e hotel and went up in the
lift. The Marvels' private sitting-room was on the second floor. They
were much too rich to condescend to the palms and bamboo tables and
wicker chairs of the common herd, and tea was served to Edna and her
guests in a green and white boudoir that was, as the Marchesa might
have said, more or less Louis Seize.

Mr Marvel came in presently, refusing tea, but asking leave to smoke,
and the Prince, gracefully deferential to his future father-in-law,
listened to the little he had to say, answering carefully in his
perfect English.

"Yes, sir. There is a great deal of poverty here. On my Tuscan estates
too. Alas! yes."

Mamie sat near him, and in the flickering red light of the fire she
looked almost pretty. Filippo's eyes strayed towards her now and then.
Edna came presently to where Olive rested apart on the wide cushioned
window-seat. "Will you have some more tea?"

"No, thank you. I think we must be going soon. The Marchesa will not
like it if we stay out too long."

Edna hesitated. "I wanted to ask you a silly question. Had you ever
seen the Prince before last week?"

There was the slightest perceptible pause before Olive answered, "No,
never. Why do you ask?"

"I thought you looked as if you had somehow that night at the
Lorenzoni palace. When we came in you were at the piano, and I thought
you looked queer--as if--"

"Oh, no," Olive said again, but she wondered afterwards if she had
done right.

On their way home Mamie drew her attention to a poster, and she saw
the name of Meryon in great orange letters on a white ground.

"He will be here before Christmas. I'll let you come with me to hear
him play if you are good," she said, and she took the elder girl's
hand in hers and pinched it. "I could race you home down this side
street, but I suppose I must not."

She was gay and good-humoured now, and altogether at her best, and
Olive tried hard to like her, but she could not help seeing that the
triumph that overflowed in easy, shallow kindness was an unworthy one.

CHAPTER III

Olive sat alone at the end of one of the tiers of the stone
amphitheatre built into the hill that rises, ilex clad, to the heights
of San Giorgio. Some other women were there, mothers with young
children, nurses and governesses dowdily dressed as she was in
dark-coloured stuffs, but she knew none of them.

Mamie seldom cared to come to the old Boboli gardens. Its green
mildewed terraces and cr