that there are half a dozen of us who could cut him out in an hour."

"Von Rosenau," said a young ensign, solemnly, "you would do better to
make a clean breast of it. Concealment is useless. Janovicz saw you with
her in Santa Maria della Salute the other day, and could have followed
her home quite easily if he had been so inclined."

"They were seen together on the Lido, too. People who want to keep their
secrets ought not to be so imprudent."

"A good comrade ought to have no secrets from the regiment."

"Come, Von Rosenau, we will promise not to speak to her without
your permission if you will tell us how you managed to make her
acquaintance."

The object of all these attacks received them with the most perfect
composure, continuing to smoke his cigar and gaze out seaward,
without so much as turning his head toward his questioners, to whom he
vouchsafed no reply whatever. Probably, as an ex-hussar and a sprig of
nobility, he may have held his head a little above those of his present
brother officers, and preferred disregarding their familiarity to
resenting it, as he might have done if it had come from men whom he
considered on a footing of equality with himself. Such, at least, was my
impression; and it was confirmed by the friendly advances which he made
toward me, from that day forth, and by the persistence with which he
sought my society. I thought he seemed to wish for some companion whose
ideas had not been developed exclusively in barrack atmosphere; and
I, on my side, was not unwilling to listen to the chatter of a lively,
good-natured young fellow, at intervals, during my long idle days.