e
impossible concierge, were a new species to him, well worth watching. An
American princess; this accounted for much. He had even looked up the
two Americans who rode up from Florence every day; but he found that
they were outside the pale of his suspicions; one of them was a
millionaire, known to the Italian ambassador in the United States; so he
dismissed them as negligible quantities. He had some pretty conflicts
with Pietro; but Pietro was also a Tuscan, which explains why the
inspector never obtained any usable information from this quarter.

Hillard and Merrihew eyed these noisy preparations broodingly. To the
one it was a damper to his rosal romance; to the other it was the
beginning of the end: this woman, so brilliant, so charming, so lovely
and human, could never be his. Well, indeed, he understood now why Mrs.
Sandford had warned him; he understood now what the great mistake was.
Had fate sent her under his window only for this? Bitterness charged his
heart and often passed his lips. And this other man, who, what, and
where was he all this time?

He was always at her heels now, saving her a care here, doing a service
there, but speaking no more of his love. She understood and was
grateful. Once she plucked a young rose and gave it to him, and he was
sure that her hand touched his with pity, though she would not meet his
eyes. And so Merrihew found but little difficulty in picking up the
thread of his romance.

As for O'Mally, he spent most of his leisure studying time-tables.

At four o'clock on the afternoon of the day before the ball, now that
the noise had subsided and the servants were in their quarters, La
Signorina went into the gardens alone. An hour earlier she had seen
Hillard mount and ride away, the last time but once. There seemed to
bear down upon her that oppression which one experiences in a nightmare,
of being able to fly so high, to run madly and yet to move slowly,
always pursued by terror. Strive as she would, she could not throw off
this sense. After all, it was a nightmare, from the day she landed in
New York up to this very moment. But how to wake? Verily, she was mad.
Would any sane person do what she had done and was yet about to do? She
might have lived quietly and peacefully till the end of her days. But
no! And all her vows were like dried reeds in a tempest, broken and
beaten. Even now there was a single avenue of escape, but she knew that
she could not profit by it and leave