udied
the guide-book.

As Madame d'Estrees stepped into her gondola, assisted by him, she
tapped him on the arm.

"Are you coming, Markham?"

The low voice was pitched in a very intimate note. Kitty turned with a
start.

* * * * *

"A casa!" said Madame d'Estrees, and she and her friend made for one of
the canals that pierce the Zattere, while Colonel Warington went off for
a walk along the Giudecca.

Kitty and Ashe bade their gondoliers take them to the Piazzetta, and
presently they were gliding across waters of flame and silver, where the
white front and red campanile of San Giorgio--now blazing under the
sunset--mirrored themselves in the lagoon. The autumn evening was fresh
and gay. A light breeze was on the water; lights that only Venice knows
shone on the tawny sails of fishing-boats making for the Lido, on the
white sides of an English yacht, on the burnished prows of the gondolas,
on the warm reddish-white of the Ducal Palace. The air blowing from the
Adriatic breathed into their faces the strength of the sea; and in the
far distance, above that line of buildings where lies the heart of
Venice, the high ghosts of the Friulian Alps glimmered amid the sweeping
regiments and purple shadows of the land-hurrying clouds.

"This does you good, darling!" said Ashe, stooping down to look into his
wife's face, as she nestled beside him on the soft cushions of the
gondola.

Kitty gave him a slight smile, then said, with a furrowed brow:

"Who could ever have thought we should find maman here!"

"Don't have her on your mind!" said Ashe, with some sharpness. "I can't
have anything worrying you."

She slipped her hand into his.

"Is that man going to marry her--at last? She called him 'Markham.'
That's new."

"Looks rather like it," said Ashe. "Then <i>he'll</i> have to look after the
debts!"

They began to piece together what they knew of Colonel Warington and his
relation to Madame d'Estrees. It was not much. But Ashe believed that
originally Warington had not been in love with her at all. There had
been a love-affair between her and Warington's younger brother, a smart
artillery officer, when she was the widowed Lady Blackwater. She had
behaved with more heart and scruple than she had generally been known to
do in these matters, and the young officer adored her--hoped, indeed, to
marry her. But he was called on--in Paris--to fight a duel on her
account, and was killed. Bef