Then, remarking my silence as I looked about me, she added with a pretty coaxing air, "I am afraid after all you are sorry you have come to see me!" I smiled.

It served my purpose now to be as gallant and agreeable as I could; therefore I answered: "Sorry, madame! If I were, then should I be the most ungrateful of all men! Was Dante sorry, think you, when he was permitted to behold Paradise ?" She blushed; her eyes drooped softly under their long curling lashes.
Ferrari frowned impatiently--but was silent.

She led the way into the house--into the lofty cool drawing-room, whose wide windows opened out to the garden.

Here all was the same as ever with the exception of one thing--a marble bust of myself as a boy had been removed.

The grand piano was open, the mandoline lay on a side-table, looking as though it had been recently used; there were fresh flowers and ferns in all the tall Venetian glass vases.