order I was staying at the Palace as owner of the car, and not as a mere chauffeur. The daughters of Italian countesses and marchionesses, though brought up so strictly, are always eager for flirtation, and therefore as I sat alone at my table in the big salle-à-manger I caught many a glance from black eyes that danced with merry mischievousness. Valentine, when she left me in Milan, had said, laughingly— “I may rejoin you again ere long, M’sieur Ewart, but not as your pretended wife, as at Brussels.” “I hope not, mademoiselle,” I had answered quite [Pg 68]frankly. “That game is a little too dangerous. I might really fall in love with you.” [Pg 68] “With me?” she cried, holding up her small hands in a quick gesture. “What an idea! Oh! la la! Jamais.” I smiled. Mademoiselle was extremely beautiful. No woman I had ever met possessed such wonderful eyes as hers. “Au revoir, mon cher,” she said. “And a pleasant time to you till we meet again.” Then as I mounted on the car and traversed the big Piazza del Duomo, before the Cathedral, she waved her hand to me in farewell. It was, therefore, without surprise that, sitting in the hall of the hotel about five o’clock one afternoon, I watched her in an elegant white gown descending the stairs, followed by a neat French maid in black. Quickly I sprang up, bowed, and greeted her in French before a dozen or so of the idling guests. As we walked across to Pancaldi’s baths she told her new maid to go on in front, and in a few quick words explained. “I arrived direct from Paris this morning. Here, I am the Princess Helen of Dornbach-Laxenburg of the Ringstrasse, in Vienna, the Schloss Kirchbüehl, on the Drave, and Avenue des Champs Elysées, Paris, a Frenchwoman married to an Austrian. My husband, a man much older than myself, will arrive here in a few days.” “And the maid?” [Pg 69] [Pg 69] “She knows nothing to the contrary. She has been with me only a fortnight. Now you must speak of me in the hotel. Say that you knew me well at Monte Carlo, Rome, Carlsbad, and Aix; that you have stayed at Kirchbüehl, and
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