ence, Miss Carew!" he replied, flushing beneath her
clear eyes.

"Only about some scenery!" interposed the manager, so hastily that she
glanced, slightly surprised, from the one to the other. "Some sets
that are--"

"'Flimsy pretexts!' I caught that much! I only wanted to ask you about
this costume. Is it appropriate, do you think, for the part we were
talking about?" Turning around slowly, with arms half-raised.

"Charming, my dear; charming!" he answered, enthusiastically.

"If I only thought that an unbiased criticism!" Her dark lashes
lowered; she looked toward the soldier, half shyly, half mockingly.
"What do you think, Mr. Saint-Prosper?"

At that moment her girlish grace was irresistible.

"I think it is not only appropriate, but"--looking at her and not at
the costume--"beautiful!"

A gleam like laughter came into her eyes; nor did she shun his
kindling gaze.

"Thank you!" she said, and courtesied low.

* * * * *

That same evening Spedella's fencing rooms were fairly thronged with
devotees of the ancient art of puncturing. The master of the place was
a tall Italian, lank and lean, all bone and muscle, with a Don Quixote
visage, barring a certain villainous expression of the eyes,
irreconcilable with the chivalrous knight-errant of distressed
Dulcineas. But every man with a bad eye is not necessarily a
rascallion, and Spedella, perhaps, was better than he looked. With a
most melancholy glance he was now watching two combatants, novices in
feats of arms. Dejection sat upon his brow; he yawned over a clumsy
_feinte seconde_, when his sinister eyes fell on a figure that had
just entered the hall. Immediately his melancholy vanished, and he
advanced to meet the newcomer with stately cordiality.

"Well met, Mr. Mauville," he exclaimed, extending a bony hand that had
fingers like the grip of death. "What good fortune brought you here?"

"An ill wind, Spedella, rather!"

"It's like a breath of the old days to see you; the old days before
you began your wanderings!"

"Get the foils, Spedella; I'll have a bout with the master. Gad,
you're as ill-looking as ever! It's some time since I've touched a
foil. I want to test myself. I have a little affair to-morrow. Hark
you, my old brigand; I wish to see if I can kill him!"

"A lad of spirit!" chuckled the master, a gleam of interest illumining
his cavernous eyes. "Young!--frisky!--an affair of honor to-day is but