in a passionate undertone.She interrupted him almost calmly."Oh! but you see that could not be--could never be. It is because I know it so painfully well, that I feel ashamed even to try to let you think I am changed really.""Give me yourself, and I'll be content to wait and work till you do "change really," he said, with the same odd tremor in his voice."You would not be afraid?""I have many faults, but that doesn't happen to be one of them. Try me.""I am trying myself first. As I speak to you now, and hear such words from you as these, I seem indeed to be someone other than myself. Do you think you could be good enough to let me stop a little while now, and perhaps begin again later.""Haven't I shown that I can wait?" he exclaimed, charmed by the wistful sweetness of her look upward into his face. Her appeal brought to the surface the best he had of consideration, and Margot felt instinctively that he held her in all respect, and would not presume upon her half-way move in his direction so pathetically restrained by her own maidenly alarms.The appearance upon the scene of Miss Carteret looking more fair, slim and distinguée, in her simple summer frock through contrast with her podgy charge clad in a Paris confection of elaborated openwork, put an end to their talk, at the same time that it precipitated the immediate departure of the Rosa Maria from the quay. Two or three men recruited from an American yacht in harbor having already presented themselves, the party lost no time in settling down in detachments of twos or threes upon benches or chairs deliciously shaded by the green striped canopy of the chief deck. At the same moment it apparently occurred to the all-accom-

plished Chapman to issue forth from the cabin bearing a tray with sundry ice-beaded glasses at which nobody looked twice before seeming willing to experiment in their cooling contents. In the ensuing general chorus of chat and laughter, individual conversations had no place."So that is the famous heiress?" whispered a merry young fellow in Margot's ear. "She certainly needs all she is reputed to possess to carry her through life. And a mere man could never be made to understand why the poor thing should be obliged to wear a dress all over holes that her maid has had to sew up before she started.""I can't hope to initiate you into the mysteries and cost of "broderie Anglaise" said Margot. "Such a frock as Miss Conners is wearing to-day, is coveted by all average womenkind, and really it becomes her very well--at least fairly well.""They tell me she is going on from Venice for a visit to an old friend of my mother's, Countess Fleury, who is known to be an autocratic match-maker, and that she will end by marrying di Stelvio. Do you know him, by the way? Man who came out to Washington

last year, and spent a few days at Newport, at my mother's house?""I have met Count Stelvio," answered Margot faintly."If he takes this girl, as seems probable, since la Fleury manages the affair, imagine their coming into a room together--he an ideal of old Greek beauty linked for life to a stout, thick-skinned female like that, who cannot open her mouth without a twang of provincial speech. I have been around the world since I started on my travels in Langdon's yacht, and have seen some varied phases of human society, but as yet, nothing so incongruous as this alliance would seem to be. Why can't she stay at home and bestow her "popper's" millions upon some worthy ambitious young American of whom there are hundreds in our colleges wanting only capital to make them rise to the top in American society.""What is the top of American society?" said Margot, glad of a change of theme. "From your standpoint of Newport high life, for instance, I should think a reasonable being might be satisfied to remain below it. But I didn't expect to find a philosopher

on Mr. Langdon's yacht, and perhaps you are not all as black as you're painted in yellow journals.""A few of us still leaven the mass of pushing plutocrats," he answered. "But to return to Stelvio, I've a bit of gossip for you. They say it was he who sang so divinely on the Canal last night in the masked boat with the emerald lanterns. An artist's freak, of course, but what a treat for the rest of us! Some friends of mine followed the boat and saw him get out at his hotel. Langdon tried to coax him to come off with us on the yacht, but he declined, and left Venice this morning. Kind of voice that draws one's soul out of one, isn't it? If I were a sentimental creature I'd say it sounded like a spirit shut out from the haunts of mortals pleading with one he loved to come after him.""You will let me shake hands with you, for Washington's sake?" said Miss Betty Carteret, crossing the deck at this juncture to stand before Margot in a very winning and wholly friendly attitude. "Besides, I have known your mother before she stopped going out to the regret of all her friends. And I am actually a fourth cousin of your father's. We Virginians are all tangled up in a skein of relationships, you see. I have

blamed myself that I never met you last winter when you were first engaged in the game of winning hearts."Someone else at that moment engaging the attention of Margot's late interlocutor, Miss Carteret slipped gracefully into the seat he had vacated upon her coming up."Isn't this breeze from the Adriatic refreshing?" she went on, hardly waiting for the young girl's answer. "And the run down from the Lido is always so beautiful. Venice melting into the background like a dream city, all the rest blue upon blue, except for the white or red or tawny sails, and the black hulks of the gondolas. I hear you are just from Como--where we go to-morrow--and that you have been, as we say on our side, "the greatest possible success." Countess Fleury wrote us about you first. She is a delightful dear, isn't she? What a dreadful pity that life can't be always moonlight and roses, or azure skies blending with azure waters, and one's troubles and responsibilities three thousand miles away! But it can't, worse luck, and the main thing is to accept realities bravely, and let the beautiful phases of our present experience go to glorify the prosaic and depressing part to come.""Thank you for saying that!" flashed the girl. She

had not expected it from the source. It almost seemed as if the older woman had acted upon some impulse of cheer and consolation, springing from a quick divination of Margot's mental conflict. In this moment of isolation and recoil, a touch of human sympathy was inexpressibly welcome."Ah! my dear!" cried Miss Carteret. "If you only knew what you bring back? You are such a thorough type of our class--and I might have been so different, had there been anyone to--there, there! Let us say no more. It's a far cry from here to old Virginia where we both began life. Let's be friends as we are compatriots."They talked for a while upon general topics, until McPhail whose anxious eye had been covertly upon the two, could bear it no longer and crossed the deck to stand beside them. A glance revealed to him that Betty was showing her best, most generous self to the girl who had supplanted her, and he looked at her gratefully. He felt rewarded for the impulse to include her in his party, which had caused him on returning to his hotel the night before, to write a cordial note of invitation for Miss Carteret and her charge. He had a little sense of shame at having fancied this invitation

might save him future annoyance at her hands, since in his letter-case he held a final note from her, written after the episode of his "bridge dinner" in Washington, in which she had bravely freed him forevermore from all obligations of fidelity to her. That he had not Betty Carteret's fine understanding of the nature of a pledge was perhaps not entirely his fault. He now brightened enormously, stopped by the two ladies for a time, and when called away by the necessity of looking after other guests, bestowed upon Miss Carteret a second look eloquent with gratitude."Now I must no longer keep away from you the men whom I see hovering about looking as if they wished me at the Antipodes," said Miss Carteret."Oh! don't go!" exclaimed Margot, who of all the men present dreaded most the return of the one who had just left them. "Talking to you has made me think of home and my own people in the nicest way, and besides, if you only knew, it has helped me in a resolve I have taken to let nothing keep me from putting them always first.""I believe I do know," said Miss Carteret, greatly moved by what she read in the frightened appeal of the face uplifted to hers. "And, dear child, I wish with

all my heart I could help you more tangibly. Will it comfort you to believe that the man you are going to accept as a lover loves you with such a deep and unselfish passion as he has never felt before? That he is capable of the largest generosities, and will never separate or wean you from those you love, and that in marrying him you are assuming a wide opportunity for good that he will try to maintain always.""You think so?" asked the girl, tears starting to her eyes."I am sure," answered Betty Carteret; and then for a few moments before separating, each woman gazed over the little steamer's rail at a panorama of sunbathed sky and water to which neither assuredly gave a thought!CHAPTER XI.IT was mid-August and summer held burning sway over the lawns and gardens of the old Virginian mansion perched upon a wooded hill-top, whose white colonnades and walls had for over a hundred years stood as a landmark to the voyagers upon the Potomac river-boats, and were revered by the humbler neighbours as a visible sign and seal of the high ideal of landed aristocracy still dominant over the popular mind of the venerable State. In the eyes of the country people the trivial fact that old Harmony Hall had drifted out of possession of the Methuen family, its Colonial owners, into that of a man of yesterday with no grandfathers in particular who happened to be in the Congress of the United States, did not affect their persistent habit of referring to it as "the grand old Methuen place, you know, where General Washington was as much at home as at Mount Vernon."The neighbourhood had not seen much in late years

of any Methuen. Years ago, Wilfred, the handsome rover had sold out his share of the estate to Augustin, his elder brother, had married a rich lady up "Nawth" and spent most of his time travelling with her in "Eurrup" until he died. Augustin, sad to say, had gone steadily down hill in point of fortune. "A perfect gentleman, but no faculty," was the way they spoke of him. "Clerk in one of the Departments at Wash'n't'n," they believed. "Family all scattered, the boys having no interest in old Virginia, anyway, regular Westerners they had become, the girls getting to be old maids, all except the youngest, the beauty, she that was 'took abroad' by Wilfred Methuen's widow. Living image, ''twas said,' of her famous Colonial great-aunt, the belle of Williamsburg and the lower James, also a Margot Methuen!" Every farmer's wife and petty tenant in the Harmony Hall district knew the traditions of the first Margot Methuen, and speculated as to whether Augustin's youngest wasn't going to build up the family fortunes by a first-rate match. A poor picture of the young lady cut from the Sunday column of a Washington Society journal was a part of the decoration of every farm-house best room for miles around the limits of Harmony Hall.During the previous autumn, workmen had been set to work at the decayed old dwelling, strengthening beams, enlarging wings and roofs, putting in modern plumbing and tanks for acetylene gas, laying new floors, introducing pipes for steam heat into halls and corridors hitherto glacial at mid-winter; and rebuilding entirely a glass room or winter garden, about which tradition told proud tales of its having been added in bygone days by a travelled Methuen who had seen its original in a Russian palace.For many a long year this annex had been an eyesore, a wrecked haunt, for broken furniture and accumulated household debris, cobwebs, dust and bats. Now, to the awesome astonishment of those privileged to behold it, arose again a crystal dome intended to overarch in winter a steam-warmed bower of greenery with walks of golden sand, a fountain surrounded by great-leafed Egyptian plants, roses trained over green trellis work upon the walls, and tall palms and bamboos planted in clumps amid couches, chairs and tables of jaunty wicker-work! The country now, indeed, sat up and began to look with respect upon the new proprietor of old Harmony.After the restoration of the house, came that of the

grounds. A landscape gardener "all the way from New York," took in charge hedges, paths, shrubbery, flower beds, box-walks and mazes, bringing order out of chaos, giving employment to more men than the neighbourhood could supply and in the end convincing even the grumblers against change that he was more inveterate than they in keeping to the models of the past. When the stables came in for their share of renovation, and were further supplemented by a smart and capacious garage up to date, the gossips who peeped at these wonders went home wagging their heads as who should say--"the last touch has been put!"And still no owner made his appearance on the scene. It was whispered that he had been there in company with his architect and landscape gardener, between two boats, and had expressed himself as satisfied in a perfunctory sort of way. "A flashy man, kind o' handsome for them as likes that style," pronounced Miss Elvira Weekes who lived in the little red cottage near the landing and had special opportunities for observation of visiting strangers. "I reckon he'd never 'a' done all this for his lonesome, and so we'd just better be lookin' out for a Mrs. McPhail by the time the old furniture gets red up."But the old furniture was covered and polished, old rugs and engravings and prints were put in place, the summer flowers were all a-bloom, before any sign of tenancy of the beautiful dwelling presented itself to Miss Elvira Weekes. She had seen a few respectable servants take possession, but all efforts at sociability with them had proved provokingly futile.And at last on this day of August, Miss Elvira's wildest hopes of excitement were destined to meet gratification. Up the hill from the boat-wharf wended a procession consisting of three young ladies, afoot, followed by an ambulance in which lay extended the spare and wasted form of a half-unconscious man attended by nurse and doctor, and the new Hall carriage brought up the rear containing an older lady veiled and weeping.Poor Mrs. Methuen was come into her desired kingdom at last, but under sad disabilities! For some weeks, her husband had lain at the point of death, and they had brought him back to his birthplace in the hope of coaxing him to live. It was a collapse of nerves reacting upon the body, and since his sudden seizure that had summoned Margot home directly after her visit to Venice, poor Mr. Methuen had shown but little recognition of passing events. Mrs. Wilfred Methuen who

promptly and graciously accompanied her niece to Washington, had lingered there long enough to find she could be of no personal service, and with a handsome present to her sister-in-law sufficient to tide her over the exigencies of such an illness, had withdrawn to Manchester-by-the-sea, which she found "more endurable than most American summer places." She had borne with perfect good humour the interruption of her plans; had allowed Mr. McPhail to make arrangements for their voyage home but suggested that he himself had better return by a later steamer, to which dictum McPhail gave reluctant assent. It was observable by him and Margot, that the good lady was distinctly nervous about her visit to the Massachusetts coast, from which both argued that she had resolved on this occasion to make a virtue of impending necessity, and effect a meeting with her future charge, Miss Minnie Fothergill.How thankfully Margot had subscribed to her aunt's decision that McPhail might not accompany them, she hardly realised. Her whole mind and heart were filled to overflowing with distress at her father's condition. She had found him in a hospital, their poor little home proving inadequate to give shelter to his case. Every day while she walked over scorching pavements

to visit him, she had thought not of the promise to marry him she had finally given McPhail on their way back from Chioggia on the Rosa Maria, but of the immediate absorbing present. Would her dear one be living another day?The poverty, mean device, discomfort of her home, the wearisome iteration of her sisters' lament over their lack of prospect, the dazed despair of her mother, did not in those days affect her sensibly. The first threatening of the break of this tie that had always been supreme in her affection dwarfed all beside. As she sat in the waiting-room of the hospital her heart beating with dull fear as to what change might have come to the dear patient in the night, till the message came down to her by telephone to mount up to his ward, even the memory of Far Niente's enchanted garden and its master dwindled to insignificance. She could not, she dared not, trust herself to think of another love than that her father claimed.At last a day had come when Augustin Methuen was distinctly better. He recognized his child, welcomed her back with a faint smile, showed that he wanted her near him. His wife, the authorities did not venture as yet to trust at their patient's bedside.The next day, the physician in charge of Mr. Methuen had accompanied his daughter along the corridor and stopped beside her with his hand on the button of the lift."Yes, I think the worst is over, my dear young lady," he had said, while casting an eye of appreciation upon the extreme beauty and distinction of his visitor, so odd an offshoot from the overworn and wasted parent to whom he dared not propose the only scheme that occurred to him as probable to revive a crushed nervous system. "I wonder if I may tell you frankly what I counsel for Mr. Methuen; the one desirable, nay indispensable thing for his possible recovery.""You mean removal from town to a place where he may have fresh air and good country food," said Margot, steadily facing his hesitating gaze of inquiry.He was surprised at the confidence in her tone."Exactly. And truly, unless this can be conveniently arranged--""My mother had already spoken to me of the necessity," she interrupted him. "And I am glad to be able to tell you that as soon as you are willing for my father to be carried there, we shall take him to his old home on the Potomac.""Harmony Hall!" exclaimed the doctor, who knew all about McPhail's purchase and restoration of the celebrated old house. In fact McPhail had told him the facts one evening at the Metropolitan Club."Yes. My mother has consented to accept the place as a loan from the present owner. I ought to tell you, perhaps, that I am engaged to marry Mr. Angus. McPhail."Not even a momentary lowering of the crest. The astonishment of the good and clever medico was only equalled by his predominant feeling that Angus McPhail was the luckiest dog in Christendom."I have no wish that it should be kept a secret," pursued Miss Methuen. "My mother already looks upon Mr. McPhail as the kindest of sons, and upon his return shortly from Europe, the time of the marriage will be announced. You can see that we have everything to hope for, if my dear father's recovery is dependent upon change to a lovely and congenial spot.""Then the sooner we get him there the better," said the doctor cheerfully. "But in offering you my congratulations, Miss Methuen, together with every hope for a favorable issue from this illness of your father's--given the conditions that now seem to obtain--I

should remind you of one thing. You are not to expect any immediate recognition of place, or times or surroundings, from my patient. It will be weeks before he notices what is going on outside his bedroom. His good nurse will be his intermediary with his family and the outer world. He will probably not know he is not still in the hospital."For the first time the Doctor observed a token of ordinary girlish sensibility in Margot Methuen. A deep red flush ran up into her face, extending to the roots of her splendid rippled hair."That is what I am counting upon," she said with perfect dignity.The physician tried after she left him to understand her meaning, and finally gave it up. He had a pretty and petted daughter of his own, and while deciding that he would hardly be glad to give her in marriage to the Honourable Angus, it seemed to him that it was a very different thing with the broken-down and impoverished gentleman who lay prone on his cot, his earthly usefulness forever over, a lot of helpless women on his hands, his two sons barely able to keep themselves going in a far-distant city. Augustin Methuen, in short, 

could not afford to look down upon this match. His friends generally would consider it a Godsend.As for the extraordinarily calm and almost haughty young person, Methuen's daughter, the doctor could not fathom her attitude to the affair, and would not try. Next winter there would be a superb new hostess for Angus McPhail's dinners, and all the world would be raving of her beauty and surroundings. In the meantime the doctor would hasten arrangements to get poor Methuen out of town.When Margot for the first time told her mother what she had told the doctor a half hour previously, Mrs. Methuen grew quite faint with joy. A heavenly vista seemed to open before her. She even found herself lifting her child's hands to her poor pale lips and kissing them. She did not offer to kiss her face."Understand me, mother," said the girl, drawing back ashamed at this unusual demonstration. "I am doing this thing for my father. I had decided upon it when your last letter came to me in Venice, and at once told Mr. McPhail I would marry him some day, if only he would give me time to be used to the idea. I suppose he considers that we are engaged. But to-day,

when I felt that a way opened to take our poor darling where it might save his life to go--I was glad, grateful for the chance. I am going now to send a cable message to Mr. McPhail telling him to come home, that we are all moving down to Harmony Hall. I have money enough for the telegram--Aunt Katrina has been so generous--and I can't rest till I send it. I tell you--I can't rest.""Oh! my precious little one!" wailed Mrs. Methuen."Not tears, mother, I really can't stand that. And you must keep the girls from talking to me about it, mind. That is all I exact. Now we have loads to do, packing and so on and shutting up this house, so stir yourself to think of that, and nothing else.""Mayn't I even tell you that there's been a letter from Julia to-day, saying she is going to make another visit in Fauquier, and needn't be home till the end of August. The Tankervilles have invited her, thank Heaven. And there's something better. She's met Mr. Slacum again at the Tankervilles and he has prospects of a place in North Carolina with a decent salary; and he's told her just to wait a little while and see. Was there ever anything better; for Julia, I must say, was completely soured over that Slacum failure. Not even

to visit Harmony Hall would she leave Fauquier now. So we'll be at rest on her score for the present. Poor Maud and Jessy will go crazy with joy over Harmony, I expect, and as for me, that and your father's betterment to-day, have made me ten years younger, I do declare."As the little procession wound up to the high ground on which the Hall stood, and Margot keeping ahead of the limp Maud and Jessy, took in the full beauty and finish of the scene, her heart swelled with an excitement that was not altogether displeasing. All that McPhail had told her about it in the Frari, was more than justified by actuality. The ancient house had been made to live again, was endued with all its old-time stateliness. Gardens, orchards, fields, uplands, forest, nestled around it in the plentitude of summer's golden prime, the whole a "goodly heritage," linking past with present.Two servants, a man and a woman, quiet, discreet and pleasant of manner, were at the door to welcome them. These people had received their orders, and acted upon them strictly. The Methuens, whenever they signified their intention of visiting the place were to be

treated as if it were still their own. Margot, first to arrive upon the threshold, was deferred to as the leader of the party. When the bustle of transferring the invalid to the chamber where he had first seen light, was accomplished successfully, and his nurse left in charge, Mrs. Methuen with the young doctor and her daughters found awaiting them in the cool airy dining-room with its fittings of black oak, flowers looking in at the open windows, such a daintily spread meal as had not for months occurred to at least three of them as a possibility."It is so wonderful, my dears," cooed the mother. "It is like fairy work, when I remember this room as it was before we sold. Awfully shabby, yet nothing much seems changed, except their putting this lovely Turkish rug in the middle of the floor, and polishing up the furniture. There's old Aunt Kitty Davenant's Spode tea service behind the glass of the corner cupboard, I'll declare! In my time it was scattered all over the house, what the negroes had left of it. I'd no idea it would look so stylish brought together."Margot ate her clear soup, her sweetbread and broiled chicken feeling like a person who had been gently drugged. When they had finished, while yet her mother

and the girls nibbled on with their ecstasies over everything, she excused herself to go to her father's room. Finding the patient not only none the worse for his transfer, but sleeping more quietly, she sent the nurse into the adjoining dressing-room where her tray had been placed at her request."It is just beautiful how he's borne it," whispered Miss Belknap, smilingly as she went off on tiptoe. "Two or three quiet days in this sweet atmosphere and I'll warrant we'll feel our minds at rest about him."Left with the beloved sufferer, Margot stood in her strong and erect young beauty beside the old four-poster-bed with its tester of snowy netting, looking tenderly down at this unconscious form. The green shutters of all the windows save one were closed, leaving the room in cool twilight. Through the aperture left by the bowed shutters of the window toward the river, came a wandering breeze scented with mignonette. Margot started unpleasantly as she remembered how she had warmly approved of McPhail's idea of planting mignonette in quantities near the house, having long ago mentioned to him her peculiar fondness for its clean fragrance.There was nothing she could do for the sleeping sufferer, and the girl withdrew to the shelter of a "grand-

father" armchair covered in large flowered chintz, that stood near the open window. Leaning both arms upon the sill, she gazed out, hardly seeing for blinding tears, the fair landscape she had so long coveted.It was all over with her past, her brief passionate love-dream was forever put aside. Here, just here, was her duty, for this she had paid her great price. Never a word had come from Stelvio since the witching night on the Grand Canal in Venice, when his song had borne to her the burden of his passionate farewell. Things subsequent had moved so rapidly; the shock of her father's illness; the rushed voyage over; the terrible fortnight of hospital attendance in Washington, all had, combined to dull and dim her impressions of the heavenly weeks at Como. This was literally the first moment she had had to collect her ideas and breathe free of the goad of anxiety to get her father safely into a better atmosphere. But now that immediate pressure was removed, she was astonished and pained by the prompt recurrence of her memories of Stelvio. Everything he was, had done, or said, returned with resistless force to haunt and charm her imagination. And as she dwelt upon these delicious memories, farther and farther into

the limbo of forgotten disagreeables, receded the thought of the master of Harmony Hall.She drew suddenly out of these musings to recall that a letter from Aunt Katrina had been, according to her custom, tucked into her blouse unopened, when they had handed it to her on setting out for the boat. In her preoccupation with the invalid's removal, she had not thought of it again. Yet nothing now could be more welcome, more life-giving than one of Mrs. Wilfred Methuen's epistles, full of congenial sympathy, and scattered with reference to their joyous days of travel, and to people of the wider, outer world."Dear Aunt Katrina," thought Margot self-reproachfully. "I understand you better now. And but for your bountiful giving to our family, we should have been dependent upon Mr. McPhail for actually the moving down here. To think how I've kept you waiting!"The letter was long, full of everything the kind aunt could think of to cheer and encourage the late companion of her rambles in foreign parts. There was even a restrained but telling recital of her reunion with the serious and advanced Miss Minnie Fothergill. Margot could not but smile at this. And then came, unheralded,

certain phrases that made the reader's heart leap up: "A letter from Countess Fleury tells me that her neighbour, Count Stelvio, has left the Lake, for what point they are not informed. It is a popular belief, however, that he will next be heard of in the Engadine, in attendance upon Miss Carteret and the richissima Miss Conners. It seems to be a fact that while she was there, he was continually in her company, and that older folk who looked on ventured to hope that the dear, beautiful boy has at last seen the folly of dragging out a life of melancholy poverty, when, with the aid of the Connors millions he might--""Oh! he would never, never stoop to that!" Margot thought, throwing down the sheet impulsively. Her eyes flashed, her cheeks burnt with resentment at the wretched insinuation. Then as quickly, her mood changed and she dropped her lovely head in contrition. For was not this what she herself had "stooped" to do? At this moment was she not reaping the full harvest of her humiliation?A faint stir in the bed summoned her, and directly she was at her father's side, answering his appeal for water with loving solicitude."I felt as if you were there," he said drowsily, as

she ministered to him. Then opening his eyes, suddenly he smiled and added:"It is good to be back in your room, mother!" and turning comfortably upon his side fell again into deep sleep.During the days immediately succeeding, upon each one of which as it opened, the nurse had a more cheering report to offer, Margot bestowed no further regrets upon her own action. Her hours occupied with attendance upon both parents, went swiftly. To her relief, the girls, her sisters, developed simultaneously sources of preoccupation for their thoughts and time: Maud being engaged in writing a novel of Society among the Four Hundred of New York (where she had never been) and the irrepressible Jessy in setting up a flirtation with the young newly-fledged physician who came down two or three times a week to Harmony Hall to supervise the favourable progress of his patient. When Mrs. Methuen, a little terrified by the prospective cost of this attendance had enquired into the matter, she had been informed that both doctor and nurse were under instructions by cable from Mr. McPhail, and with a burst of tears carefully concealed from her youngest daughter, as well as the cause thereof, had acquiesced.

Alas! the poor woman's sense of independence had taken wings to itself long since, and she was as ready to receive her benefactor's dole as any crumpled visitor with a basket applying at her own back door for alms. Her delight was immeasurable in the ease and elegance of the present life; at sitting down three times a day at the head of a perfectly served table of which she had not to count the cost; of enjoying her siesta in a great cool, fragrant chamber upon a deep luxurious lounge, with frilled muslin pillows under her worn old head; of taking down endless novels from the library shelves, and arranging flowers from her own garden--and most of all, of driving out late in the afternoon in a neat little open carriage of which the liveried coachman touched his hat quite as if he belonged to her, while her humble neighbours came out to their front doors and saluted admiringly the reinstated lady of Harmony Hall. It was her little Indian summer of enjoyment, after a hard, cruel struggle for existence, and Margot could not find it in her heart to blush for her.It was a quiet life they led. The few people of their own condition left in the neighbourhood, lived at a distance and were not to be depended upon for sociable calling. Washington, depopulated during the hot months,

sent them no visitors. In the intervals of her self-imposed duties indoors, Margot wandered in the woods, rode on horseback early in the morning, busied herself in overseeing the gardens and poultry yard, and read voraciously the well-chosen standard books with which McPhail had stocked the old library.The answer to her cablegram to McPhail had come only too promptly and was, in spirit, all that it ought to be.He thanked them for their gracious occupation of his house, rejoiced with them in Mr. Methuen's improvement and was sailing from Cherbourg on the Friday following. Margot had not dared at first to count the days intervening before his probable arrival at Harmony Hall. The little silver-mounted calendar Aunt Katrina had given her was turned with its tell-tale face toward the wall. But ten days fly quickly, and when the knowledge that he must be there on the morrow finally forced itself upon her, she started violently like one detected in a theft. All day she wandered like a soul in pain, and in the cool of evening stole out to an old favorite spot of childhood, a hillock in the near-by forest massed with tiny wild blossoms from Spring to Autumn, from which, through a vista in the great armed

oaks and beeches, she could look down upon a shining reach of the Potomac whereon a number of lazy fishing boats lay at anchor. If not quite the Court of Hermes, this niche in the old Virginian woods was a fair substitute for that spot beloved in memory. Here, Margot dropped upon a rustic bench, and for the last time, so she told herself, lived over the hour in Far Niente garden when she gave her heart away never to be recalled. She would soon be McPhail's wife, since to him her poor family must look for support till things bettered. For herself she had rather take any place as paid dependent in another's family, do any work however menial, but the great Juggernaut Car of Necessity was rolling swiftly nearer and would soon crush her to death. Had not Stelvio, too, accepted the inevitable for her and himself? Already a gulf wider than the sea seemed to separate them. She asked herself why she had been the toy of Destiny, to be thus thrown headlong into a hopeless passion for a man alien to her in race, in education, in religion, whom her parents would not have welcomed. She vaguely wondered if after a few years of misery she might not grow to be as calm and indifferent to the married tie as were many--most women indeed--of her acquaintance. The thought

of brave Betty Carteret's encouragement came back to her. Since her return home, Mrs. Methuen had told Margot it was generally believed that McPhail had been "once thinking of marrying Miss Carteret," but that it had "blown over." And Betty had actually cared for him! Had been generous enough to put aside her own hopes and pretensions, to advise Margot to make herself happy in accepting the recreant lover. Oh! why, why could not Miss Carteret have married him herself, and saved Margot these days of feeling like a hunted, panting hare?Stelvio! oh! for a last word with him to ease her bursting heart. One look only--!And here, through the thick underwood came to her in answer to this cry of the heart, Stelvio in person, pale, haggard, worn, deep love and reproach in his eyes--!"You? You here?" she cried breathlessly. "Oh! it can't be."For a moment he did not speak and she, who had risen shaking in every limb, dropped back upon the bench, putting one band across her eyes in bewilderment.Then his words came in an impetuous fiery stream."I am here because I heard you were soon to marry him, that man who bought my poor Biberon, when I, stupid fool, thought I was selling it only to win you. When Countess Fleury told me this was so I went away from my home and sailed directly for America. Since then, I have been in Washington, have learned all that you have done. A journal of this morning says that Mr. McPhail is returning to-morrow, that your marriage day will then be announced. I left the automobile that brought me here at a farm-house somewhere near, and called at your house to be told that Madame, your mother, is driving out, and that you were in this wood. A servant came with me to show the way, but I sent him back. Oh! he dared not refuse me, that man, I think I should have killed him had he not shown me where to find you. Margot, I cannot bear it, I can't lose you, I can't let that vulgar brute take from me all my treasures. If I did not believe you love me, me only, if you can look me in the eyes and say you don't, why I will give up and go away, crushed and beaten. But I won't do it without trying to keep you. I am your lover and you are mine, spite of all the world. That night I sang to you in Venice, I knew my voice went straight to your heart wherever you might be. I felt

sure you would somehow answer me, that I should hear from you again to bid me come back and take you for my own--and when no word came, when silence fell between us like a black veil, I was sore and wounded, but had no thought of change. Then I met Miss Carteret and she told me of your summons home to your father's bedside. My love fell back ashamed of its selfish persistence. I said to myself I can wait till she has fulfilled this sacred duty, and then I will go again to ask her to be my wife! I tried to be patient, to do the things that other people do. I sought the society of that sweet kind woman, Miss Carteret, in spite of the tiresome bourgeoise she had with her, because she spoke to me of you with affection and understanding. All that while I had been waiting, straining at the leash. So when at last I had Countess Fleury's dreadful tidings of your engagement, and it was confirmed by Miss Carteret, whose sad face consoled me in my black hours when I had to talk and act as if I cared not at all, I broke away and came.""And you suppose you've had all the sorrow?" cried she, hotly. "You make nothing of my suffering when I heard you in Venice and knew you were calling me and dared not answer--"She tried to withdraw the rash admission, startled by the rapture in his face, but could not, for Stelvio's arms were around her, he was kissing her face and hair."Ah! don't struggle, Margot, dearest, don't put me away, when your words, your eyes, everything, confess your love for me," he cried, "Tell me only that all this about McPhail who is not worthy to tie your shoe, is a hideous dream. That you will come to me spite of him, fulfilling our mutual destiny. While your poor father lay so ill, I would not have dared urge this upon you, but now he is better they tell me. I shall make his acquaintance, I can convince him of my fitness to win you and keep you for my own, Margot! Speak. Answer me. Tell me you have only been misled, misguided to do this cruel act to me and to yourself, and that you are mine, mine, mine."For one brief moment she had answered his heart beats with her own and exultantly let him hold her close. Then violently, guiltily, she wrenched herself away. The love in his appeal had wrung her heart as it had never been wrung before; she was bewildered with her unwonted passion; she felt like a leaf of Autumn caught up and whirling in a resistless hurricane. Yet above and throughout this fierce ordeal to

poor humanity, arose an image of the still form in the shaded chamber depending upon her for its slender hold on life; and she was enabled to stand firm by the promptings of her spirit.Stelvio, realising this check, felt a chill as of death fall upon his heart. Into her face came a look that boded him no good. She tried to speak, but failed. Neither could he speak and they stood silently, desperately, looking into each other's eyes till Margot regained her voice."Look over there!" she said sombrely, pointing to a glimpse of the mansion and gardens seen through an opening between verdant oak boughs. "You don't know, perhaps, that not one inch of this land, one brick of the old house, nothing out or inside of it, is ours? Yet it is giving refuge to my poor father and mother, to all of us--and it is I who must pay the price."Presently, she resumed:"Is it shameful to tell you this? If so, you must forgive me, for I could think of nothing to say to you but the truth. Even if things were different with you, it has gone too far for me to draw back. Nothing can help me now, but his refusing me, and that is not likely.""Not likely, no!" and Stelvio's beautiful face was distorted by the angry snarl with which he said the words. "Do you mean that your father knows of and sanctions this damnable sacrifice?"Margot's head fell forward, the lashes swept her cheek. She resented the sting of contempt in her lover's words."He knows nothing--since his attack came on he has been like a child in our hands.""Then you have no right to impose upon him," cried Stelvio, hotly. "Do you think when he comes to himself he will relish or forgive what you frightened women have--""You shall not say that," she interrupted proudly. "I, only, am responsible for my action. I can tell you, though, that but for what I have done, my poor dear would not be living now.""Margot, forgive me. I am a brute to torture you. But I felt that you being but a young girl are ignorant of life, that you are taking on yourself a fate as horrible and unnecessary as a Hindoo woman's suttee. God knows if I could save you from it without thought of myself and my own longing for you, I'd do so--but--""You can't, you can't!" she exclaimed mournfully. Even now she was sensible that the distance between them was widening. She saw that the inevitable was beginning to lay hold of and drag him down to submission."But we were happy, weren't we?" she went on, plaintively. "That little time in Como--how long it was in actual days and weeks, I have no idea. It makes no difference. We just drifted on and on amid the perfect beauty of earth and sky and water, and I never even knew I loved you till the night you sang for me at Countess Fleury's. You remember when you came out of the darkness on to the quay to put me in the boat? Something in the touch of your hand that night woke up in me a whole world of feeling no one else had ever made me know. And the walk in your garden--our talk in the Court of Hermes--it all seemed so right, so natural, as if we were born for it--and so distinctly beautiful. . . . Afterwards, when you didn't come to Villa d'Este, it was as if something had roused me rudely from a lovely sleep. Up till then, I had never thought of you as a foreigner, a person of whom I knew hardly anything, one of a different religion from my own. I hadn't in the least cared whether you were rich

or poor. You were only you. . . . We went away to Venice, and I thought I was seeing things as they were. I wrote you a farewell that I regretted a thousand times. You answered me accepting it as final, and my heart broke. I didn't want it to be final, really. But the worst of all was when you sang in Venice. Oh! I never want to hear you sing again! And when I found out about the Biberon, my heart ached."He understood her. All his being thrilled in answer to these sweet avowals, but he made no further move to approach her. It was getting toward the hour when she was accustomed to relieve the nurse in sitting beside her father, and she told him so. He walked with her to the edge of the wood, refusing her invitation to visit her mother and share their evening meal. Across that threshold of McPhail's he could not have set a foot had he been faint or starving. Just before they passed out of the fringe of trees around the little knoll into the meadow path leading to the garden, Stelvio paused, holding out his hand. Margot laid hers in it, and they looked their last into each other's souls.She stood where she was, gazing after him until Stelvio had crossed the orchard and vaulting over a

fence, struck into the high road leading to the farmhouse where his motor-man had found shelter and refreshment.Then she could see him no more for bitter, blinding tears.CHAPTER XII.THE night of the hot day when Count Stelvio sprang into his automobile in front of Farmer Cleveland's little white house and told the chauffeur to go at full speed back to Washington, to the awe and admiration of a bevy of Virginian yokels assembled to view the marvel, a great storm visited Harmony Hall. Lightning spread in a white glare over the face of Heaven, thunder ripped through the air, floods of rain descended and still the temperature remained stifling hot. Every body in the house was awakened to sleep no more, saving the invalid only. To the thankful relief of the family, Mr. Methuen continued to doze comfortably throughout the turmoil. Margot, who could not have slept in any case, came in her wrapper with her hair braided in one long ruddy rope, to enquire of Miss Belknap how her father did, and was followed by Mrs. Methuen in a cotton kimona, whose general spirit of nervous unrest sought company in misfortune. They found the good

nurse was suffering from a variety of headache to which electric disturbance lent acute pain, and lost no time in despatching her to another room, themselves assuming her charge. Margot, who would have given anything to be left alone with her father, saw with apprehension Mrs. Methuen settle down in a rocking-chair and waving a futile palm-leaf fan, begin one of her accustomed monologues, whose only merit lay in the fact of their demanding neither comment nor return of speech. Under the impression that she spoke in a soothing whisper, the lady was wont incidentally to allow her voice to ascend in pitch to a rasping semi-scream."Awful, isn't it?" she said. "The only comfort is that Julia's in Fauquier, for I do declare the way that girl goes on in a thunder-storm wears one's nerves to fiddle-strings. You got off directly after dinner, child, and I hadn't a chance to tell you there was a letter from Ju this morning. My dear, I do believe it's coming all right with Mr. Slacum. He's hardly ever away from the Tankervilles now Julia's there, and Sunday he drove her to church in a buggy and on the road home said he'd have something to tell her soon--of course that can mean but one thing; but if Julia's to be married, Heaven knows where the trousseau's coming

from. Goodness what a clap! How in the world your poor father can sleep on through it! I'm sorry your friend Count Stelvio wouldn't stop for dinner. Now that we have everything so stylish in the house it's a pleasure to entertain--I suppose you met him when on your travels with Aunt Katrina--didn't the newspaper say something about Mr. McPhail having secured in Italy the great Stelvio Biberon--I just glanced at the item and really haven't an idea what a Biberon is--I only know the price the paper said he paid, would make us comfortable for the remainder of our days. Oh! Margot, how grand you are going to be when you are Mrs. McPhail--There--another clap as bad as the last! This storm reminds me of the one we had at Harmony just before we broke up here and moved into Washington. It was at the end of a blazing hot day like this, and your poor father had just got the mail and was opening it. For weeks he had been looking gloomier and gloomier. We all knew that Caldwell was threatening to foreclose the mortgage on the house and farms, which he did soon after. There had been just one hope of better things and that was from the investment papa had made in that Merry Boy Silver Mine in--Idaho, I think, but I never can remember those Western places

apart. Everything he could rake and scrape was put into it, and when that wasn't enough, Mr. McPhail lent papa the rest. (That was before McPhail was sent to Congress the first time, and I'd never met him.) He had been what was called a 'business friend' of poor papa's, going around Washington booming up these mines."In spite of herself, Margot was interested in the vague narration. She had often felt that there was something more than common in the latent antagonism between her father and the man who was to be her husband, and now she had the right to know its nature."And so?" she asked softly, "Take care, mother, you are speaking a little loud.""Oh! my child, in that mail he was opening during the storm came a letter from McPhail's office. We were down in the library, and after he had read it I heard an exclamation and looked up--His face was gray, awful to see. 'What is it, Augustin?' I asked, sick with fright."'Ruin--ruin and disgrace, that's all,' he answered in the most unnatural voice I ever heard. And with that came one of those awful claps of thunder and a gust of wind that blew in the window, knocking over the lamp

and sending us all upon our feet. I flew up to the nursery to see about you children, and when I came back he had not stirred from where he was. He looked ghastly, worse than he does at this minute, poor dear, and for days after would hardly speak. I could only gather that we had about lost everything, the mine was a failure, all they had put into it gone in the first workings and paying for machinery and labour. But it always seemed there was something underneath. Soon afterwards, as you know, it did fail and we were ruined, but Mr. McPhail started it over again and made a fortune. We went to Washington, and through an old friend's influence poor papa got his present office. But I can never hear thunder without thinking of that night.""Hush," whispered Margot in an alarmed voice, "He is stirring, his eyes are open; it looks as if he understood.""I hear you, mother," said the invalid, distinctly. "I know you and my father were talking about me. I want you both to know the whole truth. It has weighed on me too long."Mrs. Methuen, uttering a sharp cry, started toward him but Margot barring her way with authority, would

not suffer her to go farther. Putting her finger upon her lip, she gently urged the terrified woman from the room."It is nothing, dear," she said gently, when they were outside the door. "Now, the storm is passing, do go back to bed and let me watch by him.""Oh do you think it is really nothing? I have always felt--always dreaded--Ah! my darling, there is some secret he's never told anyone, and it's distressing him now, poor dear.""I know that we must not talk outside the door," said the girl firmly. When the hysterical lady had actually betaken herself away, Margot went back to her chair close to the bed. Her sitting, almost noiseless though it was, made him move and speak again."You are there, mother? And my father has gone? That is better, perhaps he will not be so ready to forgive as you. He'd be ashamed for a son of his to have tricked and defrauded investors by lying representations. But this is the way it was. Things were looking very black. I was uneasy about McPhail's methods and spoke to him; we came to high words, and I left him. Directly after his clerk sent me an alleged copy of a paper executed and sent out months before in my

name, a paper that I had never seen, much less written, God is my witness. It bowed me to the earth with shame. He told me I needn't be holding my head so high after signing that. McPhail knew it would crush me. It came in a storm like this, just like a thunder clap. But for its being in existence, I might have plucked up courage later to go back and demand my full rights in the mine after it began working again; but I didn't. I went smash, and the rest of them made millions. Why, Grindstone, his next partner, after he'd quarrelled with McPhail, wrote me some of the most damaging statements I ever read, about McPhail. Told me what a damned sneak he'd been to me, and advised me to bring the thing into Court. But how could I, knowing McPhail could publish a copy of that lying paper? (Grindstone's letters are all there. McPhail would crawl if he knew I had them.) I wouldn't touch pitch again, I was done with it forever. Since then, my life's been a steady slide down hill. . . . And that cur pretends that I owe him money, presumes to befriend my sons, and persuades my poor wife he's an angel in disguise. He want to marry my Margot! Curse him! . . . . . What, you aren't crying? Please don't cry!"Margot controlled herself with a mighty effort, and laid her hand upon his brow."Won't you try to sleep, now?" she asked, with infinite tenderness in her tones. "For my sake, try to sleep."When he finally fell off into his former heavy slumber, and she ventured to remove her hand, Margot wanted to scream aloud. For the first time in her life, she felt her steady nerve deserting her. She thanked God that no one but herself had heard the pitiful revealing of this act of unconscious wrongdoing that had so weighed down and broken the spirit of her honourable father. With all her soul she sympathised with him, and detested the sleek and nimble-witted promoter who had entangled Augustin Methuen in his net of evil practices. And he it was, that nightmare of her father's life, to whom she had promised herself in marriage, whose bread they were now eating, whose roof sheltered them from the downpour of heavy waters. Had it been possible, she would have aroused the family and gone out into the darkness of the night! Oh! the shame of having brought her unconscious father here to be McPhail's beneficiary! Of the effect upon him of this knowledge when he should be again himself,

she did not dare to think, so terrifying it seemed in imagination. What should she do, whither flee in her extremity? The image of McPhail returning to claim her in triumph, was again and again before her. Anything, anything but that!A door softly opened and Miss Belknap came into the chamber. She had slept well since the storm had lessened, and was again alert and helpful. Margot, hesitating for a moment, told the nurse that her father had roused unexpectedly and had talked with some agitation of family affairs, without recognising her."Don't look so troubled about that, my dear," whispered Miss Belknap cheerfully. "He often does with me. It must be this room he's in that makes him always fancying his mother's near the bed. One day he said, 'Is it you, mother, or Margot? I can't tell your voices apart in these days.' The idea of her has always seemed to soothe him, poor man, and so I was glad of it. Now, run off to your bed, and get a fine sleep as I shall on my cot.""Has he--does he ever talk of business troubles?" stammered the girl, blushing in the dim light."Not coherently. There's something he's started to speak of several times, about not taking Grindstone's

advice, but I could make neither head nor tail of it. Bless you, my dear, if we bothered ourselves with our patient's private affairs, there'd be not a minute's peace or pleasure in our calling."But before morning, the good nurse had grievous cause to alter her cheery note. Margot, summoned from her belated and unrestful slumbers, was told that a great change had supervened in the patient's condition, and that she must at once call her mother and sisters to his room. Before the others could prepare themselves to answer the dread appeal, Margot was beside him, bending over a lifeless form. He had passed away quietly in his sleep.Her first thought on that sad day--for before the terror-stricken group left the room of death, dawn showed pink through the windows--was for the inculpatory paper in her father's letter-case which she had brought with them to the country. She found it, and breathed a freer breath after abstracting it. Beneath the cover which held a sealed envelope addressed by Mr. Methuen to Angus McPhail, were also some letters signed Daniel Grindstone. These, after a glance over them, she put aside, determining to surrender them to the family lawyer and to confide to him her father's

last revelation. Of the letter enclosed to McPhail she did not venture to break the seal. It was her intention to use it as the knife that should silently cut the tie between them, now tenfold more odious than before. Of what was to come after this righteous deed, of the helpless and grievous condition of her family, she did not stop to think.The news of Mr. Augustin Methuen's sudden demise telephoned to his doctor in Washington, appeared in the evening papers of that day. It was a source of general regret that the improved prospects of his family through the youngest girl's engagement to Congressman McPhail, should have had this distressing interruption. It was said that Mr. McPhail, a passenger on a North German liner then due, was half a day late, owing to heavy fogs outside of New York harbour; and that he would probably reach Harmony Hall on the following morning. This delay, transmitted to Margot, gave her breathing space. It was she to whom all now looked for direction. Her mother, safely in bed with Miss Belknap in attendance, was evidently in the best possible place for her.Margot sat alone in the library about ten o'clock that evening, going over more carefully her father's

papers, in the hope of finding some written expression of his wishes concerning his affairs, when she heard in the avenue leading from the main gate, the "teuf-teuf" of a motor-car, and her heart felt a sudden grip of fear.It was McPhail, of course. He had pushed his journey to reach her earlier. The very stopping of his machine at the front door had in it something masterful, menacing. She must face him without delay. She prayed that the courage of a brave race would not desert her now.There was a moment's parley in the hall outside. She listened to McPhail's abrupt queries to the butler and the man's low respectful answers, as to the whereabouts of the family. It passed through her mind that a gentleman would have sent to ask if she would receive him. But Angus McPhail did nothing of the kind. She heard him tell the man that he needed no supper, but would go at once to Miss Methuen in the library. For an instant she looked wildly about her thinking of escape, but the single door of exit from the old-fashioned room would lead her directly to his encounter. She must meet him now."Margot, my poor darling!" were the words that greeted her. Gone was the veneer of polite restraint he

had so long assumed to her. His voice was vibrant with triumphing passion, his arms were opened, he was coming toward her swiftly. She was his at last, a trapped bird, who had flown to him for shelter, who had chosen his home as her refuge. Henceforward he would show her that he was master, that all her charm and beauty were for the delectation of his life, that he was done forever with her girlish whims and resistances. In as short a time as convention would allow he meant to marry her. In her present need of consolation she would receive him gently, lovingly, forgetting that she had ever kept him obstinately at arm's length.Of all the rude surprises which this mortal life leads poor unfortunates to face, the one McPhail now encountered was the rudest. Margot Methuen, standing as if made of stone, turned upon him the lightning of a contempt that withered in its flash all his lover-like emotions. In her right hand resting upon the writing table scattered with her dead father's papers, lay an envelope that a glance showed him to have been addressed to him by Augustin Methuen."Before you dare speak to me," said Mr. McPhail's fiancée, "I shall ask you to open this and refresh your memory as to its contents."McPhail took the extended envelope without alacrity. Dumbfounded by her reception, a sort of vague uneasiness made his manner awkward and loutish in the extreme. He broke the official seal of the Department of Public Service in which his victim's latter days had been ground out, and extracted its contents. As he scanned the yellowish close-written letter long ago dictated with infamous cunning by himself to frighten and confound an innocent man he desired to remove from his own path, a sickly white came over his face. He had not dreamed that poor fool of a Methuen would keep a document so inculpatory. Then he regained his usual arrogance of mien."A second Portia! Well, for what do you arraign me, my dear girl?" he said, with a shrug, tossing the letter indifferently upon the table. "I see you had not broken the seal of this worthless document.""My father, before he died, told me enough to make me understand that when sending it, you had the best of reasons for wanting to rid yourself of his knowledge of your affairs. Of whatever you laid to his charge he was as innocent as a child could have been. And yet you have driven him to his grave overburdened with a sense of sin and wrongdoing!"The shot told. McPhail started violently, grew purple, bestowed a glance of fury upon his whilome love."This from you?" he exclaimed, coarsely. "A spoilt girl whose family I have loaded with my favours.""Of that you will hardly remind me now," she said quietly. "Yesterday the sense of it would have bowed me to the earth. To-night, I am in grave doubt whether it is not you who are in our debt financially. At least, that is the suggestion made and reiterated to my father in certain letters signed by your late partner, Mr. Daniel Grindstone, and still in our possession."McPhail's face, hitherto vaguely alarmed and wholly brutal with defiance, underwent a sudden tremendous change. He was thoroughly and badly scared."Grindstone!" he stammered. "You hold letters from Daniel Grindstone about me?""From Colorado. One of no more ancient date than that of your last campaign for election. What my father chose to ignore, Mr. Grindstone has evidently not let himself forget. He indeed offers, if my father will join with him, to thoroughly expose your methods in the exploiting and management of the "Merry Boy Mine.""Upon my soul, I believe the girl's gone mad." McPhail said with an oath."Not yet," said Margot, wearily. "Though I have felt nearly on the verge of it, of late. I mean to retain enough control of my senses to hand over all these documents to-morrow to our lawyer, Mr. Henry Ashton, whose character and judgment are above criticism; and, before him, I shall make a sworn declaration of my father's ante-mortem statements concerning them. After that, there can be no question of a girl's incapacity or misconception, for the law will take care of our interests."She spoke evenly, no tremor in her voice. It seemed indeed to poor Margot that she had no sorrow, no love, no fear left in her. She was but a machine grinding out punishment to the oppressor of her father's life. Too late to show him her sympathy, she had come to an understanding of Augustin Methuen's disgust at this man's audacity in offering marriage to his child; of his impotence to declare it openly at the risk of having the dishonour of which McPhail accused him made known to his family and the world.And now, McPhail, beyond all bounds of restraint, made a furious movement to clutch at the batch of

papers lying near an open drawer of the escritoire, for which the key was upon her person. Quick as thought, Margot anticipated him, sweeping all into the drawer and closing it. The lock snapped with a spring, and he was helpless. The girl whom he had believed to be a mere pink-skinned beauty made for love's dalliance, had proved herself a cool, clear-brained prosecutor of evil, going with swift intuition straight to the hidden places of his dealings with her father.For it was all true, that of which she accused him. In the beginning of their relations with each other, Methuen's courteous address, his simplicity of nature, joined to his family name and high social position, had tempted the clever unknown promoter to inveigle him into the enterprise upon which McPhail had staked his last available dollar. From the first he had falsified the facts of the affair supposed to be under their joint control. When Methuen, suspecting wrong, but unable to fathom the extent of it, demanded a change of method in the management of the "Merry Boy Mine," then apparently going from bad to worse, McPhail had retorted by sending the letter that had stabbed Methuen to the heart. In it, the innocent man was saddled dextrously with the slippery and dishonest bygones of the

guilty one. Methuen had at once withdrawn from the management of the mine, and McPhail rejoiced over his success in throwing overboard the dead wood of a too scrupulous partner. The mine was shortly afterwards announced to be a failure. A year later, McPhail, associating with him a certain Daniel Grindstone, was said to have put new funds into the further development of the property. When Augustin Methuen read in the newspaper of the extraordinary success of the "New Merry Boy" as a money-maker, he winced painfully, but said nothing. By that time he was in harness as a Government drudge, Harmony Hall had passed away from him to the despised Caldwells, his worldly ambition lay slain forevermore. Morbidly, he had dwelt upon the concealed blot on his scutcheon and allowed it to eat into his life. A bigger, more aggressive character than his, might have fought his way out of the impasse. Augustin Methuen simply allowed himself to die in it.McPhail, in all these years during which Methuen had made no sign, had even received him, albeit freezingly, at his house, had come to think of the affair as a mere successful trick of the days when he was still a climber after fame and fortune. He had done what he

could to start Methuen's sons in life, had declared that the advance he had made Methuen in the earliest days of their venture would never be reclaimed; and when he had reached the surprising experience of falling madly in love with Methuen's youngest child, had felt that here indeed was an opportunity to make up for all past wrongdoing to the family.As he now summed up these things in memory, common sense came to the relief of a strained situation. What he wondered at was that Margot showed no anger, no excitement. She was simply unspeakably cold and calm. He realized that whatever her lawyer would think of her forthcoming communication and the Grindstone letters--and a prior experience with Mr. Henry Ashton had taught him there would be no evading that gentleman's merciless investigation and unsparing judgment--it was all over forever between Margot and himself. For the sake of every one concerned, the discovery of his early relations with Augustin Methuen would probably not be allowed to reach the public eye. Unless, indeed, Daniel Grindstone, long his enemy, recently a political opponent eager to do him despite, should come out in print with the ugly story, upon hearing of Methuen's death--at this thought,

a cold perspiration broke out upon the master of Harmony Hall and his eager impulse was to get as quickly as might be, out of the sight of the tall, pale, splendid young creature, who stood behind the desk facing him like an avenging angel!A wife like that! Capable of such tragedy queen episodes if she were offended! No, not so, thought the Honourable Angus. The forgiving Betty Carteret with all her faults and her added years, was worth a dozen such!"Then since you are determined to think the worst of me," he said, with a grand rally of his usual imposing manner, "and because I consider it a most undignified and unseemly thing to hold such a conversation at this time, in this house, I will leave you. To avoid comment from servants and outsiders I will spend the night under this roof, but early to-morrow I shall return to Washington where I shall await at my home some apology for the insults you have seen fit to lavish upon me.""You will hear from me through Mr. Ashton only," answered she in the same frozen tone. "And I should say to you that my aunt, Mrs. Wilfred Methuen, has wired that she will be with us to-morrow to charge her-

self with the expenses of this sad time. For until after the funeral we must of course remain here. At the earliest possible opportunity, we too return to our house in town. There is no wish of my heart that can ever be as strong again as that one day we may rid ourselves, if any still exists, of all indebtedness to you.""That you may as well dismiss from your mind, my young lady," he said in a superior manner, "it is hardly possible. But as a proof that I bear no ill will for your exaggerated and intemperate expressions toward me, pray consider this house and all in it at the service of your family as before.""Only until we can get out of it!" she said, showing a flash of her old spirit, and when McPhail had somehow betaken himself from the room, for the first time Margot dropped her head upon the desk and gave way to a passion of bitterest weeping.In the small hours of that night of death, when old Harmony Hall that had witnessed the entrance into life and the exit therefrom of so many generations of his line, was hushed in deep silence around the chamber where Augustin Methuen slept his last sleep, an anxious frowning man stole downstairs into the library. The master of Harmony Hall was quite within his rights

in so doing, but circumstances combined to confer upon him the expression of a resentful burglar impatient of the obstacles placed by legal ownership upon the objects of his desire.In McPhail's hand was a bunch of keys, one of which was a duplicate of that left in the escritoire for the convenience of the tenants. His cheeks burned, his eye glowered, as he inserted it within the lock of the drawer Margot had insultingly closed almost upon his fingers. The drawer opened. It was neatly filled with paper and envelopes, bearing the stamp of the house (McPhail had really neglected no detail to make the thing complete) and with the usual impedimenta of a country house desk open to all comers. But of the papers he sought, notably those bearing the signature of Daniel Grindstone, there was no trace!The astute Margot, wiser than her years, had not neglected to take the precious documents to her own room for the night. McPhail, gasping with sick disappointment at his non-success in securing them, sat under the gas lamp he had lighted, trying to evolve a new plan for his own protection from this terrible young woman, of whom a few hours before he had been dreaming with all a lover's ardour."There is one thing only. I must buy them," he decided. "I will here, to-night, on the spot, write a letter to the widow that cannot fail of success. She must use her authority to deliver me from the girl's obsession of revenge."A slight noise at the door made him start. It opened softly, revealing the person of his discreet major domo, fully dressed, bearing in his hand a lighted candle."I beg your pardon, sir, but I was dozing on the sofa in the dining-room--I thought some one should be around--and it seemed to me there was a sound I could not understand in here. I thought you were abed and asleep after your journey, sir.""Well, no, Jarvis," answered his master mildly. "It's rather nervous work coming home to find a dead man in one's house, isn't it? I found I couldn't sleep, and so came down here to write a couple of letters. I shall need a little breakfast at six in the morning, and my automobile by half past. I am running back to town, since I can be of no service here. And--er--Jarvis--I'll leave a letter on this desk that you will see delivered by your wife into Mrs. Methuen's own hand, the moment she awakes. Her own hand, understand. Let Mrs. Jarvis see to it that the lady gets it,

alone and undisturbed, and she must stay there till it is read. That will do, I think--except another brandy and soda, please."Jarvis, for all his smooth, unsuspecting countenance, knew the signs of the times. He was aware of the interview after ten P. M. between the adoring bridegroom and his future wife. Had seen McPhail's countenance when he emerged from it. And had already "mentioned" to his wife his impression that Miss Methuen had "given old Mac the sack!" Jarvis had furthermore an idea not unremotely connecting the rupture with the visit to Harmony Hall the previous day of a certain handsome young gentleman, whose anxiety to be conducted into the presence of Miss Margot Methuen had materialized in a gold piece now, reposing in the man servant's virtuous pocket; but this was certainly not the hour or occasion for confidences.So McPhail, unconscious of the double influence at work against his suit, with the aid of a brandy and soda wrote on at the library desk, until he had compounded just such a kindly, manly and sympathetic letter as he felt must incline the widow's heart to him without reserve. And he ended with an offer to purchase from her certain papers of her late husband's--relating to their

former partnership and of interest to him only--at such an extraordinarily high price that poor Mrs. Methuen could not dream of refusing it. These papers, he informed her, were now in the hands of her daughter Margot, who with no understanding of their contents, was designing to place them in the custody of their legal adviser, Mr. Ashton; in which case McPhail had no alternative but to withdraw the offer to buy them from the family direct."That will undoubtedly fetch her, poor goose!" ended the Congressman, and, after sealing the letter, placed it ready for transit through Jarvis' hand. "Seems to me I'm up to the neck in this business of buying out broken-down grandees!"This belated afterthought of the Biberon, then unpacked and awaiting inspection in his museum of antiquities in Connecticut Avenue, comforted the heart of the connoisseur in the dreary prospect of a return to his home on the morrow. Then, as if quite by accident, some subtle trick of memory brought back the picture presented by the handsome Italian Count Stelvio and Margot Methuen when he and the Milanese lawyer had come upon the two beautiful young creatures standing together in the Court of Hermes in Far

Niente garden, ringed in by verdure set with glowing flowers."That blanked macaroni eater!" was what McPhail's concrete American mind found to say in comment upon the tormenting suggestion. But when Jarvis, while seeing his master off in his motor early next morning had incidentally revealed the fact of Count Stelvio's visit to Harmony Hall two days before, there was no jocularity left in Congressman McPhail. The prospect of meeting the payment offered to the widow Methuen for possession of her husband's papers, did not now present itself under an alluring aspect, following the liberal sum given for the Stelvio Biberon.CHAPTER XIII.STELVIO had drifted into the Metropolitan Club for dinner--partly because, love he never so hopelessly man must dine, and partly because he knew no better place in Washington wherein to spend the two hours before bed-time. His own immediate friends were out of town, and nobody he saw seemed ever to have looked upon his face before. Truth to tell, the desert of an American fashionable city at Midsummer was at the present moment entirely to his taste. In less than forty-eight hours he was going to sail for home and had rather determined never to set eyes upon Washington again. In this mood, between a cup of iced consommé and a cutlet, he picked up a newspaper, a thing he had not previously done since his visit to Harmony Hall four days earlier, and was shocked to see that the funeral of Mr. Augustin Methuen had taken place that morning. An item, elsewhere registered, announced the fact that Mrs. and the Misses Methuen were im-

mediately returning from Harmony Hall to their residence in X Street. Still another paragraph stated that Mrs. Wilfred Methuen of New York had come on from Manchester-by-the-Sea to visit her sister-in-law and nieces, and was now stopping at the Arlington Hotel. Lastly, the obliging sheet gave a separate assurance to the public that the "Honourable Angus McPhail, recently returned from an European trip," was in Washington for a couple of days expressly to look after the unpacking and placing in his well-known collection of objets d'art of his most recent acquisition--the celebrated Stelvio Biberon.While Stelvio was rapidly digesting these several items, he heard the last named of them discussed between three men sitting at a table near his. He had already gathered from scraps of their conversation that they were a dining club of very limited proportions, men of taste, culture and critical ability, banded together for mutual solace and protection from ennui during the absence of their wives in the brown holland period of summer existence in their homes."Oh! it is better with us," the young Italian had been saying to himself. "Married people in their condition of life keep together summer and winter, and

if the husband is bound to one spot the wife shares it with him."But he had been fain to confess there was no suggestion of martyrdom in the expression or talk of this clever trio. They had ordered a small but good dinner with exceeding judgment, were drinking an excellent light wine, and discussed all subjects of earth and heaven with nimble intelligence and an amiable agreement to disagree. He had gathered that one of them was a naval man on home duty; one whom they called "Don" a young lawyer professionally engaged in the District but of sufficient comfortable fortune to be light of spirit despite that fact; and the third also a lawyer, of Counsel for a great Railway Corporation having headquarters at the seat of Government."I am the best living authority present," said the last-named gentleman in a slow, slightly cynical voice, his eyes smiling rather than his lips, "on the subject of the Stelvio Biberon, since I got a peep at it last night. McPhail met me strolling home from here in the moonlight near his house--Ah! how beautiful Washington is in summer moonlight with the warm intoxicating odours of flowers exhaling from the many gardens of her wide spaces--how much better than

the fret and fever of half-baked Newport, or of overdone Bar Harbour. And one's empty airy house unvexed by the disturbing presence of wife and progeny! One's many bath-tubs as places of resort before bedtime--Have we not chosen the better part of our country's abominably-ordered summer life?""The Counsellor will please come to order," said his brother-in-law. "We are well acquainted with his sardonic expressions of satisfaction with his single lot, and his philosophic rhapsodies in general. But neither of us has seen the famous drinking-vessel that Italy has treasured all these centuries before allowing it to be wrenched from her by America. I am really curious to know what are his impressions of the marvel.""It is superb," said the Counsellor. "A crystal sea-monster on whom rides Neptune astride of his dolphin; every touch of goldsmith-work in its setting, one that rowdy Benevenuto (whose memoirs I lent you last March, Tony, and I wish you would send them back!) might have been proud to sign. McPhail tells me--utilitarian soul!--that he's already been offered by a man in London to whom he will probably let it go, more than he gave for it in Italy. Mac, as we all know, is not prone to convey in his conversation, an

impression of the picturesque, but I'll swear his account of the gloomy old morgue of a villa he took it from, was immensely fetching."A slight movement of the young foreigner at the adjoining table made the talkers lower their voices. What Stelvio next heard did not concern either his own house or his Biberon."He informed me, in answer to my congratulation, that his engagement is definitely off.""All my congratulations to that beautiful young creature, Margot Methuen," said Tony, the naval man, enthusiastically. "Her engagement was one of those accepted necessities of evil fortune that make a decent fellow ashamed of himself for countenancing it. But what in the name of cold common sense is her family going to do without Mac?"Stelvio, who had finished, or pretended to have done so, here rose rather brusquely and crumpling his napkin into a ball threw it upon his table and walked away. He did not therefore hear the young lawyer styled "Don" respond enigmatically:"The answer to that question is in the laps of the gods. But I'd be willing to stake the price of the Stelvio Biberon that the Olympians will in this case

look favourably upon one of their celestial circle strayed to earth and in trouble over mere mortal lendings.""It is an hereditary charge, that of the Methuen family in your office, isn't it, Don?" said the Counsellor while lighting his cigar. "I seem to remember that good old Ashton, your honored chief, did what he could to straighten out their affairs. But I'm afraid if all we hear is true, even Ashton can't "put Humpty Dumpty together again." What an ill-considered thing of Destiny to launch upon a poor man's hands four--five daughters--how many are there?--in succession, and only one of them good to look at. What becomes of women like the older Misses Methuen?""I will try to answer you this day six months," said Don, laughing. He seemed, however, to be pretty cheerful about the Methuens, so thought the Counsellor.Stelvio could think of nothing above, below, past or future,--but of Margot free, Margot sorrowing for her loved father, Margot needing his love and consolation. The days since he had quitted her in the little wood overhanging the Potomac, had been to him unutterably blank and miserable. He had gone off alone to spend them at a small inn in the suburbs where he need speak

to no man or woman and could abandon himself to passionate regret. He had opened neither book nor newspaper, interested himself in nothing, until it was time to return to town to get his belongings together, sleep the night, and take the first express next morning for New York. And now--now--what rush of strong blinding sunshine had suddenly swept over him as if from beneath a lifting cloud! His eyes were dazzled by it, he felt giddy, uncertain what to do.A short walk in the nearest city park clarified his confused ideas. He dared not go outright and ask to see Margot in her own home, a house of mourning crowded no doubt with alien folk who would eye him rebukingly. He remembered with relief the announcement of the presence at an hotel not far off, of Mrs. Wilfred Methuen. Perhaps she might consent to receive him and give him tidings of her niece. Alert now, and strong with high hope and purpose, he turned his steps toward the Arlington.The negro lad who took his card to Mrs. Wilfred Methuen remained, Stelvio thought, an unconscionable time absent. Finally he returned and with soft voice and candid grin, asked the visitor to "Step this way."Stelvio found the lady who had been his guest of

honour at the breakfast resented by old Assunta, standing fanning herself by the open window of an hotel sitting-room but faintly lighted by a shaded electric lamp. She was dressed in deep mourning, and her comely face bore a look of weariness and perplexity, but she greeted her visitor with her accustomed courteous ease."How good of you to receive me!" exclaimed the young man, fervently. "If I had not been going to New York to-morrow to sail on Saturday for home, I would not have presumed to ask for it.""If I hesitated in my doing so, it was certainly not because you were unwelcome," said she, rather nervously. "You see me trying to catch a breath of cooler air after a most fatiguing day. You are surprised that I am not more so in finding you in Washington, Count Stelvio. But I must tell you that I knew it before your card came up. We--I had thought you might have been on the ocean sailing homeward. This Southern weather of course can't be as oppressive to you as to me.""I had not given a thought to the weather," said Stelvio, truthfully. "You must know, of course, Madame, that my whole heart and my most ardent anxiety are for your niece whose sorrow I never heard of until

to-night, nor of your presence in Washington. I felt that I must ask about her, and so I dared to come here."His direct attack was charming to the older woman. She liked men who were not ashamed of their feelings. She also liked a beautiful exterior joined to a manner of perfect breeding, and Stelvio's type had been rare to her of late among the followers of Miss Minnie Fothergill. Everything about her seemed to soften with her smile."Please sit down," she said, herself gracefully accomplishing the enjoined action. She had meant to speak to him, standing, for a moment only, then let him see that his audience was over."She--Miss Methuen is well--not too much overcome? The sad occurrence was sudden? Tell me anything you please but that she is suffering.""She is suffering from great shock and a deep real sorrow," said Margot's aunt, half smiling at his impetuous flow of words. "Her poor father passed away in his sleep, as perhaps you know. She took upon her the care of everything, and until to-day when her two brothers arrived just in time for the burial at their place of family interment some miles from Harmony Hall, my niece has had great responsibility. It is better now

the sons are in the house with their mother, who adores them, but it has been very hard. We have had a long day of it in this terrible heat, and it was five o'clock this evening before we were able to bring the widow to her own home. After all, my poor sister-in-law is rich in having those around her of her own flesh-and-blood to share her grief! I never realized that as I have done to-day."The prosperous lady stopped with a trembling in her voice. She had seen Augustin Methuen laid beside the tomb of her own handsome vaurien of a husband whom she had loved so fondly until disillusion followed knowledge of his real self. She had seen the poor weak faded sister-in-law upheld in her hour of sorrow by sons and daughters who at least loved her loyally despite her faults. And she had realized that there are things that give better joy and peace in life than the world and its successes! Besides, had not her heart gone out to Margot with a great yearning to have her for her very own. After what she frankly styled "a dose" of that terrible Minnie, Margot's enchantments seemed doubled in her eyes. She had been told by the girl in confidence the tremendous sequel of the McPhail affair she had fostered. And did she not long to make

amends to this brave and staunch young creature for the pain and humiliation she had helped to lay upon her?Yes, and in reality the sight of Stelvio's card had set in motion fifty whirring wheels of speculation and device within her concerning the possibility and propriety of bringing the two young lovers again together. The fact that she had carried her niece off vi et armis a few hours back, from the crowded little house where the arrival of "the boys" had made accomodation for the night a problem; and that Margot was at this moment resting quietly in an adjoining room unconscious of Stelvio's vicinity, were burning upon her lips, yet she dared not say the words announcing them.She had left Lydia--the same foolish sentimental Lydia, but very quiet and devoted to Margot in her hour of trouble to-day--on guard near the couch where Margot had been coaxed to lie down after a bath, a little dinner, and a change from her hot mourning frock into a cool white tea-gown of Aunt Katrina's.Lydia, when interrogated mutely through a crack of the door at the moment Count Stelvio was shown upstairs, had made signs that her young lady was asleep. The conversation between Mrs. Wilfred Methuen and the desperately anxious suitor had gone

on in an undertone. Margot should certainly not--conventionally--be allowed to know that he was there. Yet would not Mrs. Methuen be justified in at least giving him a hint that might serve to arrest or defer his project of sailing in Saturday's steamer?To go and put three thousand and more miles of salt sea between him and the girl who loved him as devotedly as he loved her; why should Aunt Katrina condemn two young hearts to this ordeal? No matter what convention said, the present, the warm breathing present, might be theirs now. Life was so short, the days of man's youth so fleeting, the eyes of this lover were so true, so steadfast, his face so illuminated with honest feeling, it could surely do no good to defer the realization of their happiness.While talking with Stelvio of more ordinary topics, Mrs. Wilfred Methuen was also going over in her mind some practical aspects of the case of these two young people. A talk with her man of business in Boston had given her assurance that she might afford during her life-time to bestow upon her favorite niece an allowance of respectable proportions, and this she had already taken steps to do. Nay more, Margot's mother, who could not keep a secret however infini-

tesimal, had, that day, on the boat coming up the river, tearfully told her sister-in-law of the splendid bid McPhail had made to buy up her husband's papers; an offer that Margot had forced her to decline. Also on the day but one after "poor Mr. Methuen's" death, Margot had not only told her mother that she had broken with McPhail, but had summoned by telephone from town, a young member of Mr. Ashton's law firm in whose hands she had placed every written scrap she had found in her father's letter-case! What was more, "the boys" on their arrival, had been informed by their sister of her action, and had cordially approved it. If all her children set their judgment against hers, what was a poor woman to do? Her whole family had turned against Mr. McPhail, and would not let her remain a day longer at dear Harmony. But for her sister-in-law's generosity, where they would all be now, God only knew! In losing Mr. McPhail as a friend, they would be plunged into the direst poverty. To be sure the doctor was very attentive to Jessy, and Maud thought she would be a success in literature. "The boys" had invited herself, Jessy, Maud and Margot, to go out to their Western home and keep house for them. Both of her sons were to get a raise in salary by Christ-

mas. Julia, Mrs. Wilfred would be glad to know, had come back from Fauquier "engaged all over again" to Mr. Slacum; and the wedding-day was fixed for September twenty-fifth. This was a great relief. But she could never, if she lived to a hundred, understand why the children were all so turned against Mr. McPhail!Mrs. Wilfred, to whom Margot had given an outline of the tragic ending of her engagement, and its cause, foresaw better than did the widow, the possible shaping of present events. She felt sure that McPhail, driven to a corner by his fears of exposure, would surrender into Mr. Ashton's iron-bound care, some portion of that money of Augustin Methuen's which he had evidently used as a foundation for his fortune. Mr. Ashton had lost no time in assuring Miss Margot Methuen that the affair she had put into his hands, looked at first sight "very promising." He had "given the papers over to the immediate scrutiny of a younger member of his firm," (none other than "Don" who had dined near Stelvio that same night!) and "as far as a cursory examination" went, was glad to assure his lamented friend Methuen's family that he had "hopes."With all these exciting thoughts and suggestions swarming in her brain, Aunt Katrina's cheeks grew more girlishly pink, her eyes bluer, ten years fell away from her, as will sometimes occur to an older woman in dealing with the course of true love between her juniors. But yet, she could not decide what it was right to do. And Stelvio was going to sail on Saturday!At last, Count Stelvio enquired if she thought it would be asking too much for him to pay his respects to Miss Margot Methuen on the morrow. By taking a late afternoon train, he would still reach New York a couple of hours before it was necessary to go aboard the steamer sailing by day-break on Saturday. He would not for the world hurry or pain Miss Methuen. It was too early perhaps to take her thoughts away from her family, for whom she had such tender regard. But as he was going away so soon--so far--"Why, of course!" burst out from Aunt Katrina like the cork from a bottle of champagne. "She'd never forgive me in the world if I let you go now without her seeing you! She told me about your visit to Harmony Hall, and how it nearly broke her heart to--why, what am I saying?--I don't know, but please wait and let Margot tell you for herself. Only don't excite

her, or stay too long. She's in there, resting, but she won't be tired after she's seen you."With a swift retreat to hide her breakdown into ignominious tears, Mrs. Wilfred Methuen disappeared into the next room.Stelvio, springing to his feet in rapt delight, wondered whether he slept or woke. But all! no dream was this, but an exquisite thrilling reality to behold Margot pale and sad come into the room holding out her hand to him in shy greeting, then sitting at a little distance from him, talk soberly of her sorrow, her gratitude for his sympathy, her wonderment when Aunt Katrina had told her he had found them out at the Arlington. All the joy of the world was tingling in his veins while he watched and listened to her. But he said no word of his love, and she seemed relieved that this was so.Stelvio, too, was content; he had no wish to startle her now by a renewal of his vows of love. If he once began, thought the poor fellow, he could never stop it in the world, and he would not prove unworthy of Aunt Katrina's trust in him. So their talk, by and by, glided into the old congenial sympathetic course it had followed in the early days of their acquaintance on Lake Como. After she had told him what was need-

ful of the circumstances of her father's death, and the discovery of certain complications in business with McPhail dating back many years, which had made it impossible for her father's child to fulfil a pledge made under false impressions to Mr. McPhail--by mutual consent the two abandoned the painful subject, and went back to this region of their first enjoyment of each other."And that grim old Guiseppe of yours--and Assunta who looked as if she would like to stab me with one of her gold hairpins," said Margot, after a prolonged review of her visit to Far Niente. "Were they not greatly relieved when the one poor American vanished out of the neighbourhood?""Good old souls, it is always through excess of zeal for me that they show at their worst. When they know you--if they know you better, they will fawn upon your feet. I must tell you that the money I got for the Biberon has raised me in their estimation to the plane of a millionaire, and they strut and preen accordingly. Even Guiseppe has condoned my being "rich.""The Biberon! Don't speak of it," cried she, her eyes grown misty. "If you knew how your sacrifice has haunted me!""Pray don't distress yourself. It would have had to go some day. Why, I heard to-night without more than a passing pang that the present owner is already talking of selling it again.""Ah! If you might only have it back.""I fear that's not to be thought of. I have already experienced too much comfort from the privileges it has bought me! And then, frankly speaking I am glad, first to think it will go back to London and be out of the clutches of a possible second McPhail; next that the value another man sets on it proves the sum I received to have been a just one.""All the same, I'd give anything if the quaint crystal creature had never left Far Niente. I shall have to own to you that the tender grace of a day that is dead in Italy means more to me now than the same atmosphere in Virginia. How it has all come back to me, to-night! And your exquisite Far Niente possesses my soul in memory more even than dear old Harmony Hall!"As she spoke, a clock chimed upon the mantel. Guiltily, Stelvio sprang upon his feet."Let me take those sweet words away with me," he said remorsefully. "How wretchedly selfish I am

to keep you up. If I stay one moment longer, your dear good aunt will never again put her trust in my good faith."Margot, who had been during their blissful hour of talk, trying to put from her the thought of his going, took this to be a last farewell. As she also arose, all her sorrow came back overpoweringly, and the fatigues and emotions of the last days joined themselves to the poignant feeling that whatever death might be, it was worse to part with him. The brief subtle happiness died out of her eyes, she grew pale and trembled all over. But she held out her hand to him like a brave lady as she was, and tried to speak cheerfully."This is good-bye then? You are sailing Saturday?""Sailing? Leaving you? Don't hurt me like that, Margot.""Ah! thank God!" she cried, and once again, and now for always, the love that was in them brought them heart to heart.A couple of years later, Mrs. Clandeboye, who had successfully accomplished her coveted free visit to America was again at Lake Como (this time in

autumn) drinking tea tête-è-tête with Countess Fleury in that fascinating lady's hillside temple."I stopped last spring in Washington with the McPhails," she was saying, "and really, my dear, the way they live is all I ever imagined it.--Quite too luxurious--and such a lovely old country home on the Potomac, too. Her frocks and jewels are of the best, and he seems to think of nothing but lavishing money on her. So un-English, isn't it? She looks handsomer than ever and seems perfectly happy, as why shouldn't she be? To be sure, the man's rather dreadful, but then so many of them are. Of course you don't mind, dear, one never thinks of you as one of them. Besides, we English all hate you Americans collectively and adore you personally. What I really meant was that the rich ones, those who give, are so apt to be horrid. She was a lady born, and shows it, and it must be hard, though I've been told she really likes him.""Did anyone ever chance to speak to you of where the money came from that Countess Stelvio spends?" asked Madame Fleury, indifferently. In her heart she was dying to know."Oh! of course. Some old mining interest that

turned up and proved valuable, after her father's death. It's nothing very remarkable, but enough for the family to live on. And you know Mrs. Wilfred Methuen came down after all with a fair allowance. But you ought to be better up than I in the Stelvios' affairs. I thought you and she were bosom friends.""We might have been," said the Countess, pensively, "but she doesn't forget that I did my best to marry him to Miss Conners--who has certainly made a much better match in Prince Leoni. The Stelvios are only at Far Niente a month in the spring and autumn. His work is at Milan, where people make no end of fuss over them.""It's a grave mistake for husband and wife to be both so tremendously good-looking," observed the Englishwoman. "It's monotonous.""If you'll believe it," said Countess Fleury, "I think the Stelvios like to be monotonous!"THE END.Advertisement  included in the back of Harrison's The Count and the Congressman.Advertisement  included in the back of Harrison's The Count and the Congressman.Advertisement  included in the back of Harrison's The Count and the Congressman.