sure she was
adored, albeit not embraced. After this act of prudence he went toward
the curtain, while the fair Austrian soubrette flew on her previous
errand.

It was enough that Beppo found himself in a dark antechamber for him to
be instantly scrupulous in his footing and breathing. As he touched the
curtain, a door opened on the other side of the interior, and a tender
gabble of fresh feminine voices broke the stillness and ran on like a
brook coming from leaps to a level, and again leaping and making noise of
joy. The Duchess of Graatli had clasped the Signora Laura's two hands and
drawn her to an ottoman, and between kissings and warmer claspings, was
questioning of the little ones, Giacomo and her goddaughter Amalia.

'When, when did I see you last?' she exclaimed. 'Oh! not since we met
that morning to lay our immortelles upon his tomb. My soul's sister! kiss
me, remembering it. I saw you in the gateway--it seemed to me, as in a
vision, that we had both had one warning to come for him, and knock, and
the door would be opened, and our beloved would come forth! That was many
days back. It is to me like a day locked up forever in a casket of pearl.
Was it not an unstained morning, my own! If I weep, it is with pleasure.
But,' she added with precipitation, 'weeping of any kind will not do for
these eyelids of mine.' And drawing forth a tiny gold-framed
pocket-mirror she perceived convincingly that it would not do.

'They will think it is for the absence of my husband,' she said, as only
a woman can say it who deplores nothing so little as that.

'When does he return from Vienna?' Laura inquired in the fallen voice of
her thoughtfulness.

'I receive two couriers a week; I know not any more, my Laura. I believe
he is pushing some connubial complaint against me at the Court. We have
been married seventeen months. I submitted to the marriage because I
could get no proper freedom without, and now I am expected to abstain
from the very thing I sacrificed myself to get! Can he hear that in
Vienna?' She snapped her fingers. 'If not, let him come and behold it in
Milan. Besides, he is harmless. The Archduchess is all ears for the very
man of whom he is jealous. This is my reply: You told me to marry: I
obeyed. My heart 's in the earth, and I must have distractions. My
present distraction is De Pyrmont, a good Catholic and a good Austrian
soldier, though a Frenchman. I grieve to say--it's horrible--that it
sometimes tick