You're wrong there," said I, "he's very rich."

"At all events, it is ridiculous, this flirtation," exclaimed the
plump Baronessa. "He is a mere child. Gaeta is making a fool of
herself. You are her friend. You should see this and put a stop to the
affair in some way."

"As to that, many women marry men younger than themselves," I replied,
willing to tease the lady, though I could have laughed aloud at the
bare idea of marriage for the Boy. "Still," I went on more
consolingly, "I hardly think it will come to anything serious between
them."

"Ah, if you say that, you little know Gaeta," protested Gaeta's
friend. "She is infatuated--infatuated with this youth of seventeen or
eighteen, whom she insists, to justify her foolishness, is a year
older than he can possibly be. Something must be done, and soon, or
she is capable of proposing to him, if he pretend to hang back."

"Something will be done, my dear; do not be unnecessarily excited,"
said the Baron. "I fear we have not the full sympathy of Lord Lane."

"If you mean, will I do anything to keep the two apart, I confess you
haven't," I answered. "The Contessa di Ravello is her own mistress,
and I should say if she wanted the moon, it would be bad for anyone
who tried to keep her from getting it."

[Illustration: "HERE WE WERE AT ANNECY".]

"We shall see," murmured the Baron, as the Boy had murmured a few days
ago; and behind this hint also I felt that there lurked some definite
plan.

I had been to Aix-les-Bains years before, but it had not then occurred
to me to visit Annecy, so near by. It was the Boy who had suggested
coming, and we had planned excursions up the lake, looking out on our
guide-book maps various spots of historic or picturesque interest
which we should see _en route_, especially Menthon, the birthplace of
St. Bernard. Now, here we were at Annecy, and in all the world there
could not be a town more charming. By the placid blue lake--whose
water, I am convinced, would still be the colour of melted turquoises
if you corked it up in a bottle--you could wander along shadowed
paths, strewn with the gold coin of sunshine, through a park of dells
as bosky-green as the fair forest of Arden. In the quaint,
old-fashioned streets of the town you were tempted to pause at every
other step for one more snap-shot. You longed to linger on the bridge
and call up a passing panorama of historic pageants. All these things
the Boy and I would have done, and enjoyed