"But I don't know that you would like it," he said, still ruefully. "You
see, Nina, you might have to dress in the same room with two or three of
the chorus-girls--"

"And then?" she said, with a little dramatic gesture, and an elevation
of her beautifully formed black eyebrows. "Leo, you never saw my
lodgings with the family Debernardi--you have only mount the stairs--"

"My goodness, Nina, I could guess what the inside of the rooms was like,
if they were anything like those interminable and horrid stairs!" he
exclaimed, with a laugh. "And you who were always so fond of pretty
things, and flowers, and always so particular when we went to a
restaurant--to live with the Debernardis!"

"Ah, Leo, you imagine not why?" she said, also laughing, and when she
laughed her milk-white teeth shone merrily. "Old Pietro Debernardi he
lives in England some years; he speaks English, perhaps not very well,
but he speaks; then he teach me as he knows; and when it is possible I
go on the _Risposta_ and sail over to Capri, and all the way, and all
the return, I listen, and listen, and listen to the English people; and
I remember, and I practise alone in my own room, and I say, 'Leo, he
must not ridicule me, when I go to England.'"

"Ridicule you!" said he, indignantly. "I wish I could speak Italian as
freely as you speak English, Nina!"

"Oh, you speak Italian very well," said she. "But why you speak still
the Neapolitan dialetto--dialect, is it right?--that you hear in the
shops and the streets? Ah, I remember you are so proud of it, and when I
try to teach you proper Italian, you laugh--you wish to speak like