ct of our sacrifice to be aware what we were
doing for them. The Contessa did not even, so far as this, yield to the
temptation of fate.

In the meantime Bice had gone through her own little episode. Mr.
Derwentwater came about noon, before the Contessa was up; but he did not
know the Contessa's habits, and he was admitted, which neither Montjoie
nor any of the Contessa's friends would have been. He was overjoyed to
find the lady of his affections alone. This made everything, he thought,
simple and easy for him, and filled him with a delightful confidence
that she was prepared for the object of his visit and had contrived to
keep the Contessa out of the way. His heart was beating high, his mind
full of excitement. He took the chair she pointed him to, and then got
up again, poising his hat between his hands.

"Signorina," he said, "they say that a woman always knows the impression
she has made."

"Why do you call me Signorina?" said Bice. "Yes, it is quite right. But
then it is so long that I have not heard it, and it is only you that
call me so."

"Perhaps," said Mr. Derwentwater, with a little natural complacency,
"others are not so well acquainted with your beautiful country and
language. What should I call you? Ah, I know what I should like to call
you. _Beatrice, loda di deo vera._ You are like the supreme and sovran
lady whom every one must think of who hears your name."

Bice looked at him with a half-comic attention. "You are a very learned
man," she said, "one can see that. You always say something that is
pretty, that one does not understand."

This piqued the suitor a little and brought the colour to his cheek.
"Teach me," he said, "to make you understand me. If I could show you my
heart, you would see that from the first moment I saw you the name of
Bice has been written----"

"Oh, I know it already," cried Bice, "that you have a great devotion for
poetry. Unhappily I have no education. I know it so very little. But I
have found out what you mean about Bice. It is more soft than you say
it. There is no sound of _tch_ in it at all. Beeshe, like that. Your
Italian is very good," she added, "but it is Tuscan, and the _bocca
romana_ is the best."

Mr. Derwentwater was more put out than it became a philosopher to be. "I
came," he cried, with a kind of asperity, "for a very different purpose,
not to be corrected in my Italian. I came----" but here his feelings
were too strong for him, "to lay my life and