THE PRINCE’S OWN.

Dunstan Times, Issue 2486, 21 June 1909, Page 2

THE PRINCE’S OWN.

(By Katharine Brack.)

I ’ooked at her carefully. Henrietta, I remarked, “you are uncommonly smart and very beautiful tins evening. On m i e ht easily think that it was you who were trying to subjugate the prince instead °* we always thought that Daisy would marry an American,’ replied mv wife. “She 80 y° un S alwi P ret T “I never heard that Italians were aiteree to vouth and beauty,” I murmured. . “Mother sent her to Rome to us thin winter, to keep her out of society for another year, she was eo young, said Henrietta, pathetically, “ but even you, Geoffry, must admit that Domatello is the nicest Italian in the world. “I so completely agree with you, i hastened to assure her, “that I am even now thanking my stare that you put * national limit to his charms. « “We meet get to the point,” H™rietta, vdth a delightful btah. Jke nrince will be here in a few minutes Sow and there is so much to decide before he comes. That is why I sen

y °“i forgot that this was a business interview ” I replied. When I had come home that afternoon I had found a formal note in Henrietta’* requeuing the pleasure of Mr Geoffry Ford s com ”v in the blue salottmo one hom beSdtaner to dieoa*. affair of enormo™ importance with a lady T > , had explained when, punctual to minute I had presented myself, i don i STS* if l iaS excised an untamed thought with you for days, Geoffry. are always off hunting antiques w l Mediatoie or playing golf, D^ sy rnany I are sightseeing and 'fttiuS t i ank the balk and a „L”S- S I do want Daisy to meet important things with you, at when I try to talk to you at other JjllJa parties the hostess always looks STf now**that we were mamed we could Tave nothin* of inter«t .in commonshe looked thoroughly distressed “We will look up a desert ;u once,” I laughed. *‘What kind of a day

«ly a week’ B solilud. a deux to tell you all 1 am dying confide,” she replied, I really dou t Sow where to begin, but we must Uge all and talk seriously about Daisy

rdVeprinc.. 1 i rupted herself to say, “I that J ver dessert service to-day from the Media tore It’s too sweet, and he actually tame ] S n to your offer. And I have a per- , Sy new dress on, and you have not < eTen mentioned it. Don’’t you like it! ; Which question called forth the lespo at the top of the story. Henrietta i “We must get to the point, Henrietta repeated? as If I had U the one vo ' ““St'you think.” I suggested mildly, i “that when you asked him here to dmne?lo veS informally, you advanced the , question beyond the discussing point. fore we decide what we will do, let us fi d out just what has already been done and ’’'"Eve/since she*flrst met him at *emi on that absurd terrace of the cafe looking that heavenly lake and I was asleep 3 and you had gone to we Don Filimx) and that awful man from No ■ talk to her and Domatello saw St she was annoyed and pretended that he, ‘ nobleman rescuing an American girl from the rude and unwelcome attentions of one of her own countiymen is an incident so strange to fiction that might well rivet her attention. “And then when we came, Henuctta resumed, “and found that not only hj s mother was English, but that she was lust ZAm? husband audjha Domatello had spent two ' he was at the University right next dooi £ and that he knew her so like a letter of introduction from the old lady herself ! , • ' “Every time that Daisy has met him Romance has graced the occasion. He rietta went on dismally. Ihe day that insisted on taking her through He catncombs, didn’t he appear as if by nugic and rescue us from a hms nove utj* trophe which threatened? The kind thing never happens any more. And if that was not ridiculous enough, when s dropped her handkerchief from the dome i St Peter’s didn’t it flutter down iut J » ■( he had been wa.t.ng tor it and sho knew it, instead of took, j like an ant if we saw him at all and ne didn’t know that we were there and then that rainy day she went to the L< a •p • »> al *You "always see everyone that vou know at the Rag Fair on rainy dajs, i nroteated “It wasn’t queer her meeting Sim there They all. think that you are more apt to get bargains in the ram—- “ That may be true,’ said Hennett. , “but they never take their best things out in the rain, so that there is that to b thought of too. But we are wandeiin f r o m g the pint, Geoffry, and we must put things clearly so as to know wheie we are. Their whole acquaintance has been a series of romantic coincidences. “All the men who know him speak well of him,” 1 said, “and bes rich enough not to be a fortune hunter. 1 heir place u» one of the few really old Villas here, well kept up by the same family for whom it vSf originally built. But,”. I went on “of course all this is for your fatheT and Daisy to decide later. \Vhat I want to know, Henrietta, is just where we are now. How friendly a stand have his charms beguiled you into taking. How am I to greet him to-night, for in Sance™ As t friend and pteajwct.vo brother-in-law or a robbei wno . “Oh, dear! I wish that 1 knew . cried Henrietta. “When, he proposed for her Sid you told him that she was very young and that he must say nothing to her unt he had talked to her father, I thought that we’d have a two months respite urn father came over for her in April, and that before then we might tmd thine definite against him— Aot U;ii i want to find out anything against him, she added, seeing my amazed look, but I have the old-fashioned American idea that there must be something wrong with all foreigners. And there often is, especially with the oi.es that marry American

8 “Your father will especially hale her marrying am Italian,” I made answer and his titl/will be like waving a red flag in the face of the American eaghn “We must not forget his mother and Aunt Susan!” cried Henrietta hopefull) • “She married an # Englishman and has lived happily ever after and she is fathei s own sister^and Uomatello’s mother lish and lived next door to Aunt Susans husband until she was married. . „ “All this may be unnecessary worrying, I said. “It may be that Daisy does not care for him*at all. Do you know how v she feels?” , . , “I don’t want to talk about him too much to her,” replied Henrietta, ‘or try to draw her out at all. If we do find that he’s an imposter and a villain she will get over it much more quickly if she thinks that no one knows.” . “Ip other words, you think she is very much in love.” “I do not know how much she realises . it " said Henrietta, “but it shines in her radiant face and dances in her blue eyes. Heally, Geoffry, she is so sweet such a darling, 1 don’t see how he can help being in love with her!” . “She comes from an exceptionally good family for wives,” 1 admitted, “but Henrietta, if you wanted a two months re . spite, why did you ask him here to dinner to-night with no one else but the Greys?”

“It happened,” replied Henrietta, vague- t ly. “Really, Geoffry,” she went on, f gathering herself together, “I can’t tell a you just how it came about and I do feel fi a bit guilty about it, but six balances the t table better and i knew that they liked t him and it did not occur to me how seri- c ously the Italian side of him might take c an informal invitation like this. Of J course he was glad to come, but I dont t think it would be fair to try to put the blame on him and say that he beguiled i me into asking him.” “You don’t know beguilement when you < see it—in others,” I laughed, “but now that it is done we must make the best j and the lightest of it possible. t “John and Julia are such dears ( and they will help make it seem natural, she said, glad that I was sharing the responsibility, “and I’m going to use the new dessert set. I told you, did I not, that I had bought it from the Mediatore to- ( clci/y * “How did you ever get him down to the price?” I asked admiringly. i° u . are really a wonder. It's worth more than that, and I never thought he d come down. Let’s have another look at u. “It’s too late now. Baldaseerom s been

cleaning it to get it ready and I didu i mean to tell you. I had planned not to say a word but just let it burst upon you in all ; ts clean splendor at dessert, but 1 forgot and told!” , . » “To get back to. Daisy and the prince, 1 think,” said Henrietta, “that the reason I am so suspicious about Italians tonight is the story the Mediatore told me about the former owner ot this service. The man who sold it to him won it last fall from the owner, the man m whose family it had been for years, centimes with the Mediatore yon mu>'t never lose eight of the deplorahlo fact that ho is a very likely liai, 1-aid. “Remember that faked picture ho ofkud you. It was at most two years old and yet he was ready to take the oath that it had been in the family of a Roman prime of his acquaintance for seventy years. “I know,” said Henrietta, “but 1 thuu he must have been very hard pressed lm money just .then, Geoffry, for 1 think that he is really truthful by nature. “Seein* that it was your confiding disposition which led you to listen to my entreaties it would be ungrateful to repioa 1 you with that very trustfulness now, 1 exclaimed, “what more did the Mediatore tell you about the silver “He said that it would be betraying a

confidence to tell me to whom it had belonged,” replied Henrietta, glancing a mo to see if I appreciated his reserve, “but that it had been made for that family I forget how many centuries ago and that it had their crest on, so that while delicacy prevented his mentioning the name weVouM look it up easily it wo wished. Don’t you know its all queer beasts and curls and geometrical figures. He said that it was part of a marriage service. That thev used to have twenty or tniitj courses at the wedding feasts and all carried in on silver plates Chicken cooked with sugar and rose water and all kinds of disgusting things. lor all these yeau it had been in the same family, one o their most valued possessions, and an kinds of famous people have eaten oft it, Beatrice d’Kste and Leonardo and the Sforza and—” . . . “How old di<l he say it was. 1 inquired blandly, “and where did these owners live? and did the blameless but imaginative Mediatore say that all these people ate off these plates? "lie said who knows but they did! “Not I!” I laughed. “What us there about all this, my dear, that you found so depressing? Are you afraid that you \m have to eat chicken and rose water it Daisy marries into an Italian /ami y . “You’re too ridiculous!" cried Henrietta “As if I'd let a little thing like that interfere with Daisy’s happiness. Ive not come to the awful part yet. I mean about the present head of the house, the one that lost it at cards. Hes too awful to think about / so weak and depraved, a type of the very worst side of modern Italy. i’hvsically and mentally and morally skimped. He’s awfully poor and has repeatedly tried to marry money, but ao far in vain, thank goodness! Now,

Geoffry, just suppose that Domatello—“Talk about being ridiculous, 1 interrupted, “who is being so now? Think ot that strapping big Domatello with his line color ana his quick mind—“l know !” Henrietta apologised. Uh, there’s some one coming! It can t he eight o’clock!” -It’s Daisy,” 1 said. “Come m, D. dear. How sweet you look !” . „ “I’m glad you wore that blue dices, said Henrietta. “Did Peters wave your hair? It’s just right. Marcel was a great man!” , My pretty sister-in-law came into the ■robm and sat down in a big gold chair covered with velvet a few shades darker than her frock. The fire and the soft light from the candles played on hei pretty hair and her soft cheeks. bhe looked very young and very much to. he protected, I thought, but only said: “Have you had a good day ! . “Very,” she smiled. “I am beginning to feel as much at home hero as ill New and 1 -refrained from looking

at each other. •There is always,” the girl went on, a delicious strange feeling here, a feeling of unreality and romance. It’s so hard to make myself realise that 1 am at hod and actually seeing original Work ; that Michael Ange'o’s hands really touched these marbles, that Raphael’s brush coloured these very walls, that some of the statues and fragments were carved by the Greeks at their best, their golden period. it a too wonderful! I feel as I couldn t e I! And yet some days I feel as if 1 nan a part of my own in all the romance and Un ‘The t part that a spring daffodil .has that "rows on one of the old rums here. said ' Henrietta, beginning warmly and ending somewhat lamely as she caught my appreciative eye. . ‘Then the Gfeys came in and half a minute afterwards Prince Domatello. He and John Grey were both fine-looking men, tall and well built. As they shook hands John looked the more Latin of the two. Domatello’s fresh color and big frame were surely more Anglo-Saxon than John’s slight elegance. I used to wonder if it was his Italian appearance or ms American mind that attracted Julia. 1 erhaps it was the combination. She was born in Rome and had been brought up in Italy, and though she called herself an American she had absorbed so much Ita’G.n atmosphere that though she may have been American to the Italians, to the Americans she was quite Italian. “I had a ’most amusing experience this afternoon,” she began, after we were comfortably seated at the table, “one of those coincidences you’d call impossible if it did not happen to yourself.”

“Or if it were not recounted to you b.v some trustworthy person like Julia Grey, laughed her husband. . “Our villino,” she explained to Daisy, “is quite in the country and the widening of the street on which it stands has ■ brought the house so much forward that the little loggia from my room overlooks the highway. I was sitting there one noon a few days ago when my attention was diverted from the distant mountains to something more directly under my eye. A man, a woman, and a dancing bear had stopped, and the man was asking it the signora bella would like to see Beppo dance. Lunch was not served, and 1 was glad of an excuse for not going in to answer a lot of cards which had come in the morning mail, so I signified my gracious willinirness and Beppo went through the usual clumsy antics of every trained bear. My camera was on the chair by me and the sun was just right as they stood, and they made a tempting subject against the white road, so I snapped

them, and then they went away bowing for their soldi, and I thought no more about them until this afternoon when the films came back, developed. ihey were the pictures that Henrietta and I had taken in the Forum, and I wanted specially to have them good. It was* nearly dark when John brought them home and I took them out on the loggia to get a better light on them, and they re all bad, Henrietta! The only good one was of that wretched' animal. I&n t it a shame. “It’s anoying, not to say curious, how often you get things you don’t want m

this world,” I said. ■ ’ “Do vou not think that much depends on how much and in what manner you want them?” asked the prince seriously. “There is more to my story, broke m Julia. “Let’s talk of tire psychology of coincidences afterwards, for the prance has a fascinating theory about it all, but 1 want to tell the queer part of my story

first s “While I stood there looking at the ( photographs, who should come by but the , man, the woman, and the bear. They j had spent the intervening days m enter- ( taining the Romans, and were on their wandering way to pastures new. -they asked if I wanted to see the bear dance, , but I was not in the mood and shook my , head and they were just going on when I bethought me of the picture I had taken of them. I dropped down. The man ( thought it was money at first, and when ( he saw that it was not, he motioned to the woman to pick it up. “But if you could have seen them when they looked at it! It was perfectly delidons . If a .ife-sized portrait of yourself by Sargent had dropped intc your lap iii the tram you couldn't have been more surprised or dumbfounded than those poor souls were with that photograph. they nearly looked their eyes out of their heads. They gave each other awful nudges with their elbows as they pointed out each exquisite detail. When at last they thou'lit of mo they cuifed the boar sharply as an indication of their own shortcoming in social amenities. They courtesred themselves and made the bear courtesy. They walked un the street, into the twilight hills, leaning on each other, intoxicated with joy, and punctuating their delight with more awful nudges. ihc bear, quite forgotten, shambled on behind. “A tiling like that could not happen once in a million times,” said Henrietta, looking at the prince, as wo all murmured our appreciation of the dramatic finale. “I don’t know your theory, prince“No,” said the prince. “This is quite outside my theory. It is one of the rarest tilings in the world, pure coincidence. Unadulterated coincidence, as you would say in .America.” He went on, seeing that we were all interested. “I don t remember ever hearing of so remarkable a case!” . .. , "But Prince!” began Henrietta, and stopped suddenly. It was impossible to confront him with the instances she mul in mind' of his extraordinary meetings with Daisy. . . ' “There is almost inevitably another element that enters in,” he said. "For the first time, perhaps in months, you think of a certain friend and the next day you have a letter from him. Ihat may bo thought transference. You are unable to remember a name, then just as you are about to speak u someone else savs it also. Another instance of mindreading. You start to walk down the Corso and some sudden impulse makes you turn into the via Condotti and there you meet a friend whom you particularly wanted to see, but that may he duo to your will cud because you particularly wanted to see this friend—that some subconscious sense inclined you to turn a corner which a moment before you had every idea of paasiag.” Daisy was listening with every a pearanoo of simple interest, but Henriettas cheeks were scarlet. “That is why your story seems to me not only charming but remarkable, Domatelio went on. turning to Julia, "because none of these enter into it. It was pure coincidence.” “Do you really think that wanting a thing help you to get it ! ’ asked Julia. "I don’t mean - because you try in the ordinary way, but that the desire of your will can bend circumstances or people to , meet your wishes ” "1 don’t know that I ever formulated a creed about it,” he replied, “1 only know that when 1 want a thing very much J work for it internally as well as externally, if I may put it so clumsily. I am : like the small boy who wished his mother to hunt for his lost knife while he prayed ; that she might find it! I believe in bend- ! in<4 every cne ; r«y to the accomplishment of an’ object which is worthy of so much thought.” "Did you ever try to find anything that you had lost that way?” asked Henrietta, trying to open a more impersonal avenue 1 of conversation. “I never lost but one thing that I cared ' cnormouslv about,” ho said, ‘and I sup- ' pose that the person who got it cored about it even more than I did, for in spite of strenuous efforts I have not ' been able to get hold of it again.” “Is there a story about it that we can ! hear?” Daisy asked. : -‘Do tell it!” cried Julia. “1 ve been chatterinar ever since we sat down and I I am half starved!’’ r “It’s rather a personal story, began the . prince, “but I can skip most of the r family history and all of the dates and

it’s a* droll old tale in itself. “My mother came of a Genoese family, and it was to one of her ancestors that this story hanpened, once upon a time. He was called Don Ludivioo, although lie afterwards succeeded to the title. He had for a neighbor a very powerful duke whose only daughter, the beautiful Grnsiola, fell madte in love with Don Lndivico, whose family was not equal to hers in wealth or in rank. Moroever, beautiful and charming as she was, Don Ludivico was more embarrassed than pleased with her affection, as he loved her not at all, hut rather a certain Donna Maria cli Pacienti, who became subsequently, and I quite forget in exactly what degree, my grandmother. “The duke had chosen quite another sposo for his daughter, a gentlemen from his point of view much more desirable, and indeed so delightful a man in himself that had her father not selected him as her misbnnd in all probability Grasiola would have fallen in love with him herself. The duke sent for Don Ludivico and threatened him with all kind's of horrible vengeance if ho did not immediately stop making love to his daughter. Ludivico was clever enough not to deny making love to Grasiola, knowing that while her father might be angry with him if he had, yet he would probably be much more angry did he think that Grasiola’s advances to him had not been favorably received. ‘He put his own interpretation on Don Ludivico’s silence and went on to say what he wished, or , rather commanded, my grandfather to do. There was to be some kind of a tournament in the course of n few days, jousting, archery, high

jumping, croquet, or whatever lorm ot sport was synchronous to the time, and the duke proposed that Don Ludivico should allow Prince Errico to win from him, Don Ludivico being such a good player and Donna Grasiola so sure of his skill that she was willing to promise her hand to the victor * ‘Was he not afraid' that his own lady might also prefer to wed a conquering hero;” asked Julia. “Exactly the point that occurred to Don Ludivico,” replied the prince with an apnreciative glance at Julia, “but the difficulty and its solution seem to have presented themselves almost simultaneously to his mind/ and, according to his chronicler, a priestly cousin, he. replied to the duke that while he was willing tp obey him in all things, the disappointment of not being his son-in-law was crushing. ‘Name any other lady in the realm and she is vours.’ cried the duke in the eood old-fashioned robber-baron way. ‘Surely there are others who might make you happy,’

“Don Ludivico admitted cautiously that the estates of Donna Maria di Pacienti adjoined his and that if he was really not to be allowed to follow the dictates of his heart—and so on. You see what an old hypocrite be was! He then went on to say that he '{pared that Donna Maria was interested in .Errioo and that _ should he win the contest — The duke interrupted him to assure him that Donna Maria should be delicately taken into the secret, in such a way as to do his cause much good j “Everything seems to have happened exactlv as it was planned. Grasiola married the prince and lived happily with him ever afterwards as far as anyone knows. Don Ludivico not only married the lady of his choice, a precedent we

have all striven to follow, but he sueceeded in so inspiring the duke with a sense of obligation that he sent them some beautiful silver for a wedding present. This silver, a dessert service, has come down from mother to son ever since. This silver 1 succeeded by my incredible folly in losing, and I have not yet recovered it.” Henrietta was shading her face with a pink fan that partly disguised her paleness. but 1 know from the lines about her. mouth that she was suffering. I ncertainty was the one thing she could not bear.' “What kind of a service was it?’ she asked bravely, trying to make her question sound as natural as the comments of the others. Domatello described it all too accurately, the large round platters, the fruit dishes, and eighteen plates, with the crest worked into the design of each plate. Henrietta looked at me and at the pantry door. Should she countermand the order for the dessert.service? I shook mv head, trying hard to think quickly and oloarly. I was very much distressed. A degenerate young gambler, the Mecn.iN had said. * John and Julia were 'old friends, tried and to be trusted. Why not show him up before them? I believed that 1 could do it In a way that would make it less hard for Daisy than to make more of a circumstance of it when we were alone. Baldasseroni was carving the birds and 1 was mixing the salad dressing. With the appalling knowledge that salad alone stood between us mid the appearance of the dessert set, no epicure ever measured his oil or counted his grains of salt more carefully than did 1. ~ | - Henrietta sent me appealing glances. Ut course, she seemed to admit, his marrying Daisy was quite out of the question, but did the laws of hospitality not demand that we should not expose him at our own table? Did they or did they not, I wondered. Had ho not forfeited all right to consideration? 1 must think of pool, pretty Daisy and of what would be easiest f01 ‘‘1 1 always have the feeling,” continued the prince, as the oil dropped slowly into the salad, “that I shall find that silver. For so many years it has been in our family, always a wedding present to a bride' given afterwards by her to her son for a gut to his bride, as my mother gave it to me. 1 know now that it was a trust and not a possession which I right to part with, but 1 was young ‘•1, too, have a feeling that you will find it and in sumo unexpected way. My voice sounded hollow in spite of my efforts to keep it natural. "What a quantity of oil you are putting into that salad, Heoffry!” said Daisy. "How did you lose the silver, prince. Was it stolen?” -I should have blamed myself less if it had been!” ho replied. * -He’s brazen!” I telegraphed to Henrietta, but her face was too pitiful and she nodded. 1 saw Baldasseroni’s bewildered look as she spoke quickly to him. An Italian servant, no matter how well trained, never attains to the unquestioning obedience of an English one, and 1 was afraid ho would remonstrate audibly, but Henrietta knows when to plead and when to command, and doing the one with her eves and the other with her tongue she got him safely out of the room just as the much mixed salad began its course around the table. -I adored my father,” the prince was saving. I must have missed a few sentences in the excitement of watching Henrietta and the butler. “And I was on.lv sixteen and it all seemed so awful to me. Ho had just recovered from the typhoid fever and one day when 1 was in the room the doctor told him that he must go to Switzerland for a couple,of months to recuperate. •“Things arc too busy here, replied my father. ‘ 1 can’t afford to go to Switzerland now.’ “Foolish boy that I was, 1 immediately associated this remark of my father’s with his having that morning consented to buy for me a pair of horses I had asked foi instead of connecting it with a very important crisis in Parliament, of which my father was a member. "He couldn’t afford to go to Switzerland! That was the only thing 1 heard, and that very day ho had been so generous to me! I could hardly wait to bundle up my silver, the only valuable thing I personally owned, and I sold it to the first dealer L found. Tito money which 1 took to my father was hardly sufficient to take him to the Italian border, and though he was tremendously touched by my thoug.it of him, his distress when he found how 1 had obtained the money was great. We tried at once to get the silver back but it seemed to have disappeared off the face of tho earth. My father always thought that the dealer must have thought I had stolen it and that it had gone promptly into the melting pot, for he offered an enormous reward for its return. I have never felt that it was gone. _ I have searched the shops of Italy and it is not here, but some day I shall find it. W ho knows, signorina, perhaps in the house of some of your rich compatriots!’ He looked smilingly at Daisy. “It’s a shame the way Americans rob Italy!” she responded warmly. “I never thought of it so much there at home, but here°where the things belong it seems almost inhuman to transplant them ! ’ “You’re mixing your animal vegetable and mineral kingdoms most awfully in your me(aphoi ! ,”f .teased John. T have in my pocket, said the prince, “the advertisement which my father had printed at the time of the loss. It has a full description of the silver. I always carry it with me as a kind of identinca- , tion in case I ever run across it. Would you like to see it?” He was sitting by Henrietta and handed it naturally enough to her. She read it carefully, her face assuming the emancipated expression ol one freed from a particularly noisome dungeon. She passed the paper to John and met my contended glance with one as contented. I knew her generous nature and knew that having Domatello in her mind she was now planning a royal recompense. She gave more hurried directions to the bewildered Baldassoroni. Would she be able to keep Daisy out of it? How far would ber feeling reparation carry her? Did I or did 1 i not know Henrietta? “Stranger things than your finding it in an American house have happened, she chattered, hound to keep the hero ol the* occasion from noticing until the psychological moment the silver plate that had been placed before him, ‘ call it com- : cidence, or thought transference or strength of will and desire, or Will 1 you have an ice. Domatello • It was the first time she had dropped : his title in addressing him and he flushed 1 slightly with pleasure. He turned his head. For a moment he was UMi’iy 1 stunned by what he saw, then he fairly bubbled over with excitement. ’* “Do you mean,” asked Julia as soon a 5 she could make herself heard, ‘ that this is your long-lost silver? The service which ! you have been telling us about, and that you did not know that Henrietta had it and that she did not know that it was yours? It is far more wonderful than my

bear story This must be a haunted house 1” Domatelo’s English mother and Ins Anglo-Saxon training were submerged for the moment by his Latin temperament. “It is mine,” he replied ardently, with his glowing eyes on Daisy, “until I am permitted to offer it to my bride!’ ' Daisy’s soft glance met his and a loveiy pink suffused her cheeks, her throat and her pretty shoulders. They had quite forgotten* us. As interested observers it was quite evident to us that in those- glances the silver had been offered to his bride—and accepted! . , T • “Why didn’t you tell us? cried Julia, as she looked from him to Daisy and then reproachfully at Henrietta. “Here’s to the bride!” John rose, glass

in hand. “Until her father comes— I began resolutely, looking at Henrietta to support me, but Henrietta had eyes, as I might have known she would have, only for Daisy and Domatello, and the glance with which she regarded them was a benediction. I lifted my glass with the others. “Henrietta bought it of a lying mediatore,” I said an hour later when Domatello had sufficiently recovered himself to remember the silver again and to ask about it. “A man who when he finds out about the reward offered will probably die of pure chagrin. “He told me the most ridiculous tale about the owner of the service,” said Henrietta hotly. “A mediatore, indeed! He’s a worthless wretch.” “Not quite worthless I” Domatello laughed with satisfacton. Not that I will admit that I owe my two treasures to him entirely, but, after all, what is a mediatore but an instrument for bringing together people and things which might otherwise not meet so soon ! He has been a useful instrument, a successful media-

tore!”