ess
entertainment to them both. Suddenly Cecilia gave a little shriek of
delight at the way her good friend, Mr. Grey, dwindled into a pigmy;
upon which the Count, attracted apparently by her voice, left his
chair and came and sat down beside them.

As he lifted his hat, with a polite "_Permetta, Signorina_," Blythe
noticed, for the first time on the whole voyage, that he was without
his gloves. Perhaps the general humanising of his attitude, through
intercourse with the child, had caused him to relax this little point
of punctilio.

Cecilia, meanwhile, had promptly climbed upon his knee, and now,
laying hold of one of the ungloved hands, she began twisting a large
seal ring which presented itself to her mind as a pleasing novelty.
Presently her attention seemed arrested by the device of the seal, and
she murmured softly, "_Fideliter_."

Blythe might not have distinguished the word as being Latin rather
than Italian, had she not been struck by the change of countenance in
the wearer of the ring. He turned to her abruptly, and asked, in
French:

"Does she read?"

"No," Blythe answered, thankful that she was not obliged to muster her
"conjugations" for the emergency!

There was a swift interchange of question and answer between the old
man and the child, of which Blythe understood but little. She heard
Cecilia say "Mamma," in answer to an imperative question; the words
"_orologio_" and "_perduto_" were intelligible to her. She was sure
that the crest and motto formed the subject of discussion, and it was
distinctly borne in upon her that the same device--a mailed hand and
arm with the word _Fideliter_ beneath it--had been engraved on a lost
watch which had belonged to the child's mother. But it was all surmise
on her part, and she could hardly refrain from shouting aloud to Mr.
Grey, standing over there, in dense unconsciousness, to come quickly
and interpret this exasperating tongue, which sounded so pretty, and
eluded her understanding so hopelessly.

The mind of the Count seemed to be turning in the same direction, for,
after a little, he arose abruptly, and, setting the child down beside
Blythe, walked straight across the deck to the Englishman, whom he
accosted so unceremoniously that Blythe's sense of wonders unfolding
was but confirmed.

The two men turned and walked away to a more secluded part of the
deck, where they remained, deep in conversation, for what seemed to
Blythe a long, long time. She felt