cluster at her breast.

"Look at your flowers, child," I said, earnestly. "See how they begin
to droop in this heated air. The poor things! How glad they would feel
could they again grow in the cool wet moss of the woodlands, waving
their little bells to the wholesome, fresh wind! Would they revive now,
think you, for your great Prince de Majano if he told them they were
fair? So with your life and heart, little one--pass them through the
scorching fire of flattery, and their purity must wither even as these
fragile blossoms. And as for beauty--are you more beautiful than SHE?"

And I pointed slightly to my wife, who was at that moment courtesying
to her partner in the stately formality of the first quadrille.

My young companion looked, and her clear eyes darkened enviously.

"Ah, no, no! But if I wore such lace and satin and pearls, and had such
jewels, I might perhaps be more like her!"

I sighed bitterly. The poison had already entered this child's soul. I
spoke brusquely.

"Pray that you may never be like her," I said, with somber sternness,
and not heeding her look of astonishment. "You are young--you cannot
yet have thrown off religion. Well, when you go home to-night, and
kneel beside your little bed, made holy by the cross above it and your
mother's blessing--pray--pray with all your strength that you may never
resemble in the smallest degree that exquisite woman yonder! So may you
be spared her fate."

I paused, for the girl's eyes were dilated in extreme wonder and fear.
I looked at her, and laughed abruptly and harshly.

"I forgot," I said; "the lady is my wife--I should have thought of
that! I was speaking of--another whom you do not know. Pardon me! when
I am fatigued my memory wanders. Pay no attention to my foolish
remarks. Enjoy yourself, my child, but do not believe all the pretty
speeches of the Prince de Majano. A rivederci!"

And smiling a forced smile I left her, and mingled with the crowd of my
guests, greeting one here, another there, jesting lightly, paying
unmeaning compliments to the women who expected them, and striving to
distract my thoughts with the senseless laughter and foolish chatter of
the glittering cluster of society butterflies, all the while
desperately counting the tedious minutes, and wondering whether my
patience, so long on the rack, would last out its destined time. As I
made my way through the brilliant assemblage, Luziano Salustri, the
poet, greeted me with a gra