appallingly in earnest lover woman ever had. He wept for a kiss with his
fingers twiddling on the hilt of his stiletto. Dear heart, these Italians!"

"I should like to meet his countship," said I energetically.

"Yes, he was a count, with a pedigree as long as the Rialto, and he had
not two silver piastres to rub against each other. He was the handsomest
man I have even seen. Fortunately, we left Venice before he had quite
decided that it was time to dig his knife into me."

"You speak lightly of your danger, madam," I said coldly.

"A hot-blooded Italian with a stiletto in his hand is a much more
desirable creature, let me tell you, than a cold-blooded Englishman with
the devil in his heart. That fiery little count, conceited and
poverty-stricken, did at any rate pay me the compliment of thinking for at
least a fortnight that I was a patch of heaven fallen in his way, whereas
to your cold-livered English lord I am no more than an appetizing dish."

She was not speaking lightly now, but with cold, concentrated anger. I
remembered the reticencies of her statement at the Hanyards, and began to
see dimly some of the connecting links in her story. My Lord Brocton's
character was well enough known to be the subject of common talk at our
market ordinaries. My very manhood shamed me in the presence of this
queenly woman, marked down by a titled blackguard as his quarry, and I sat
still, fists tightly clenched on the tiller-ropes, and said nothing,
waiting for her to speak again.

"I have seen to-day, Master Wheatman," she said, "a sight I have never
seen before--a beautiful English maiden growing up to womanhood in the