cked tables. Our chosen
chalet made a specialty of milk, and a view. There was a rough balcony
at the back, built over a sheer precipice, and far beneath, the Rhone
Valley spread itself for our eyes. We sat resting, with glasses of
rich yellow milk in our hands, when a voice under the road-shelter in
front roused us from reverie. It was the Contessa greeting Joseph and
Innocentina, who were reposing on a bench in the delicious shade.

"I was just thinking it was rather queer they hadn't caught us up," I
said, rising; and then I asked myself why I had said it; for, when I
came to cross-question my own thoughts, they had to own up that the
Contessa had not been in them.

"Oh, it was the Contessa you were thinking of, then, when you sat
looking as if you were a thousand miles away, and had left your body
behind to keep your place?" said the Boy, jumping up quickly. "Well,
here she is; your mind may be at ease."

We returned to the front of the house, through the neat, bare
"living-room," the Boy a step or two ahead of me, as if anxious to
greet the new arrivals. Off came his hat, and he stood leaning against
the carriage, looking up into the warm brown eyes of Gaeta, which were
warmer and brighter than ever because of this sudden show of devotion.

Had the magnetism of her coquetry fired him? I wondered, it would be
strange if it were not so, for she was beautiful, and her manner
flattering to a boy so young. Somehow, my spirits were dashed at the
thought that my companion's last words to me might be explained by
jealousy of an older man with a pretty woman. It would be hard if it
were to come to this between us. Though I had talked of going to see
her in Monte Carlo, the butterfly Contessa was no more to me than a
delicate pastel on someone else's wall, or a gay refrain, which charms
the ear without haunting the memory. I would not interfere with the
Boy; if he chose to encourage Gaeta to flirt with him, he need not
fear me; but I had liked to think he valued my comradeship. Now, a
fancy for this child-woman would rob me of him. Instead of being
piqued by the Contessa's growing preference for the Boy, as I ought
to have been by all the rules of the game of flirtation, I was
conscious of anger against her as an intruder.

This feeling increased almost to sulkiness when the Boy was invited to
take a seat in the carriage beside the gloomy Baron, and accepted
promptly.

The driving party had been delayed a long time in