in spite of its inauspicious opening. A very little encouragement
induced her to enter into conversation, and ere long she was prattling
away as unrestrainedly as if we had been friends all our lives. She
asked me a great many questions. What was I doing in Venice? Had I known
Alberto long? Was I very fond of him? Did I think that the old Count
von Rosenau would be very angry when he heard of his son's marriage?
I answered her as best I could, feeling very sorry for the poor little
soul, who evidently did not in the least realise the serious nature
of the step which she was about to take; and she grew more and more
communicative. In the course of a quarter of an hour I had been put in
possession of all the chief incidents of her uneventful life.

I had heard how she had lost her mother when she was still an infant;
how she had been educated partly by two maiden aunts, partly in a
convent at Verona; how she had latterly led a life of almost complete
seclusion in the old Venetian palace; how she had first met Alberto; and
how, after many doubts and misgivings, she had finally been prevailed
upon to sacrifice all for his sake, and to leave her father,
who,--stern, severe, and suspicious, though he had always been generous
to her,--had tried to give her such small pleasures as his means
and habits would permit. She had a likeness of him with her, she
said,--perhaps I might like to see it. She dived into her travelling-bag
as she spoke, and produced from thence a full-length photograph of a
tall, well-built gentleman of sixty or thereabouts, whose gray hair,
black moustache, and intent, frowning gaze made up an ensemble more
striking than attractive.

"Is he not handsome--poor papa?" she asked.

I said the marchese was certainly a very fine-looking man, and inwardly