different."

"In your cousin's case, to be sure," pursued Susanna, "there is one
other means. You happen to be, on the Valdeschi side, her nearest
kinsman, and therefore, until she marries and has children, you are her
heir presumptive. Well, if she were to retire into a convent, taking
vows of celibacy and poverty, then what they call the usufruct of her
properties could be settled upon her heir presumptive for her lifetime,
the properties themselves passing to him at her death."

"We will wish the young lady no such dreary fate," laughed Anthony.
"Fortunately for her, she is not troubled by your scruples."

"How do you know she is n't?" asked Susanna.

"We can safely take it for granted," said he. "Besides, you have told
me so yourself."

"_I_ have told you so--?" she puzzled.

"You have told me that there is but one legitimist in Sampaolo. If my
cousin were troubled by your scruples, she would make a second. And of
the whole population of the island, can you suggest a less probable
second?"

"They say that Queen Anne was at heart a Jacobite," Susanna reminded
him. "Your cousin is young. One could lay the case before her, one
could work upon her conscience. And, supposing her conscience to be
once roused, then, if you could n't be brought to offer her your hand,
she 'd have no choice but renunciation and the Cloister."

"Let us hope, therefore, that her conscience may remain comfortably
asleep," said he. "For even to save her from the Cloister, I could not
offer her my hand."

Susanna, leaning back against the rugged trunk of her elm, gazed down
the long shaded avenue, and appeared to muse. Here and there, the sun,
finding a way through the green cloud of leaves, a visible fillet of
light in the dim atmosphere, dappled the brown earth with rose. In her
white frock, her dark hair loose about her brow, a faint colour in her
cheeks, her dark eyes musing, musing but half smiling at the same time,
I think she looked very charming, very interesting, very warmly and
richly feminine, I think she looked very lovely, very lovable; and I
don't wonder that Anthony--as his eyes rested upon her, fed upon
her--felt something violent happen in his heart.

"Occasion is everything--the occasion has come--the occasion has come,"
a silent voice seemed to incite him. And as it were unseen hands
seemed to push him on.

The blood rushed tumultuously to his head.

"I 'm going to risk it, I 'm going to risk everyt