llion. My estates in the Romagna have been confiscated, my serfs in
Hungary freed, and I have lost frightful sums by my investments. I know
many a poor devil has been forced to wont himself to rags and poverty,
but for one who has been a leader among men to debase himself and drag
out a miserable existence in obscurity--never! Shall I, forsooth,
suspend the erection of the votive church which I began at the seat of
my ancestors twelve years ago? Or shall I, discarding the masterpieces
of a Thorwaldsen, embellish the sacred edifice with the rude productions
of a stone-cutter? Would you have me say to the woman I adore, 'My dear,
hitherto we have lived in two palaces; henceforth we must be content
with one'? But most impossible of all would it be to confess my
pecuniary embarrassments to my banker and my major-domo, and to direct
them to cut down my future expenditures by a third, to sell my
picture-gallery, my museum, and two-thirds of my collection of diamonds.
No, no! What I am now telling you has never passed my lips before, nor
ever will again; for I know how to apply the remedy, and I will not
submit to humiliation, even though it should cost human blood to prevent
it."

The speaker bent forward and went on in a more guarded tone:

"Now as to the woman of whom we were speaking. When her brothers gave
her to me in marriage, we entered into a contract which stipulated that
the property of the one who died first should go to the survivor. She
was young, I was old; the advantage was all on her side. Our divorce has
not annulled this contract. If Blanka Zboroy dies, her brothers must
deliver her property over to me."

"But her fortune is only a million."

"Don't you believe it. To be sure, her brothers paid her the interest on
only a million, but her property really amounts to five times that sum.
My part thus far has been simply to await the turn of events. In Rome,
as it appears, this woman's fate hung by a thread; but all at once she
took the insane notion of marrying again. However, that does not
invalidate the contract between us, as the Roman Curia, though it
granted her a divorce, did so on terms that will make it impossible to
recognise her marriage with a Protestant. When death overtakes her, it
will be as the Princess Cagliari that she leaves this world. One thing
we must remember, however: the Protestant Church will require her to
renounce her former faith in order to render her separation from her
first h