ruined, undone!"

"Why, there's not a soul that can hear us!" said Mrs. Riccabocca,
soothingly.

"'That's chance, ma'am! If you once contract the habit of blabbing out a
secret when nobody's by, how on earth can you resist it when you have the
pleasurable excitement of telling it to all the world? Vanity, vanity,--
woman's vanity! Woman never could withstand rank,--never!" The doctor
went on railing for a quarter of an hour, and was very reluctantly
appeased by Mrs. Riccabocca's repeated and tearful assurances that she
would never even whisper to herself that her husband had ever held any
other rank than that of doctor. Riccabocca, with a dubious shake of the
head, renewed,

"I have done with all pomp and pretension. Besides, the young man is a
born gentleman: he seems in good circumstances; he has energy and latent
ambition; he is akin to L'Estrange's intimate friend: he seems attached
to Violante. I don't think it probable that we could do better. Nay, if
Peschiera fears that I shall be restored to my country, and I learn the
wherefore, and the ground to take, through this young man--why,
gratitude is the first virtue of the noble!"

"You speak, then, of Mr. Leslie?"

"To be sure--of whom else?"

Mrs. Riccabocca leaned her cheek on her hand thoughtfully. "Now you have
told me that, I will observe him with different eyes."