The

think no more about it. Let me be a lawyer and enter public life.' 'A lawyer indeed! Will you wrangle in public with notaries' sons, defend murderers and burglars, and take fees like the old men who write letters for the peasants under a green umbrella in the street? It would be almost better to turn musician and give concerts.' Church, perhaps?' I suggest. The Church? Are you not the heir, and will you not be the head of the family some day? You must be mad.' 'Then give me a sum of money and let me try my luck with my cousin San Giacinto.' ⚫ Business? If you make money it is a degradation, and with these new laws you cannot afford to lose it. Besides, you will have enough of business when you have to manage your estates.' So all my questions are answered, and I am condemned at twenty to be a farmer for my natural life. I say so. 'A farmer, forsooth! Have you not the world before you? Have you not received the most liberal education? Are you not rich? How can you take such a narrow view! Come out to the villa and look at those young thoroughbreds, and afterwards we will drop in at the club before dinner. Then there is that reception at the old Principessa Befana's to-night, and the Duchessa della Seccatura is also at home.' That is my life, Monsieur Gouache. There you have the question, the answer, and the result. Admit that it is not gay."

"It is very serious, on the contrary," answered Gouache, who had listened to the detached jeremiad with more curiosity and interest than he often showed. "I see nothing for it but for you to fall in love without losing a single moment." Orsino laughed a little harshly.

"I am in the humor, I assure you," he answered.

Anastase took the half-finished portrait of Orsino from the easel and put another in its place, considerably further advanced in execution. Orsino lit a cigarette in order to quicken his judgment, and looked at the canvas.

The picture was decidedly striking, and one felt at once that it must be a good likeness. Gouache was evidently proud of it. It represented a woman, who was certainly not yet thirty years of age, in full dress, seated in a high carved chair against a warm dark background. A mantle of some sort of heavy claret-colored damask, lined with fur, was draped across one of the beautiful shoulders, leaving the other bare, the scant dress of the period scarcely breaking the graceful lines from the throat to the soft white hand of which the pointed fingers hung carelessly over the carved extremity of the arm of the chair. The lady's hair was auburn; her eyes were distinctly yellow. The face was an unusual one and not without attraction, very pale, with a full red mouth, too wide for perfect beauty, but well modeled, almost too well, Gouache thought. The nose was of no distinct type, and was the least significant feature in the face, but the forehead was broad and massive, the chin soft, prominent, and round, the brows much arched and divided by a vertical shadow which, in the original, might be the first indication of a tiny wrinkle. Orsino fancied that one eye or the other wandered a very little, but he could not tell which; the slight defect made the glance dis

it was one of those faces which to one man say too little, and to another too much.

Orsino affected to gaze upon the portrait with unconcern, but in reality he was oddly fascinated by it, and Gouache did not fail to see the truth.

"You had better go away, my friend," he said, with a smile. "She will be here in a few minutes, and you will certainly lose your heart if you see her." "What is her name? asked Orsino, paying no attention to the remark. "Donna Maria Consuelo - something or other, a string of names ending in Aragona. I call her Madame d'Aragona for shortness, and she does not seem to object."

"Married? And Spanish?"

"I suppose so," answered Gouache. "A widow, I believe. She is not Italian and not French, so she must be Spanish."

"The name does not say much. Many people put 'd'Aragona' after their names

some cousins of ours, among others: they are Aranjuez d'Aragona; my father's mother was of that family."

"I think that is the name, Aranjuez. Indeed I am sure of it, for Faustina remarked that she might be related to you."

"It is odd. We have not heard of her being in Rome, and I am not sure who she is. Has she been here long?" "I have known her a month, since she first came to my studio. She lives in a hotel, and she comes alone, except when I need the dress, and then she brings her maid, an odd creature, who never speaks and seems to understand no known language."

"It is an interesting face. mind if I stay till she comes? really be cousins, you know."

Do you

We may

"By all means; you can ask her. The relationship would be with her husband, I suppose?"

Gouache did not answer, for at tha moment the lady's footfall was hear upon the marble floor, soft, quick, an decided. She paused a moment in th middle of the room when she saw tha the artist was not alone. He went for ward to meet her and asked leave t present Orsino, with that polite inditinctness which leaves to the persons in troduced the task of discovering one an other's names.

Orsino looked into the lady's eyes and saw that the slight peculiarity of the glance was real, and not due to any erro of Gouache's drawing. He recognized each feature in turn in the one glance he gave at the face before he bowed and he saw that the portrait was indeed very good. He was not subject to shy

ness.

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"We should be cousins, madame.` he said. My father's mother was a Aranjuez d'Aragona."

"Indeed?" said the lady, with caln indifference, looking critically at the pic ture of herself.

"I am Orsino Saracinesca," said the young man, watching her with some admiration.

"Indeed?" she repeated, a shade less coldly. "I think I have heard my poor husband say that he was connected with your family. What do you think of myportrait? Every one has tried to paint me and failed, but my friend Monsieur Gouache is succeeding. He has reproduced my hideous nose and my dreadful mouth with a masterly exactness. No, my dear Monsieur Gouache, it is a compliment I pay you. I am in earnest. I do not want a portrait of the Venus of Milo with red hair, nor of the Minerva Medica with yellow eyes, nor of an imaginary Medea in a fur cloak. I want myself, just as I am. That is exactly what you are doing for me. Myself and I have lived so long together that I desire a little memento of the ac

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You can afford to speak lightly of

what is so precious to others," said Gouache gallantly. Madame Aranjuez sank into the carved chair Orsino had occupied.

"This dear Gouache, he is charming, is he not?" she said, with a little laugh. Orsino looked at her.

“Gouache is right," he thought, with the assurance of his years. "It would be amusing to fall in love with her."

III.

Gouache was far more interested in his work than in the opinions which his two visitors might entertain of each other. He looked at the lady fixedly, moved his easel, raised the picture a few inches higher from the ground and looked again. Orsino watched the proceedings from a little distance, debating whether he should go away or remain. Much depended upon Madame d'Aragona's character, he thought, and of this he knew nothing. Some women are attracted by indifference, and to go away would be to show a disinclination to press the acquaintance. Others, he 'reflected, prefer the assurance of the man who always stays, even without an invitation, rather than lose his chance. On the other hand, a sitting in a studio is not exactly like a meeting in a drawingroom. The painter has a sort of traditional, exclusive right to his sitter's sole attention. The sitter, too, if a woman, enjoys the privilege of sacrificing one half her good looks in a bad light, to favor the other side which is presented to the artist's view, and the third person, if there be one, has a provoking habit of so placing himself as to receive the least flattering impression. Hence the great unpopularity of the third person, or "the third inconvenience," as the Romans call him.

Orsino stood still for a few moments, wondering whether either of the two would ask him to sit down. As they VOL. LXIX. - NO. 411.

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did not, he was annoyed with them and determined to stay, if only for five minutes. He took up his position in a deep seat under the high window, and watched Madame d'Aragona's profile. Neither she nor Gouache made any remark. Gouache began to brush over the face of his picture. Orsino felt that the silence was becoming awkward. He began to regret that he had stayed, for he discovered from his present position that the lady's nose was indeed her defective feature.

"You do not mind my staying a few minutes?" he said, with a vague interrogation.

"Ask madame, rather," answered Gouache, brushing away in a lively man

"Am I indiscreet?" asked Orsino. "How? No. Why should you not remain? Only, if you please, sit where I can see you. Thanks. I do not like to feel that some one is looking at me and that I cannot look at him, if I please: and as for me, I am nailed in my position. How can I turn my head? Gouache is very severe."

"You may have heard, madame, that a beautiful woman is most beautiful in repose," said Gouache.

Orsino was annoyed, for he had of course wished to make exactly the same remark. But they were talking in French, and the Frenchman had the advantage of speed.

"And how about an ugly woman?" inquired Madame d'Aragona.