collars. Every day an inch higher. _Dio mio!_ Is that the way to
please women? I wear a flannel shirt and my neck is as bare as a
plucked chicken, and yet I--" he stopped short.

Mario laughed. "Women are strange," he admitted.

"Mad!" cried Cesare, and then as Bembi still smirked ineffably he
appealed to Olive. "Do you admire fowls wrapped in flannel or _in
arrosto_?"

When she came out she found Rosina waiting for her in the courtyard,
a grey shadow with smooth fair hair shining in the moonlight. "The
professor let me go at eight so I dressed and came out here," she
explained. "The dressing-room is full of dust and spider's webs. I
told the porter the other day that he ought to sweep it, but he only
laughed at me and said Domeniddio made spiders long before he took a
rib out of Adam's side to whip a naughty world."

"Who is the man?" she asked presently as they walked along together.
"Do I know him?"

"I do not think so. He is not an artist."

Rosina laid a hand upon her arm. "Is that he?" she said.

They had passed through one of the narrow streets that lead from the
Corso towards the river and were come into the Ripetta.

A tall man was walking slowly along on the other side of the road. He
did not seem to have noticed the two girls, and yet as he stopped to
light a cigarette he was looking towards them. A tram came clanging
up, the overhead wires emitting strange noises peculiar to themselves,
the gong ringing sharply. Olive glanced up at the red painted triangle
fixed to the lamp-post at the corner. "It will stop here. Quick! while
it is between us. Perhaps he has not seen--"

They ran to her door and up the stairs together. "It has only just
gone on," cried Rosina. "Have you got your key?"

She stayed on the landing while Olive went into the room and lit her
candle. There was no sound in the house at all, no step upon the
stair. As she peered down over the banisters into the darkness below
she listened intently. The rustling of her skirt sounded loud in the
stillness, but there was nothing else.

"He did not see us," she said. "I shall go now. Lock your door.
_Felice notte, piccina._"

CHAPTER V

Camille, loitering on the terrace of the old garden of the Villa
Medici, was quick to hear the creaking of the iron gate upon its
hinges. His pale face brightened as he threw away his cigarette and he
went down the path between the ilex trees to meet his model.

"You have come. Oh, I seem to ha