e Emilio's life is in danger,
and you alone can save him."

"What is to be done?" she asked.

"Ah! Can you resign yourself to play a degrading part--in spite of the
noblest face to be seen in Italy? Can you drop from the blue sky where
you dwell, into the bed of a courtesan? In short, can you, an angel of
refinement, of pure and spotless beauty, condescend to imagine what the
love must be of a Tinti--in her room, and so effectually as to deceive
the ardor of Emilio, who is indeed too drunk to be very clear-sighted?"

"Is that all?" said she, with a smile that betrayed to the Frenchman a
side he had not as yet perceived of the delightful nature of an Italian
woman in love. "I will out-do la Tinti, if need be, to save my friend's
life."

"And you will thus fuse into one two kinds of love, which he sees as
distinct--divided by a mountain of poetic fancy, that will melt away
like the snow on a glacier under the beams of the midsummer sun."

"I shall be eternally your debtor," said the Duchess, gravely.

When the French doctor returned to the gallery, where the orgy had
by this time assumed the stamp of Venetian frenzy, he had a look of
satisfaction which the Prince, absorbed by la Tinti, failed to observe;
he was promising himself a repetition of the intoxicating delights he
had known. La Tinti, a true Sicilian, was floating on the tide of a
fantastic passion on the point of being gratified.

The doctor whispered a few words to Vendramin, and la Tinti was uneasy.

"What are you plotting?" she inquired of the Prince's friend.

"Are you kind-hearted?" said the doctor in her ear, with the sternness
of an operator.

The words pierced to her comprehension like a dagger-thrust to her
heart.

"It is to save Emilio's life," added Vendramin.

"Come here," said the doctor to Clarina.

The hapless singer rose and went to the other end of the table where,
between Vendramin and the Frenchman, she looked like a criminal between
the confessor and the executioner.

She struggled for a long time, but yielded at last for love of Emilio.

The doctor's last words were:

"And you must cure Genovese!"

She spoke a word to the tenor as she went round the table. She returned
to the Prince, put her arm round his neck and kissed his hair with an
expression of despair which struck Vendramin and the Frenchman, the
only two who had their wits about them, then she vanished into her room.
Emilio, seeing Genovese leave the table, whil