along to take her old place among the ladies of Rome. No one knew whose
card she had delivered up at the entrance to the sacristy, and she
enjoyed the triumph of showing that the wife of the revolutionary, the
banker, the member of parliament, had not lost caste after all.

She looked Giovanni full in the face with her disagreeable blue eyes as
she came up, apparently not meaning to recognise him. Then, just as she
passed him, she deigned to make a very slight inclination of the head,
just enough to compel Sant' Ilario to return the salutation. It was very
well done. Orsino did not know all the details of the past events, but
he knew that his father had once wounded Del Ferice in a duel and he
looked at Del Fence's wife with some curiosity. He had seldom had an
opportunity of being so near to her.

"It was certainly not about her that they fought," he reflected. "It
must have been about some other woman, if there was a woman in the
question at all."

A moment later he was aware that a pair of tawny eyes was fixed on him.
Maria Consuelo was following Donna Tullia at a distance of a dozen
yards. Orsino came forward and his new acquaintance held out her hand.
They had not met since they had first seen each other.

"It was so kind of you," she said.

"What, Madame?"

"To suggest this to Gouache. I should have had no ticket--where shall I
sit?"