er face was like a jewel set in gold and velvet. But, when I
think of it, such a combination would seem absurdly vulgar by the side
of Hedwig von Lira. She was so pale and exquisite and sad that Nino
could hardly look at her. He remembered that there were violets,
rarest of flowers in Rome in January, in her belt.

To tell the truth, Nino had expected to find her stern and cold,
whereas she was only very quiet and sorrowful.

"Will you forgive me, signorina, for this rashness?" he asked, in a
low voice.

"In that I receive you I forgive you, sir," she said. He glanced
toward De Pretis, who seemed absorbed in some music at the piano and
was playing over bits of an accompaniment. She understood, and moved
slowly to a window at the other end of the great room, standing among
the curtains. He placed himself in the embrasure. She looked at him
long and earnestly, as if finally reconciling the singer with the man
she had known so long. She found him changed, as I had, in a short
time. His face was sterner and thinner and whiter than before, and
there were traces of thought in the deep shadows beneath his eyes.
Quietly observing him, she saw how perfectly simple and exquisitely
careful was his dress, and how his hands bespoke that attention which
only a gentleman gives to the details of his person. She saw that, if
he were not handsome, he was in the last degree striking to the eye,
in spite of all his simplicity, and that he would not lose by being
contrasted with all the dandies and courtiers in Rome. As she looked,
she saw his lip quiver slightly, the only sign of emotion he ever
gives, unless he loses his head altogether, and storms, as he
sometimes does.

"Signorina," he began, "I have come to tell you a story; will you
listen to it?"

"Tell it me," said she, still looking in his face.

"There was once a solitary castle in the mountains, with battlement
and moat both high and broad. Far up in a lonely turret dwelt a rare
maiden, of such surpassing beauty and fairness that the peasants
thought she was not mortal, but an angel from heaven, resting in that
tower from the doing of good deeds. She had flowers up there in her
chamber, and the seeds of flowers; and as the seasons passed by, she
took from her store the dry germs, and planted them one after another
in a little earth on the window-sill. And the sun shone on them and
they grew, and she breathed upon them and they were sweet. But they
withered and bore no off