he never took the
trouble to invent a falsehood and was as ready as ever to support his
words. On this occasion no one could have doubted him, for there was an
unusual ring of sincere feeling in what he said. Orsino could not help
wondering what the tie between him and Madame d'Aranjuez could be, for
it evidently had the power to make Spicca submit without complaint to
something worse than ordinary unkindness and to make him defend on all
occasions the name and character of the woman who treated him so
harshly. It must be a very close bond, Orsino thought. Spicca acted very
much like a man who loves very sincerely and quite hopelessly. There was
something very sad in the idea that he perhaps loved Maria Consuelo, at
his age, broken down as he was, and old before his time. The contrast
between them was so great that it must have been grotesque if it had not
been pathetic.

Little more passed between the two men on that day, before they
separated. To Spicca, Orsino seemed indifferent, and the older man's
reticence after his sudden outburst did not tend to prolong the meeting.

Orsino went in search of Contini and explained what was needed of him.
He was to make a brief list of desirable apartments to let and was to
accompany Madame d'Aranjuez on the following morning in order to see
them.

Contini was delighted and set out about the work at once. Perhaps he
secretly hoped that the lady might be induced to take a part of one of
the new houses, but the idea had nothing to do with his satisfaction. He
was to spend several hours in the sole society of a lady, of a genuine
lady who was, moreover, young and beautiful. He read the little morning
paper too assiduously not to have noticed the name and pondered over the
descriptions of Madame d'Aranjuez on the many occasions when she had
been mentioned by the reporters during the previous year. He was too
young and too thoroughly Italian not to appreciate the good fortune
which now fell into his way, and he promised himself a morning of
uninterrupted enjoyment. He wondered whether the lady could be induced,
by excessive fatigue and thirst to accept a water ice at Nazzari's, and
he planned his list of apartments in such a way as to bring her to the
neighbourhood of the Piazza di Spogna at an hour when the proposition,
might seem most agreeable and natural.

Orsino stayed in the office during the hot September morning, busying
himself with the endless details of which he was now