st" type. The husband was fooled (naturally), and the chief
amusement of the piece appeared to consist in his being shut out of his
own house in dressing-gown and slippers during a pelting storm of rain,
while his spouse (who was particularly specified as "pure") enjoyed a
luxurious supper with her highly moral and virtuous admirer. My wife
laughed delightedly at the poor jokes and the stale epigrams, and
specially applauded the actress who successfully supported the chief
role. This actress, by the way, was a saucy, brazen-faced jade, who had
a trick of flashing her black eyes, tossing her head, and heaving her
ample bosom tumultuously whenever she hissed out the words Vecchiaccio
maladetto [Footnote: Accursed, villainous old monster.] at her
discomfited husband, which had an immense effect on the audience--an
audience which entirely sympathized with her, though she was
indubitably in the wrong. I watched Nina in some derision as she nodded
her fair head and beat time to the music with her painted fan. I bent
over her.

"The play pleases you?" I asked, in a low tone.

"Yes, indeed!" she answered, with a laughing light in her eyes. "The
husband is so droll! It is all very amusing."

"The husband is always droll!" I remarked, smiling coldly. "It is not a
temptation to marry when one knows that as a husband one must always
look ridiculous."

She glanced up at me.

"Cesare! You surely are not vexed? Of course it is only in plays that
it happens so!"

"Plays, cara mia, are often nothing but the reflex of real life," I
said. "But let us hope there are exceptions, and that all husbands are
not fools."

She smiled expressively and sweetly, toyed with the flowers I had given
her, and turned her eyes again to the stage. I said no more, and was a
somewhat moody companion for the rest of the evening. As we all left
the theater one of the ladies who had accompanied Nina said lightly:

"You seem dull and out of spirits, conte?"

I forced a smile.

"Not I, signora! Surely you do not find me guilty of such ungallantry?
Were I dull in YOUR company I should prove myself the most ungrateful
of my sex."

She sighed somewhat impatiently. She was very young and very lovely,
and, as far as I knew, innocent, and of a more thoughtful and poetical
temperament than most women.

"That is the mere language of compliment," she said, looking straightly
at me with her clear, candid eyes. "You are a true courtier! Yet often
I think yo