rtrait we have so long desired, is at last to be given to us!"

I heard a chair move, and a slow footstep. Cristoforo appeared, with
white hair and black moustache, his tall figure buttoned up in an
old-fashioned frockcoat, the petrified, mummified remains of a once
handsome man. He walked up to me, took both my hands and shook them
ceremoniously. His face showed no traces of emotion; his eyes were dry,
and he had not a word to say. Did he understand? I really do not know. He
seemed to think the affair was an ordinary introduction. As I looked at
him his wife's words came back to me, "Men forget sooner." She gazed at
him as if she would put blood into his veins, where it had long ceased to
flow.

"Cristoforo, I know this will be a great joy to you, and you will join
with me in thanking Monsieur Lampron for his generosity. You, sir, will
express to him all the Count's gratitude and my own, and also the
sympathy we feel for him in his recent loss. Besides, we shall write to
him. Is Monsieur Lampron rich?"

"I had forgotten to tell you, Madame, that my friend will accept nothing
but thanks."

"Ah, that is truly noble of him, is it not, Cristoforo?"

All the answer the old Count made was to take my hands and shake them
again.

I used the opportunity to put forward my request in behalf of M. Charnot.
He listened attentively.

"I will give orders. You shall see everything--everything."

Then, considering our interview at an end, he bowed and withdrew to his
own apartments.

I looked for the Countess Dannegianti. She had sunk into her great
armchair, and was weeping hot tears.

Ten minutes later, M. Charnot and Jeanne entered with me into the
jealously guarded museum.

Museum was the only name to give to a collection of such artistic value,
occupying, as it did, the whole of the ground floor to the right of the
hall. Two rooms ran parallel to each other, filled with pictures, medals,
and engravings, and were connected by a narrow gallery devoted to
sculpture.

Hardly was the door opened when M. Charnot sought the famous medals with
his eye. There they were in the middle of the room in two rows of cases.
He was deeply moved. I thought he was about to make a raid upon them,
attracted after his kind by the 'auri sacra fames', by the yellow gleam
of those ancient coins, the names, family, obverse and reverse of which
he knew by heart. But I little understood the enthusiast.

He drew out his handkerchief and specta