no other plan."

"At any rate, I should have thought you might have selected some more
retired rendezvous than the most frequented church in Venice."

He shrugged his shoulders. "I wish you would suggest one within reach,"
he said. "There are no retired places in this accursed town. But, in
fact, we see each other very seldom. Often for days together the only
way in which I can get a glimpse of her is by loitering about in my boat
in front of her father's house, and watching till she shows herself at
the window. We are in her neighborhood now, and it is close upon the
hour at which I can generally calculate upon her appearing. Would you
mind my making a short detour that way before I set you down at your
hotel?"

We had entered the Grand Canal while Von Rosenau had been relating his
love-tale, and some minutes before he had lowered his sail and taken to
the oars. He now slewed the boat's head round abruptly, and we shot into
a dark and narrow waterway, and so, after sundry twistings and turnings,
arrived before a grim, time-worn structure, so hemmed in by the
surrounding buildings that it seemed as if no ray of sunshine could ever
penetrate within its walls.

"That is the Palazzo Marinelli," said my companion. "The greater part of
it is let to different tenants. The family has long been much too poor
to inhabit the whole of it, and now the old man only reserves himself
four rooms on the third floor. Those are the windows, in the far corner;
and there--no!--yes!--there is Bianca."

I brought my eyeglass to bear upon the point indicated just in time
to catch sight of a female head, which was thrust out through the open
window for an instant, and then withdrawn with great celerity.

"Ah," sighed the count, "it is you who have driven her away. I ought to
have remembered that she would be frightened at seeing a stranger. And
now she will not show herself again, I fear. Come; I will take you home.
Confess now--is she not more beautiful than you expected?"

"My dear sir, I had hardly time to see whether she was a man or a woman;
but I am quite willing to take your word for it that there never was
anybody like her."

"If you would like to wait a little longer--half an hour or so--she
_might_ put her head out again," said the young man, wistfully.

"Thank you very much; but my sister will be wondering why I do not come
to take her down to the _table d'hote_. And besides, I am not in love
myself, I may perhaps be excus