had an intuitive conviction that he had seen her in the fullest brilliance of her beauty and of the charm of her mind. A woman like that was a great power, he reflected, and then it occurred to him that, marvellous as she was, she was not her own mistress. 

 Some church clock striking loudly the hour roused him up, but before he went downstairs he paced the floor to and fro several times. And when he forced himself out of that empty room it was with a profound disgust of all he was going to see and hear, a momentary repulsion towards the claims of the world, like a man tearing himself away from the side of a beloved mistress. 

III

 Returning that evening to the Palazzo Brignoli, Cosmo found the lantern under the vaulted roof lighted. There was also a porter in gold-laced livery and a cocked hat who saluted him, and in the white anteroom with red benches along the walls two lackeys made ready to divest him of his cloak. But a man in sombre garments detained Cosmo, saying that he was the ambassador's valet, and led him away along a very badly lighted inner corridor. He explained that His Excellency the Ambassador wished to see Monsieur Latham for a few moments in private before Monsieur Latham joined the general company. The ambassador's cabinet into which he introduced Cosmo was lighted by a pair of candelabra. Cosmo was told that His Excellency was finishing dressing, and then the man disappeared. Cosmo noticed that there were several doors besides the one by which he had entered, which was the least conspicuous of them all, and in fact so inconspicuous, corresponding exactly to a painted panel, that it might have been called a secret door. Other doors were framed in costly woods, lining the considerable thicknesses of the walls. One of them opened without noise and Cosmo saw enter a man somewhat taller than he had expected to see, with a white head, in a coat with softly gleaming embroideries and a broad ribbon across his breast. He advanced, opening his arms wide, and Cosmo, who noticed that one of the hands was holding a snuffbox, submitted with good grace to the embrace of the Marquis d'Armand, whose lips touched his cheeks one after another and whose hands then rested at arm's length on his shoulder for a moment. 

 "Sit down, mon enfant," were the first words spoken, and Cosmo obeyed, facing the armchair into which the Marquis had dropped. A white meagre hand set in fine lace moved the candelabra on the table, and Cosmo good-humouredly submitted to being contemplated in silence. This man in a splendid coat, white-headed and with a broad ribbon across his breast, seemed to have no 

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