paid the boy. There is another irony of unconsciousness. Vere, bone of
your bone, flesh of your flesh, rewards your pain-giver. How we hide
ourselves from those we love best and live with most intimately! You,
her mother, are a stranger to Vere. Does not to-day prove it?"

"Ah, but Vere is not a stranger to me. That is where the mother has
the advantage of the child."

Artois did not make any response to this remark. To cover his silence,
perhaps, he grasped the oars more firmly and began to back the boat
out of the cave. Both felt that it was no longer necessary to stay in
this confessional of the rock.

As they came out under the grayness of the sky, Hermione, with a
change of tone, said:

"And your friend? The Marchese--what is his name?"

"Isidoro Panacci."

"Tell me about him."

"He is a very perfect type of a complete Neapolitan of his class. He
has scarcely travelled at all, except in Italy. Once he has been in
Paris, where I met him, and once to Lucerne for a fortnight. Both his
father and mother are Neapolitans. He is a charming fellow, utterly
unintellectual, but quite clever; shrewd, sharp at reading character,
marvellously able to take care of himself, and hold his own with
anybody. A cat to fall on his feet! He is apparently born without any
sense of fear, and with a profound belief in destiny. He can drive