eams; so that I woke up several times, thinking I was trying to
comfort her, and could not. But toward dawn I felt sure that Nino was
coming, and that all would be well.

I was chatting with my old landlady the next morning, and smoking to
pass the time, when there was suddenly a commotion in the street. That
is to say, someone was arriving, and all the little children turned
out in a body to run after the stranger, while the old women came to
their doors with their knitting, and squinted under the bright
sunlight to see what was the matter.

It was Nino, of course--my own boy, riding on a stout mule, with a
countryman by his side upon another. He was dressed in plain gray
clothes, and wore high boots. His great felt hat drooped half across
his face, and hid his eyes from me; but there was no mistaking the
stern square jaw and the close even lips. I ran toward him and called
him by name. In a moment he was off his beast, and we embraced
tenderly.

"Have you seen her?" were the first words he spoke. I nodded, and
hurried him into the house where I lived, fearful lest some mischance
should bring the party from the castle riding by. He sent his man with
the mules to the inn, and when we were at last alone together he threw
himself into a chair, and took off his hat.

Nino too was changed in the two months that had passed. He had
travelled far, had sung lustily, and had been applauded to the skies;
and he had seen the great world. But there was more than all that in
his face. There were lines of care and of thought that well became his
masculine features. There was a something in his look that told of a
set purpose, and there was a light in his dark eyes that spoke a world
of warning to anyone who might dare to thwart him. But he seemed
thinner, and his cheeks were as white as the paper I write on.

Some men are born masters, and never once relax the authority they
exercise on those around them. Nino has always commanded me, as he
seems to command everybody else, in the fewest words possible. But he
is so true and honest and brave that all who know him love him; and
that is more than can be said for most artists. As he sat in his
chair, hesitating what question to ask first, or waiting for me to
speak, I thought that if Hedwig von Lira had searched the whole world
for a man able to deliver her from her cruel father and from her hated
lover she could have chosen no better champion than Nino Cardegna, the
singer. Of cou