dern; the Marchese di
Valdo, though more modern actually than his brother, still seemed to
keep his touch on the age that was past.

"Do these old legends please you, Mademoiselle? Or are you too restless?
Too progressive? Americans, like the horse Pegasus, leap into the air
without any need of foundation to stand on. We, over here, build, like
the coral reefs, slowly perhaps, but always from the foundation up."

"I think," said Nina slowly; "it is the mystery of the past that makes
it so wonderful. We never can know quite enough about it. All legends
are like pictures seen through a fog; it lifts and shows a glimpse, then
as quickly closes in again. I always want to know what happened next."

As she said this, she realized that she was more or less making an
allegorical description of Giovanni himself. He was like his country and
its traditions, revealing himself only in glimpses. He attracted her
immensely through his subtle impersonality underlying all that was
seemingly personal. She could not fathom his depth, nor determine his
shallowness--she did not even guess which it might be. She was
irresistibly drawn to him; yet she was on her guard, as one who, looking
down from a great height, in fear of vertigo clings to the parapet over
which he leans. The parapet she clung to was her own good American
common sense. Yet she feared she did not know what. A little gleam in
Giovanni's dark eyes, a curious, deliberate, intentionally produced
expression of his smiling lips, swept over her sensibilities with a
feeling that was as terrifying as it was delicious--and both perhaps
because it was strange.

A little look--like triumph--flickered in his face; he laughed joyously.
"Mademoiselle, you are--adorable!" he said.

CHAPTER VII

ROME

Christmas and New Year's passed, and the Sansevero household moved to
Rome. The princess was impatient to have Nina meet people, but from the
first glimpse of the domed City its immortal charm claimed the American
girl, and for a little while she had neither time nor inclination for
anything but sight-seeing. She fairly hungered for history and
tradition, and she soon made the discovery that if Don Giovanni _did_
nothing, he at least _knew_ a great deal.

She marveled at his memory. He seemed to have every name and date in the
history of Rome and Italian art at the tip of his tongue. One afternoon
they were going through the apartments of the Borgias; the princess,
tired out