confirming in his devotion: it was only that seeing her there, listening to another man's compliments, had given a slight shock to the sense of unquestioning security which had grown up with him since the very first earliest days of his love. Already he began to look back with some jealous uneasiness at the past years when Italia had seemed as much his, and as much a necessity of his being, as the breath he drew. True, he had never spoken to her about it, at least not in so many definite words; that was partly because she was still so young—only eighteen on this birthday, and partly too that there had seemed no need for vexing his mother beforehand: he had not money enough to marry upon as yet, and his mother was sure to object; she had always discouraged his being so much at Drea's. But now all these considerations seemed to go for nothing, to become futile and irrelevant seen in the light of this new possibility that another man could step in and attempt to carry away his own especial treasure from before his very eyes. Dino had but little of old Andrea's capacity for personal reverence; there was not enough modesty in his own nature for that; so that it did not strike him as so utterly preposterous that a man in the young Marchese's position should fall seriously in love with a fisherman's daughter. On the other hand, there was always a certain doubt lurking at the bottom of his strongest assertions of equality. He had no weight of simple conviction to steady his possession of the theories which attracted him the most. There was always a struggle between his intelligence and his instincts. Things outside and away from his creed of conduct appealed to him. He could not take life simply: there was the exaggeration of effort in his innermost beliefs. He looked at Italia: he looked with almost more than a woman's sensitiveness, to material impressions at the gallant and determined bearing of the man beside her, whose frank and noble beauty was only like an additional distinction—an emphasis of class differences. No devout believer in the divinest rights of kings could have recognised those differences more keenly than Dino did at that moment. For there is nothing ambiguous in the secret language of jealousy: 'And they say—we say—that one man is as good as another without regard to his rank! I was a fool—a fool,' De Rossi reflected bitterly.

Gasparo seemed to have a talent for seeing everything. He took his cigarette case out of his pocket and asked old Drea for a light; then he said: 'There are changes. Why, even the old gardens up there at the Villa seem to have grown smaller. I remember I thought there was no end to them when I was a boy.'

'Ay, there's something in a place, but there's more in the eye that looks at it. And you'll have seen a many fine places since then, sir, and a many fine people, I'll warrant. It's only the little people and the little places in life that don't change much; they're away down at the bottom, in the still water, out o' reach o' the tide. You'll not find much change in us, sir. There's not a question if we're proud and glad to see you back.'

'Oh, if there's any change among you it's not of the kind I'm finding fault with,' the young man said, glancing again at Italia; 'only it makes one feel how much time has passed. Why, you must be getting an old man now yourself, Drea—beginning to think about giving up work and settling down for a bit—while you look out for a husband for Italia. You'll need to find a good fellow. But perhaps you have done that already.'

'Nay, as for that,—the little girl can wait for a bit,—she can wait a bit yet,' her father answered slowly, taking his pipe out of his mouth and knocking the ashes on the table. 'Our girls are not like the young ladies you're accustomed to, sir,—with nothing to do but sit in their chairs while they pick and choose. Gentlefolks—Lord bless you! they've got one paradise here on earth, and, as for the other one, they've got plenty o' money to spend in masses—they've only got to pay for it. But with us 'tis different, you see.' He took up his glass of wine, looked at it thoughtfully for a moment, and then emptied its contents down his throat with a sudden jerk of his wrist. 'And I'd never be one to urge a girl to jump at the first comer,' he said cheerfully, leaning across the narrow table to emphasise his remark. 'No, no, patience never spoilt any man's luck. And the biggest fish—they're often nearest the bottom—they're nearest the bottom, eh, Sora Lucia?'

'Gesu Maria! how should I know?' the little woman murmured hurriedly, with an apologetic look at the young Marchese. 'In my time we did not think these things should be discussed before young—young persons,' she said primly; it would have seemed a familiarity to her if she had used a common expression such as, 'before young girls.'

'Nay, nay, Lucia mia, you won't make us swallow that!' retorted Sor Drea, with another chuckle of supreme good humour. 'You won't make us swallow it, my dear. For you'll sooner find an old man without an ache than a young girl without a lover,—eh, signor Marchese? 'Tis the good Lord who made us all, who chose to make us in that way, and where's the harm in speaking of it?' He filled his glass up with a more unsteady hand. 'There's Dino over there looking at me like a black thunder-cloud,—but I suppose I may say what I like about my own daughter in my own house,—eh, boy?'

'I was not contradicting you, Sor Drea,' the young man answered quietly.

'Nay, lad, nay, I meant no malice. But it's a poor sort of business to waste your breath whistling for yesterday's breeze. Cheer up, lad! There's always plenty o' good work to the fore when a man's ready to do it. Ready and cheery,—even the dog can earn his dinner by wagging his tail.'

Gasparo laughed. 'Well, I must be going,' he said, and stood up and put out his hand for his belt and sword. As he was buckling it about him his eye fell upon Palmira's pale intent little face. He sat down again.

'Come here, child,' he said, and held out his hand.

'Go to the gentleman, Palmira. Go and tell him what your name is, like a good little girl, and don't be frightened,' said Lucia hastily, with a general tug at the child's frock.

Palmira looked at her with flashing eyes. 'I am not frightened,' she said indignantly, and went and stood composedly beside Gasparo's knee.