ctly like Elena's. He was seized with
impatient curiosity to see her face--its expression and colouring.

'Manuel,' she was saying, 'has to leave on Friday. He will come back for
me later on.'

'Much later, let us hope,' said Donna Francesca cordially. 'A month, at
the very least, eh, Don Manuel? The best plan would be to wait and all
go on the same day. We are at Schifanoja till the first of November.'

'If my mother were not expecting me, nothing would delight me more than
to stay with you. But I have promised faithfully to be in Sienna for the
17th of October--Delfina's birthday.'

'What a pity! on the 20th there is the Festival of the Donations at
Rovigliano--so very beautiful and peculiar.'

'What is to be done? If I do not keep my promise, my mother will be
dreadfully disappointed. She adores Delfina.'

The husband took no part whatever in the conversation, he seemed a very
taciturn man. He was of middle height, inclined to be stout and bald,
and his skin of a most peculiar hue--something between green and violet,
in which the whites of the eyes gleamed as they moved like the enamel
eyes of certain antique bronze heads. His moustache, which was harsh and
black and cut evenly like the bristles of a brush, shadowed a coarse and
sardonic mouth. He appeared to be about forty, or rather more. In his
whole appearance there was something disagreeably hybrid and morose,
that indefinable air of viciousness which belongs to the later
generations of bastard races brought up in the midst of moral disorder.

'Look, Delfina--orange trees, all in flower!' exclaimed Donna Maria,
stretching out her hand to pluck a spray as they passed.

Near Schifanoja, the road lay between orange groves, the trees being so
high that they afforded a pleasant shade, through which the sea-breeze
sighed and fluttered, so laden with perfume that one might almost have
quaffed it like a draught of cool water.

Delfina was kneeling on the carriage seat and leaned out to catch at the
branches. Her mother wound an arm about her to keep her from falling
out.

'Take care! Take care! You will tumble--wait a moment till I untie my
veil. Would you mind helping me, Francesca?'

She bent her head towards her friend to let her unfasten the veil from
her hat, and in doing so the bouquet of roses fell at her feet. Andrea
promptly picked them up, and as he rose from his stooping position, he
at last saw her whole face uncovered.

It was an oval face, pe