enly, with quick movements of both hands at once, Maria Addolorata
threw back the veil from her face, and drew away the folds that covered
her mouth.

"There, see me!" she exclaimed. "Look at me well this once!"

Her face was as white as marble, and her dark eyes had a wild and
startled look in them, as though she saw the world for the first time.
A ringlet of red-gold hair had escaped from the bands of white that
crossed her forehead in an even line and were drawn down straight on
either side, for in the quick movement she had made she had loosened the
pin that held them together under her chin, and had freed the dazzling
throat down to the high collar.

[Illustration: "She had covered her face with the veil."--Vol. I., p.
126.]

Dalrymple's pale, bright blue eyes caught fire, and he looked at her
with all his being, at her face, her throat, her eyes, the ringlet of
her hair. He breathed audibly, with parted lips, between his clenched
teeth.

Gradually, as he looked, he saw the red blush rise from the throat to
the cheeks, from the cheeks to the forehead, and the marble grew more
beautiful with womanly life. Then, all at once, he saw the hot tears
welling up in her eyes, and in an instant the vision was gone. With a
passionate movement she had covered her face with the veil, and throwing
herself sideways against the high back of the chair, she pressed the
dark stuff still closer to her eyes and mouth and cheeks. Her whole body
shook convulsively, and a moment later she was sobbing, not audibly, but
visibly, as though her heart were breaking.

Dalrymple was again taken by surprise. He had been so completely lost in
the utterly selfish contemplation of her beauty that he had been very
far from realizing what she herself must have felt as soon as she
appreciated what she had done. He at once accused himself of having
looked too rudely at her, but at the same time he was himself too much
disturbed to argue the matter. Quite instinctively he rose to his feet
and tried to take one of her hands from her veil, touching it
comfortingly. But she made a wild gesture, as though to drive him away.

"Go!" she cried in a low and broken voice, between her sobs. "Go! Go
quickly!"

She could not say more for her sobbing, but he did not obey her. He only
drew back a little and watched her, all his blood on fire from the touch
of her soft white hand.

She stifled her sobs in her veil, and gradually grew more calm. She even
arr