, calmly. "I am ready to
pledge you my word of honor that I never uttered your name, nor made a
single allusion to you in any way. Will that satisfy you?"

"It ought," muttered he, gloomily; "but suspicions and distrusts spring
up in a mind like mine just as weeds do in a rank soil. Don't be angry
with me, old fellow."

"I 'm not angry with you, Ludlow, except in so far as you wrong
yourself. Why, my dear boy, the pursuit of a foolish spite is like going
after a bad debt. All the mischief you could possibly wish this poor
woman could never repay _you_."

"How can _you_ know that without feeling as I feel?" retorted he,
bitterly. "If I were to show you her letters," began he; and then, as
if ashamed of his ignoble menace, he stopped and was silent.

"Why not think seriously of this heiress she speaks of? I saw her
yesterday as she came back from riding; her carriage was awaiting her at
the Piazza del Popolo, and there was actually a little crowd gathered to
see her alight."

"Is she so handsome, then?" asked he, half listlessly.

"She is beautiful; I doubt if I ever saw as lovely a face or as
graceful a figure."

"I 'll wager my head on't, Loo is handsomer; I 'll engage to thrust my
hand into the fire if Loo's foot is not infinitely more beautiful."

"She has a wonderfully handsome foot, indeed," muttered Stocmar.

"And so you have seen it," said Paten, sarcastically. "I wish you 'd be
frank with me, and say how far the flirtation went between you."

"Not half so far as I wished it, my boy. That's all the satisfaction you
'll get from me."

This was said with a certain irritation of manner that for a while
imposed silence upon each.

"Have you got a cheroot?" asked Paten, after a while; and the other
flung his cigar-case across the table without speaking.

"I ordered that fellow in Geneva to send me two thousand," said Paten,
laughing; "but I begin to suspect he had exactly as many reasons for
not executing the order."

"Marry that girl, Ludlow, and you 'll get your 'bacco, I promise you,"
said Stocmar, gayly.

"That's all easy talking, my good fellow, but these things require time,
opportunity, and pursuit. Now, who's to insure me that they 'd not find
out all about _me_ in the mean while? A woman does n't marry a man with
as little solicitation as she waltzes with him, and people in real life
don't contract matrimony as they do in the third act of a comic opera."

"Faith, as regards obstacles, I bac