in the dance, had once again scattered to the winds all resolution,
all hope of the possibility of escaping from the toils. What was all
else that he desired to be put in comparison with that raging,
craving desire that he felt and sickened with for her? That was what
he really wanted--what he must have or die. It was madness to see
her, as he saw her then, in the arms of other men, laughing,
sparkling, brilliant with animation and enjoyment. Worst hell of all
to see her thus with his nephew, her admiration for whom she had
frankly confessed; whose ways with women he knew, and whose intimacy
with Bianca had already become suspicious to him.

Yet not the less did he stand and gaze, as they danced together,
clearly the handsomest and best-matched couple in the room--matched
so admirably evidently by design and forethought.

He had seen Ludovico and Bianca leave the ball-room, after the last
dance, together with the crowd of most of those who had been joining
in it, and had begun fluttering, poor moth, after the irresistible
attraction, to follow them towards the supper-room. Missing sight of
them in the throng for a minute, he had followed on to the principal
supper-room, and not finding them there (for the reason the reader
wots of) had returned on his steps, and was sitting on the end of a
divan, by the door of the next room to the ball-room, through which
all had to pass who wished to go thence to the supper-room. There
were people passing through the centre of the room from door to
door; but there was no other, save the Marchese, sitting down in it.

There the Conte Leandro found him, and came and sat down by his
side; much, at first, to the Marchese's annoyance.