I demand purity for purity
your silence and your blushes condemn you, and I must bid you a final
farewell."

Christine could not answer, and as Alfonso left the house, she fell
weeping upon the sofa, where her sister Fredrika found her, long past
midnight. The terrible sorrow of that evening remained forever a mystery
to Fredrika.

It was 10 o'clock next morning when the marquis called upon Alfonso
Harris at the Hotel Holland. He found him busy answering important
letters from the coast. The marquis was not long in detecting that
Alfonso lacked his usual buoyancy of spirits, and so rightly concluded
that the meeting with Christine the night before had resulted
unfavorably.

Alfonso explained all that transpired, and the two artists, who had
flattered themselves that they knew women well, admitted to each other
their keen disappointment in Christine's character. Both lighted cigars,
and for a moment or two unconsciously smoked vigorously, as if still in
doubt as to their unsatisfactory conclusions.

Soon Alfonso said, "Leo, how about your own former love, Rosie Ricci? To
meet Rosie again was possibly the motive that prompted you to leave your
estate in Italy."

"Yes, Alfonso, I loved Rosie, as I once frankly stated to your sister on
the ocean, but in a moment of peevishness she returned the engagement
tokens, and the lovers' quarrel resulted in separation. But after the
death of Lucille I found the smouldering fires of the old love for Rosie
again easily fanned into a flame, so I crossed the sea in search of my
dear country-woman."

"And did you find her!"

"Yes, Alfonso, that is, all that was left of the vivacious, happy
songster, as we once knew her. Her new world surroundings proved
disastrous."

"How so?"

"Look, here is a picture in water color, that tells the story." Saying
this the Marquis slowly removed a white paper from a small sketch which
he had made the week before. It was a picture in the morgue on the East
River, with its half hundred corpses, waiting recognition or burial in
the Potter's Field. Upon a cold marble slab lay the body of a young girl,
her shapely hands across her breast. Alfonso recognized Rosie's sweet
face and golden tresses that artists had raved over.

The marquis in sad tones added a few words of explanation. "The senator
who educated Rosie proved a villain. When she acted as Juliet at the
Capitol, fashionable society gave hearty approval of her rare abilities.
Rosie's gen