erene disregard of the
inappropriateness of the occasion, a doorway in St. Michele.

When at last they drove into the principality, the evening was well
advanced. Even the irrepressible Mrs. Dollond was not to be enticed
by the brilliant windows of the Casino from the sofa upon which she
had stretched herself luxuriously, when their extensive dinner was
at an end; and Rainham with a clear conscience could betake himself
immediately to bed. But, in spite of his fatigue, he lay for a long
time awake; the music of the concert-room, the strains of M.
Oudshorn's skilful orchestra, floated in through the half-closed
_persiennes_ of his room, and later mingled with his dreams, tinging
them, perhaps, with some of that indefinable plaintiveness, a sort
of sadness essentially ironical, with which all dance music, even
the most extravagant, is deeply pervaded.

A week later, as from the window of the receding Italian train he
caught a last glimpse of the Dollonds on the crowded platform, he
waved a polite farewell to them with a sensible relief. It was a
week in which Mrs. Dollond had been greatly on his hands, for her
husband had made no secret of the willingness with which he had
accepted Rainham's escort for the indefatigable lady amongst the
miscellaneous company of the tables, leaving him free to study the
picturesque in the less heated atmosphere which he preferred. And a
week of Mrs. Dollond, as Rainham was obliged to confess, was not
good for any man to undergo.

Nor was Mrs. Dollond's verdict upon their acquaintance, who had
become for the space of seven days an intimate, more complimentary.

"I suppose he was better than nobody," she remarked with philosophy
as they made their way up the terrace. "He looked after my stakes,
and did not play much himself, and was always at hand; but he was
really very dull."

"Better than me, I suppose you mean, my dear?" suggested her husband
humorously. "Was he so dull? You ought to know; I really have hardly
spoken to him."

"Don't be absurd!" she remarked absently. Then she said a little
abruptly: "It seems funny, now that one knows him, that there should
be those stories."

"Stories? About Rainham?"

Her husband glanced at her with some surprise.

"Yes," she said. "Of course, you never know anything; but he is
talked about."

"Ah, poor man!" said Mr. Dollond. "What has he done?"

Mrs. Dollond's fair eyebrows were arched significantly, and Mrs.
Dollond's gay shoulders