The Lure of the Mask

"Our little jig is up. Read these and see for yourself."

She seized the clipping eagerly, but the eagerness died from her face quickly, leaving it pale and stony. The clipping fluttered unheeded from her fingers to the ground. Her gaze passed from one face to another, all the while a horror growing in her eyes. Slowly she picked up the envelope and drew out the card. Her eyes filled, but with tears of rage and despair.

"Tell me, what is it?" cried Hillard, troubled, for his keen lover's eyes saw these changes.

In answer she gave him the card. He read it. It was rather a knock. Now, why should the Principessa di Monte Bianca take it into her head to give a ball in the Villa Ariadne, Wednesday week, when she had loaned the villa indefinitely to her friend, La Signorina?

TANGLES

Hillard passed the card to Merrihew, who presented it to Kitty. Smith had already seen it. He waved it aside moodily. La Signorina's eyes roved, as in an effort to find some way out. Afar she discovered Worth, his chin in his collar, his hands behind his back, his shoulders studiously inclined, slowly pacing the graveled path which skirted the conservatory. From time to time he kicked a pebble, followed it and kicked it again, without purpose. Whether he saw them or not she could not tell. Presently he turned the corner and was gone from sight. During the past few days he had lived by himself; and for all that she did not like him, she was sorry for him.

"It's a pretty kettle of fish," said O'Mally, rather pleased secretly in having created so dramatic a moment. "She might have been kind enough, however, to notify us in advance of her intentions. I am still broke," disheartened; "and the Lord knows what I'll do if I'm shunted back into the hands of the tender hotel managers and porters. There is nothing for us to do but to clear out, bag and baggage. It's a blamed hard world. I wish I had kept some of old Pietro's tips." He spoke with full dejection. Up to this time he had been playing the most enjoyable part in all his career, plenty to eat and to drink and no worry. And here the affair was ended with the suddenness of a thunder-clap.

"I'm even worse off than you are, Tom," said Smith. "You've got a diamond. The sooner we light out the better. In a day or two the princess will be piling in upon us with her trunks and lackeys and poodles."

"Poodles!" La Signorina was white with anger.

"Why, yes," said Smith innocently. "Nearly all Italian ladies carry one or more of those woozy-eyed pups. Good-by to your sparkler, Tom, this trip, if we ever expect to see the lights of old Broadway again."

O'Mally sighed deeply. The blow had finally fallen.

Then La Signorina rose to her feet. She took the card from Kitty's fingers, tore it into many pieces and flung them over the wall.

"We have been betrayed!" she cried, a storm in her eyes.

"Betrayed?"

O'Mally looked at Smith; Hillard stared at Merrihew; Kitty regarded La Signorina with wonder.

"Betrayed? In what manner?" asked Hillard.

"Her Highness has had no hand in this. I know. Some one with malice has done this petty thing." To La Signorina everything had gone wrong to-day. "I shall telegraph her Highness at once. I say that we have been made the victims of some practical joke."

"Joke or not, we can't stay here now," Smith declared. "All the high muckamucks in and roundabout Florence will be getting out their jewels and gowns. If we send a denial to the paper, and we really have no authority to do that, there'll be a whole raft of 'em who will not see it. And since nobody knows how many invitations have been sent out or to whom they have been sent—oh, what's the use of all this arguing? The thing's done. No matter how we figure it, we're all railroaded. Third-class to Naples and twelve days in the steerage. Whew!"

"I guess Hillard and I can help you," said Merrihew. "We'll see that you get home all right."

"To be sure," assented Hillard. Poor devils!

"We'll make good, once we strike Broadway," replied O'Mally gratefully.

La Signorina, her arms folded, her lips compressed into a thin line of scarlet, the anger in her eyes unabated, began to walk back and forth, and there was something tigerish in the light step and the quick turn. The others, knowing her to be a woman of fertile invention, patiently and in silence waited for her to speak.

But the silence was broken unexpectedly by O'Mally. He gripped Smith by the arm and pointed toward the path leading to the gates.

"Look!" he whispered.

All turned, and what they saw in nowise relieved the tenseness of the situation. Two carabinieri and an inspector of seals, dusty but stern of countenance, came up the path. O'Mally, recollecting the vast prison at Naples, saw all sorts of dungeons, ankle-deep in sea-water, and iron bars, shackles and balls. Every one stood up and waited for this new development to unfold itself. La Signorina alone seemed indifferent to this official cortège. The inspector signed to the carabinieri, who stopped. He came on. Without touching his cap—a bad sign—he laid upon the tea-table a card and a newspaper, familiar now to them all.

"Signora," he said politely but coldly to the whilom prima donna, "will you do me the honor to explain this? We have some doubts as to the authority upon which this invitation was issued." He spoke fluent English, for the benefit of all concerned.

Hillard waited for her answer, dreading he knew not what.

She spoke evenly, almost insolently. "The invitation is perfectly regular."

Everybody experienced a chill.

This time the inspector bowed. "Then her Highness will occupy her villa?"

"She is already in possession. I am the Principessa di Monte Bianca," calmly.

Had an earthquake shattered the surrounding hills, and gulfs opened at their feet, it could not have spread terror more quickly among the transient guests at the Villa Ariadne than this declaration. They were appalled; they stood like images, without the power to take their eyes off this woman. This transcendental folly simply paralyzed them. They knew that she was not the princess; and here, calmly and negligently, she was jeoparding their liberty as well as her own. Mad, mad! For imposture of this caliber was a crime, punishable by long imprisonment; and Italy always contrived to rake in a dozen or so accomplices. They were all lost indeed, unless they could escape and leave La Signorina alone to bear the brunt of her folly.

The keen-eyed inspector took mental note of these variant expressions.

"Your Highness," he said, his cap setting the dust on the stones flying, "a thousand pardons for this disagreeable intrusion. It was not officially known that your Highness was here."

"It is nothing," replied the pseudo princess. "Only I desired to remain incognito for the present."

"And the seals?" purred the official.

"We shall go through that formality the morning after the ball. At present I do not wish to be disturbed with the turning of the villa upside down, as would be the case were the seals removed."

"That will require the permission of the crown, your Highness."

"Then you will set about at once to secure this permission."

The air with which she delivered this command was noble enough for any one. The inspector was overcome. "But as your Highness has never before occupied the villa, some definite assurance—"

"You will telegraph to Cranford and Baring, in the Corso Umberto Primo, Rome. They will supply you with the necessary details and information."

The inspector inscribed the address in his notebook, bowed, backed away and bowed again. The crunch of the gravel under his feet was as a sinister thunder, and it was the only sound. He spoke to the carabinieri. They saluted, and the trio marched toward the gates.

There remained a tableau, picturesque but tense. Then Kitty began to cry softly.

"Are you mad?" cried Hillard, his voice harsh and dry.

La Signorina laughed recklessly. "If you call this madness."

"Smith, my boy," said O'Mally, moistening his lips, "you and I this night will pack up our little suit-cases and—movimento, moto, viaggio, or whatever the Dago word is for move on. I'm out of the game; the stakes are too high. I pass, signorina."

"How could you do it?" sobbed Kitty.

Merrihew patted her hand and scowled.

"What an ado!" said La Signorina, shrugging. "So you all desert me?"

"Desert you?" O'Mally resumed his seat and carefully loosened the topmost buttons of his coat. "Of course we shall desert you. We are sane individuals, at any rate. I have no desire to see the inside of an Italian jail, not knowing how to get out. What under the sun possessed you? What excuse have you to offer for pushing us all into the lion's mouth? You could have easily denied all knowledge of the invitation, referred them to your princess, wherever she may be, and we could have cleared out in the morning, poor but honest. And now you've gone and done it!"

Hillard leaned against a cypress, staring at the stones.

"In Venice," said she, her voice gentle, "you accepted the chance readily enough. What has changed you?"

O'Mally flushed. What she said was true. "I was a fool in Venice," frankly.

"And you, Mr. Smith?" continued La Signorina, as with a lash.

But it was ineffectual. "I was a fool, too," admitted Smith. "In Venice it sounded like a good joke, but it looks different now." He sat down beside O'Mally.

"So much for gallantry! And you, Kitty?"

"I made a promise, and I'll keep it. But I think you are cruel and wicked."

"No nonsense, Kitty," interposed Merrihew. "I've some rights now. You will leave this villa to-night."

"I refuse," replied Kitty simply.

Hillard slipped into the pause.

"Did you issue those invitations yourself?" he asked this strange, incomprehensible woman.

"Do you believe that?" La Signorina demanded, with narrowing eyes.

"I don't know what to believe. But I repeat the question."

"On my word of honor, I know no more about this mystery than you do." And there was truth in her voice and eyes.

"But are you not over-sure of your princess? Being a woman, may she not have changed her plans?"

"Not without consulting me. I am not only sure," she added with a positiveness which brooked no further question, "but to-morrow I shall prove to you that her Highness has not changed her plans. I shall send her a telegram at once, and you shall see the reply. But you, Mr. Hillard, will you, too, desert me?"

"Oh, as for that, I am mad likewise," he said, with a smile on his lips but none in his eyes. "I'll see the farce to the end, even if that end is jail."

"If!" cried O'Mally. "You speak as though you had some doubt regarding that possibility!"

"So I have." Hillard went to the table, selected a rose, and drew it through the lapel of his coat.

"I say, Jack!" Merrihew interposed, greatly perturbed.

"And you will stay also, Dan."

"Are you really in earnest?" dubiously. Why hadn't this impossible woman sung under somebody else's window?

"Earnest as I possibly can be. Listen a moment. La Signorina is not a person recklessly to endanger us. She has, apparently, put her head into the lion's mouth. But perhaps this lion is particularly well trained. I am sure that she knows many things of which we are all ignorant. Trust her to carry out this imposture which now seems so wild. Besides, to tell the truth, I do not wish it said that I was outdone by Miss Killigrew in courage and the spirit of adventure."

"Oh, give me no credit for that," broke in Kitty.

La Signorina, however, rewarded Hillard with a look which set his pulses humming. Into what folly would he not have gone at a sign from this lovely being? In his mind there was not the shadow of a doubt: this comedy would ultimately end at some magistrate's desk. So be it.

Merrihew cast about helplessly, but none held out a hand. He must decide for himself.

"Do you mean it, Kitty?"

"Yes."

O'Mally's face wore several new wrinkles; and both he and Smith were looking at the green mold on the flag-stones as interestedly as if China was but on the other side. Kitty saw nothing, not even the hills she was staring at.

"Since you have made up your mind, Jack," said Merrihew doggedly, "why, there's nothing for me to do but fall in. But it's kings against two-spots."

"Mental reservation?" said the temptress. "Mr. Hillard has none."

"I am not quite certain I have none," replied Hillard, renewing his interest in the rose.

A moment later, when he looked up, her glance plunged into his, but found nothing. Hillard could fence with the eyes as well as with the foils.

"Well," she said, finding that Hillard's mental reservations were not to be voiced, "here are three who will not desert me."

"That's all very well," rejoined O'Mally; "but it is different with those two. Mr. Hillard's a millionaire, or near it, and he could buy his way through all the jails in Italy. Smith here, Worth and Miss Killigrew and myself, we have nothing. More than that, we're jotted down in the police books, even to the mole on the side of my nose. There's no way out for us. We are accomplices."

"You will leave in the morning, then?" asked La Signorina contemptuously.

"I hope to."

"Want of courage?"

"No. Against physical danger I am willing to offer myself at any time to your Highness," with a touch of bitter irony. "But to walk straight into jail, with my eyes open, that's a horse of a different color."

"I like you none the less for your frankness, Mr. O'Mally. And I apologize for doubting your courage. But if to-morrow I should produce a telegram from her Highness that would do away with all your doubts?"

"I'll answer that when I see the telegram." O'Mally made an unsuccessful attempt to roll a cigarette. This honeyed blarney, to his susceptible Irish blood, was far more dangerous than any taunts; but he remembered in time the fable of the fox and the crow. "We have all been together now for many weeks. Yet, who you are none of us knows."

"I am the princess," laughing.

"Oh, yes; of course; I forgot. But I mean your real name."

"My real name? Have you ever before asked me what it is?"

"Perhaps we have been a little afraid of you," put in Smith.

The shadow of a smile lay upon her lips and vanished. "My name is Sonia Hilda Grosvenor." And her voice was music.

"Pardon me," said O'Mally drolly, "but were any of your ancestors—er—troubled with insanity?"

This query provoked a laughter which gave them all a sense of relief.

"My father had one attack of insanity, since you ask." La Signorina's face sobered. She stepped over to the wall, rested upon it, and searched the deepening eastern horizon. Yes, her father had been insane, and all her present wretchedness was due to this insanity of a rational mind. For a moment she forgot those about her, and her thought journeyed swiftly back to the old happy days. "Yes, there is a species of insanity in my veins." She turned to them again. "But it is the insanity of a sane person, the insanity of impulse and folly, of wilfulness and lack of foresight. As Mr. O'Mally said, I have gone and done it. What possessed me to say that I am the princess is as inexplicable to me as to you, though you may not believe it. But for me there is no withdrawing now; flight would do us no good. We, or I, I should say, have created a suspicion, and if we ran away we should be pursued from one end of Italy to the other, till this suspicion was dissipated. We should become suspects, and in Italy a suspect is liable to immediate arrest. I am sorry that I have tangled you up in this. I release you all from any promise," proudly.

"If you talk like that—" began O'Mally.

"Sh!" Smith elbowed him sharply in the small ribs.

"It's all right, Smith. No one can force me into a scrape of this sort; but when she speaks like that! Signorina, or I should say, Miss Grosvenor, you have the most beautiful voice in the world. Some day, and we are all out of jail, I expect to hear you in the balcony scene with some famous tenore robusto as Romeo. You will be getting three thousand a week. You needn't bother about the telegram; but I'll have to have a new suit," touching the frayed cuffs of his coat. "Now, if we go to jail, how'll we get out?"

"Trust me!" La Signorina had recovered her gaiety.

"Well," said Smith, "suppose we go and break the news to Worth?"

Hillard refused to canter, so the two walked their horses all the way into Florence. Merrihew spoke but seldom and Hillard not at all. By now the sun had gone down, and deep purple clouds swarmed across the blue face of heaven, forecasting a storm.... It was not dishonorable for him to love this woman, but it was not honorable for her to listen. Sonia Hilda Grosvenor; that solved no corner of the puzzle.

"To-morrow," said Merrihew, "I'm going to look up the jail and engage rooms ahead. It might be crowded."

Hillard raised his face and let a few drops of cooling rain patter on his cheeks. "I love her, I love her!" he murmured.

THE DÉNOUEMENT

The morning sun poured over the hills, throwing huge shadows in the gorge below. The stream, swollen by the heavy rains of the past night, foamed and snarled along its ragged bed. The air was fresh and cool, and the stately cypresses took on a deeper shade of green. Lizards scampered over the damp stones about the porter's lodge or sought the patches of golden sunshine, and insects busied themselves with the daily harvest. O'Mally sniffed. As the wind veered intermittently there came to him the perfume of the locust trees, now in full bloom, the flowers of which resembled miniature cascades hanging in mid-air. Pietro rocked, his legs crossed, his face blurred in the drifting tobacco smoke.

"No more tourists, Pietro."

"No." Pietro sighed, a ruminating light in his faded eyes.

"Did you ever see La Signorina before? Do you know anything about her?"

"Never! No!" answered Pietro, with the perfect candor of an accomplished liar.

"Have you ever seen her Highness?"

"When she so," indicating a height about two feet from the ground.

"You said that you had never seen her."

"Meestake."

"How old would she be?"

Pietro wrinkled his brow, "Oh, quaranta, cinquanta; fifty-forty. Who knows?"

"Fifty! How old are you?" suspiciously.

"Settanta; seventy."

"Well, you look it. But why hasn't the princess ever been here, when it's so beautiful?"

"Woman."

"What woman?"

"La Principessa. Many villas, much money."

O'Mally kicked at one of the lizards. "I thought she might be young."

"No. But La Signorina-bah! they ar-r-r-rest her. Patienza!"

"You think so?"

"Wait."

"But her friend the princess will come to her assistance."

Pietro laughed scornfully, which showed that he had some doubts.

"But you won't betray her?"

"Never!" puffing quickly.

"It's a bad business," admitted O'Mally. This old rascal of a gardener was as hard to pump as a frozen well.

Pietro agreed that it was a bad business. "Eenspector, he come to-day, domani—to-morrow. He come nex' day; watch, watch!" Pietro elevated his shoulders slowly and dropped them sharply. "All ar-r-r-rest!"

"You think so?"

"Si."

"But you wouldn't betray her for money, Pietro?"

"No!" energetically.

Pietro might be loyal; still, O'Mally had some shadow of doubt.

"La Signorina is very beautiful," irrelevantly. "Ah!" with a gesture toward the heavens. "And if she isn't a princess, she ought to be one," slyly.

"Zitto! She come!" Pietro got up with alacrity, pocketing his pipe, careful that the bowl was right side up.

She was as daintily fresh in her pink frock as a spring tulip; a frock, thought O'Mally, that would have passed successfully in any ball-room. She was as beautiful as the moon, and to this bit of Persian O'Mally added, conscious of a deep intake of breath, the stars and the farther worlds and the roses close at hand. Her eyes were shining, but her color was thin. O'Mally, for all his buffoonery, was a keen one to read a face. She was highly strung. Where would they all land finally?

"I have been looking for you, Mr. O'Mally," she said.

"At your Highness' command!"

Pietro, hearing this title, looked from one to the other suspiciously.

"I have just received a telegram from her Highness."

An expression of relief flitted over Pietro's withered countenance.

"It wasn't necessary," said O'Mally gallantly.

"But I wish you to read it. I know that you will cease to dream of dungeons and shackles." There was a bit of a laugh in her voice. It was reassuring.

"All right." O'Mally accepted the yellow sheet which the government folds and pastes economically. There were fifty words or more. "I can make out a word or two," he said; "it's in Italian. Will you read it for me?"

"I forgot," apologetically.

Briefly, La Principessa di Monte Bianca gave Sonia Hilda Grosvenor full authority to act as her proxy in giving the ball; that in case of any difficulty with the civil authorities to wire her at once and she would come. As for the invitation, she knew absolutely nothing about it.

This last statement rather staggered the erstwhile concierge. If the princess hadn't issued the invitation, who the deuce had? "This leaves me confused, but it improves the scenery a whole lot. But who, then, has done this thing?"

"To solve that we must look nearer home."

"Have you any idea who did it?" he inquired anxiously.

"No."

"Have you another invitation?"

"I tore up the only one."

"That's too bad. A stationer's imprint might have helped us."

"I was angry and did not think. To-morrow a dozen temporary servants will be added to the household. We shall be very busy."

"Before and after," said O'Mally dryly. He wondered what she on her part had telegraphed the real princess. It was all very mystifying.

"Listen!" she said.

"Horses," declared O'Mally.

"Two," said Pietro, with a hand to his ear.

La Signorina's color deepened.

"Our friends," laughed O'Mally; "come up to see if we are still out of jail."

The dreamy, pleasurable days at the Villa Ariadne were no more. The spirit of suspicion, of unrest, of doubt now stalked abroad, peering from veiled eyes, hovering on lips. And there was a coming and going of menials, a to-and-froing of extra gardeners and carpenters, and the sound of many hammers. The ball-room and the dining-room were opened and aired, the beautiful floors polished, and the dust and cobwebs of twenty years were vanquished.

In Florence there was a deal of excitement over the coming affair, for the Villa Ariadne had once been the scene of many a splendid entertainment. Men chatted about it in their cafés and the women chattered about it in their boudoirs. And there was here and there a mysterious smile, a knowing look, a shrug. There had always been a mystery regarding the Principessa di Monte Bianca; many doubted her actual existence. But the prince was known all over Europe as a handsome spendthrift. And the fact that at this precise moment he was quartered with the eighth corps in Florence added largely to the zest of speculation. Oh, the nobility and the military, which are one and the same thing, would be present at the ball; they were altogether too inquisitive to decline.

Daily the inspector of seals made his solemn round, poking into the forbidden chambers, into the lofts, into the cellars. He scrutinized every chest and closet with all the provocative slowness of a physiologist viewing under the microscope the corpuscles of some unhappy frog. The information he had received from Rome had evidently quieted his larger doubts; but these people, from the princess down to the impossible concierge, were a new species to him, well worth watching. An American princess; this accounted for much. He had even looked up the two Americans who rode up from Florence every day; but he found that they were outside the pale of his suspicions; one of them was a millionaire, known to the Italian ambassador in the United States; so he dismissed them as negligible quantities. He had some pretty conflicts with Pietro; but Pietro was also a Tuscan, which explains why the inspector never obtained any usable information from this quarter.

Hillard and Merrihew eyed these noisy preparations broodingly. To the one it was a damper to his rosal romance; to the other it was the beginning of the end: this woman, so brilliant, so charming, so lovely and human, could never be his. Well, indeed, he understood now why Mrs. Sandford had warned him; he understood now what the great mistake was. Had fate sent her under his window only for this? Bitterness charged his heart and often passed his lips. And this other man, who, what, and where was he all this time?

He was always at her heels now, saving her a care here, doing a service there, but speaking no more of his love. She understood and was grateful. Once she plucked a young rose and gave it to him, and he was sure that her hand touched his with pity, though she would not meet his eyes. And so Merrihew found but little difficulty in picking up the thread of his romance.

As for O'Mally, he spent most of his leisure studying time-tables.

At four o'clock on the afternoon of the day before the ball, now that the noise had subsided and the servants were in their quarters, La Signorina went into the gardens alone. An hour earlier she had seen Hillard mount and ride away, the last time but once. There seemed to bear down upon her that oppression which one experiences in a nightmare, of being able to fly so high, to run madly and yet to move slowly, always pursued by terror. Strive as she would, she could not throw off this sense. After all, it was a nightmare, from the day she landed in New York up to this very moment. But how to wake? Verily, she was mad. Would any sane person do what she had done and was yet about to do? She might have lived quietly and peacefully till the end of her days. But no! And all her vows were like dried reeds in a tempest, broken and beaten. Even now there was a single avenue of escape, but she knew that she could not profit by it and leave these unfortunate derelicts to shift for themselves. It was not fair that they should be made to suffer for her mad caprices. She must play it out boldly to the final line, come evil or not.... Love! She laughed brokenly and struck her hands in suppressed fury. A fitting climax, this! All the world was mad and she was the maddest in it.

Some one was coming along the path. She wheeled impatiently. She wanted to be alone. And of all men Worth was not the one she cared to see. But the sight of his pale face and set jaws stayed the words she was inclined to speak. She waited restlessly.

"I realize that my presence may be distasteful to you," he began, not without some minor agitation. It was the first time in days that he had stood so near to her or had spoken while alone with her. "But I have something to say to you upon which your future welfare largely depends."

"I believed that we had settled that."

"I am not making any declaration of love, madame," he said.

"I am listening." This prelude did not strike her favorably.

"There has been a tremendous wonder, as I understand, about this ball."

"In what way?" guardedly.

"In regard to the strange manner in which the invitations were issued."

"Have you found out who did it?" she demanded.

"Yes." The light in his eyes was feverish despite the pallor of his face.

"Who was it?" fiercely. Oh, but she would have revenge for this miserable jest!

"I issued those invitations—with a definite purpose."

"You?" Her eyes grew wide and her lips parted.

"I!" a set defiance in his tone.

"It is you who have done this thing?"

"Yes. I am the guilty man. I did the work well, considering the difficulties. The list was the main obstacle, but I overcame that. I represented myself as secretary to her Highness, which, when all is said, was the very thing agreed upon in Venice. I am the guilty man;" but he spoke like a man who was enjoying a triumph.

"And you have the effrontery to confess your crime to me?" her fury blazing forth.

"Call it what you please, the fact remains."

"What purpose had you in mind when you did this cowardly thing? And I had trusted you and treated you as an equal! And so it was you who perpetrated this forgery, this miserable jest?"

"Forgery, yes; jest, no." Her anger did not alarm him; he had gone too far to be alarmed at anything.

"Why did you do it?"

"I did it as a man who has but a single throw left. One chance in a thousand; I took that chance and won."

"I do not understand you at all." She was tired.

"As I said, I had a definite purpose. An imposture like this is a prison offense. I asked you to marry me. I do so again."

"You are hiding a threat!" The mental chaos cleared and left her thought keen and cold.

"I shall hide it no longer. Marry me, or I shall disclose the imposture to the police."

"Oh!" She shot him a glance, insolent and piercing. Then she laughed, but neither hysterically nor mirthfully. It was the laughter of one in deadly anger. "I had believed you to be a man of some reason, Mr. Worth. Do you suppose, even had I entertained some sentiment toward you, that it would survive a circumstance like this?"

"I am waiting for your answer."

"You shall have it. Why, this is scarcely on the level with cheap melodrama. Threats? How short-sighted you have been! Did you dream that any woman could be won in this absurd fashion? You thought nothing of your companions, either, or the trouble you were bringing about their heads."

"Yes or no?" His voice was not so full of assurance as it had been.

"No!"

"Take care!" advancing.

"I am perfectly capable of taking care. And heed what I have to say to you, Mr. Worth. You will leave this villa at once; and if you do not go quietly, I shall order the servants to put you forth. That is my answer."

"You speak as though you were the princess," he snarled.

"Till Thursday morning I am!" La Signorina replied proudly.

"I shall inform the police."

"Do so. Now, as there is nothing more to be said, be gone!"

He saw that he had thrown and lost; and a man who loses his last throw is generally desperate. Regardless of consequences, he seized her roughly in his arms. She struck him across the eyes with full strength, and she was no weakling. He gasped in pain and released her.

"If I were a man," she said quietly, but with lightning in her eyes, "you should die for that!" She left him.

Worth, a hundred varied emotions rocking him, stared after her till she was no longer in sight. There were tears in his eyes and a ringing in his head. Fool! To play this kind of game against that kind of woman! Fool, fool! He had written the end himself. It was all over. He went to his room, got together his things, found a cart, and drove secretly into Florence.

On the night of the ball there was a brilliant moon. Rosy Chinese lanterns stretched from tree to tree. The little god in the fountain gleamed with silver on one side and there was a glow as of life on the other. From the long casement windows, opened to the mild air of the night, came the murmur of music. The orchestra was playing Strauss, the dreamy waltzes from The Queen's Lace Handkerchief. Bright uniforms and handsome gowns flashed by the opened windows. Sometimes a vagrant puff of air would find its way in, and suddenly the ball-room dimmed and the dancers moved like phantoms. The flames of the candles would struggle and, with many a flicker, right themselves, and the radiant colors and jewels would renew their luster.

O'Mally, half hidden behind a tree, wondered if he had not fallen asleep over some tale by Scheherazade and was not dreaming this. But here was old Pietro standing close by. It was all real. At odd whiles he had a vision of Kitty in her simple white dress, of Merrihew's flushed face, of Hillard's frowning pallor, of La Signorina wholly in black, a rare necklace round her white throat, a star of emeralds in her hair, her face calm and serene. Where would they all be on the morrow?

"Pietro, she is more than beautiful!" sighed O'Mally.

"But wait," said Pietro. He alone among the men knew the cause of Worth's disappearance. "Trouble."

Leaning against the door which gave entrance to the ball-room from the hall were two officers, negligently interested in the moving picture. "What do you make of it?" asked one.

"Body of Bacchus, you have me there!"

"Shall we go?"

"No, no! The prince himself will be here at eleven. He was, singularly enough, not invited; and knowing the story as I do, I am curious to witness the scene. The women are already picking her to pieces. To give a ball in this hurried manner, without ladies in attendance! These Americans! But she is beautiful," with evident reluctance.

Hillard, peering gloomily over their shoulders, overheard. The prince! Oh, this must not be. There could be only one prince in a matter of this kind. He pushed by the Italians without apology for his rudeness, edged around the ball-room till he reached La Signorina's side. He must save her at all hazards.

"A word," he whispered in German.

"What is it?" she asked in the same tongue.

"The prince himself will be here at eleven."

"What prince?"

"Di Monte Bianca. Come, there is no time to lose. I have been holding my carriage ready ever since I came. Come."

"Thank you, but it is too late." She smiled, but it was a tired and lonely little smile. "Wait near me, but fear nothing." She had long since armed her nerves against this moment.

"But—"

"Enough! Leave everything to me."

"In God's name, who and what are you that you show no alarm when such danger threatens?"

"I have told you to wait," she answered.

He stepped back, beaten, discouraged. He would wait, and woe to any who touched her!

At precisely eleven the music ceased for intermission. There was a lull. Two carabinieri pushed their way into the ball-room. Tableau.

"Which among you is called the Principessa di Monte Bianca?" was asked authoritatively.

"I am she," said La Signorina, stepping forth.

The carabinieri crossed quickly to her side.

"What do you wish?" she asked distinctly.

"You are under arrest for imposture. You are not the Principessa di Monte Bianca; you are known as La Signorina, a singer."

Hillard, wild with despair, made as though to intervene.

"Remain where you are!" he was warned.

As the carabinieri were about to lay hands upon La Signorina, a loud voice from the hall stopped them.

"One moment!" An officer in riding breeches and dusty boots entered and approached the dramatic group. Hillard and Merrihew recognized him instantly. It was the man with the scar. "What is the trouble?"

"This woman," explained one of the carabinieri, saluting respectfully, "is posing as your wife, Highness. We are here to arrest her."

"Do not touch her!" said the prince. "She has the most perfect right in the world to do what she has done. She is the Principessa di Monte Bianca, my wife!"

MEASURE FOR MEASURE

Silence invested the Villa Ariadne; yet warm and mellow light illumined many a window or marked short pathways on the blackness of the lawn. Of the hundred lanterns hanging in the gardens, not a dozen still burned, and these offered rather a melancholy reminder of joy and laughter departed. The moon was high in the heavens now, and the shadows cast by the gloomy cypresses put the little god in the fountain in complete darkness. A single marble bench stood out with that vividness which only marble and moonshine can produce. All the carriages, save one, were gone. A solitary saddle-horse rattled his bit, pawed restively, and tossed his head worriedly from side to side, as if prescience had touched him with foretelling.

On the other side of the wall, lurking in the dark niches, was a tall, lean, grey-haired old man who watched and listened and waited. Whenever he ventured into the moonlight the expression on his face was exultant but sinister. He was watching and listening and waiting for the horse. At the first sound of the animal's prancing hoofs on the stones by the porter's lodge, the old man was prepared to steal to the self-appointed place somewhat down the road. What befell there would be wholly in the hands of God. Seven years! It was a long time. He had not hunted for this man; he was breaking no promise; their paths had recrossed; it was destiny. So he waited.

Within the ball-room the candles were sinking in their brass sconces and little waxen stalactites formed about the rims. The leaving of the guests had been hurried and noisy and without any particular formality or directness. In truth, it resembled a disorderly retreat more than anything else. The dénouement was evidently sufficient; they had no desire to witness the anti-climax, however interesting and instructive it might be. Carabinieri and tableaux and conjugal reunion; it was too much to be crowded all into one night. Good-by! During this flight his Highness the Principi di Monte Bianca, Enrico by name, had taken the part of an amused spectator; but now that the last of the unwelcome guests was gone, he assumed the role premeditated. He strode up and down the floor, his spurs tinkling and his saber rattling harshly. He stopped before this painting or that, scrutinized the corners to ascertain what artist had signed it; he paused an interval before the marble faun, which he recognized as a genuine antique. These things really interested him, for he had never been inside the Villa Ariadne till this night. And there was an excellent reason. Occasionally he glanced at the group on the opposite side of the room. He laughed silently. They were as lively as so many sticks of wood. Oh, he would enjoy himself to-night; he would extract every drop of pleasure from this rare and unexpected moment. Had she been mad, he wondered, to give him out of hand this longed-for opportunity? A month longer and this scene would have been impossible. At last he came to a stand in front of La Signorma, who was white and weary. The two had not yet exchanged a word.

"So," he said, "after five years I find you, my beautiful wife!" With one hand hipping his saber and the other curling his mustaches, he smiled at her. "What a devil of a time you have given me! Across oceans and continents! A hundred times I have passed you without knowing it till too late. And here, at the very moment when I believed it was all over, you fling yourself into the loving arms of your adoring husband! I do not understand."

"Be brief," she replied, the chill of snows in her voice. Her hate for this man had no empty corners. "I have played foolishly into your hands. Say what you will and be gone."

"What a welcome!"

"Be quick!"

There was danger in her voice now, and he recognized the tense quality of it. "I shall telegraph to the attorneys in Rome to partition the estates, my heart!" mocking her. "The king will not add to his private purse the riches of Colonel Grosvenor and the Principi di Monte Bianca, your father and mine, old fools! To tell the truth, I am badly in need of money, and, head of Bacchus! your appearance here is life to me, my dear Sonia. Life! I am a rich man. But," with a sudden scowl, dropping the mask of banter, "I do not understand these companions of yours." He eyed the group coldly. "What position in my household does this gentleman occupy?" indicating Hillard and smiling evilly.

"Give no heed," said La Signorina, as Hillard took a step forward.

"So it is all true, then?" he asked despairingly. "You are his wife?"

"Yes. Forgive me, but did I not warn you many times? In the eyes of the Italian civil law I am this man's wife, but in the eyes of God and the Church, never, never!"

"What do you mean?"

"In a few days I shall write you; in this letter I promise to explain everything. And you will forgive me, I know."

"Forgive you? For what? There is nothing to forgive on my side; the gift is on yours. For I have been a meddler, an unhappy one."

"Will you and Mr. Merrihew go now? I do not wish you two to witness this scene."

"Leave you alone with this wretch? No!" said Hillard.

"Well?" cried the prince impatiently. He was not inclined toward these confidences between the American and his wife. "I have asked a question and nobody replies. I inquire again, what position does he hold?"

"This villa is mine," she answered, the sharpness of her tone giving hint to the volcano burning in her heart. "However the estates may be partitioned, this will be mine. I command you to leave it at once, for your presence here is as unwelcome to me as that of all creeping things. I find that I do not hate you; I loathe you."

The prince laughed. That she loathed or hated him touched him not in the quick. Love or hate from this woman who knew him for what he was, a soulless scoundrel, was nothing. She was simply a sack of gold. But this was his hour of triumph, and he proposed to make the most of it.

"I could have let the carabinieri take you to prison," he said urbanely. "A night in a damp cell would have chastened your spirit. But I preferred to settle this affair as quickly as possible. But this friend of yours, he annoys me."

"Is it possible?" returned Hillard. "Your Highness has but to say the word and I will undertake the pleasure of relieving you of this man's presence."

"Be still," she said. "Will you go?" to the prince.

"Presently. First, I wish to add that your dear friend is both thick-skulled and cowardly. I offered to slap his face a few nights ago, but he discreetly declined."

Hillard laughed shortly. He desired to get closer to this gentlemanly prince.

"For my sake!" whispered La Signorina.

"I am calm," replied Hillard, gently releasing his arm from her grasp. He approached the prince smiling, but there was murder and despair in his heart. "Had I known you that night, one of us would not be here now."

"It is not too late," suggested the prince. "Come, are you in love with my wife?"

"Yes."

The bluntness of this assertion rather staggered the prince. "You admit it, then?" his throat swelling with rage.

"There is no reason why I should deny it."

"She is your—"

But the word died with a cough. Hillard, a wild joy in his heart, caught the prince by the throat and jammed him back against the rose-satin panel, under a dripping candelabrum. The prince made a violent effort to draw his sword, but Hillard seized his sword-arm and pinned it to the panel above his head. The prince was an athlete, but the man holding him was at this moment made of iron. The struggling man threw out a leg after the manner of French boxers, but his opponent met it with a knee. Again and again the prince made desperate attempts to free himself. He was soon falling in a bad way; he gasped, his lips grew blue and the whites of his eyes bloodshot. This man was killing him! And so he was; for Hillard, realizing that he had lost everything in the world worth living for, was mad for killing.