"Many thanks, Marchese; but you look as if life were agreeing with you." Beltrami laughed, not with his former sardonic merriment, but with a hearty sense of enjoyment. "Ma foi, yes! I am married again!" "Oh! I hope I can congratulate you this time," I said with great significance. "The present Marchesa is an angel, mon ami. Dame! I had enough of demons with the Contessa Morone." "Well, she was punished for her sins." "Eh! what would you? There is a God, mon ami, and He was wearied of the crimes of that Lucrezia Borgia. But what about the poor girl she tried to poison?" "Signora Pallanza! Oh, I hear she is in America with her husband. He has made a wonderful success in New York, and Bianca tells me they have two children, a boy and a girl." "A new Mario and Patti, I suppose. Diavolo! what a pity the old Maestro is not alive to train the voices of his great-grandchildren!" "Yes, he is dead, poor old man! I heard all about it in Vienna, and Petronella has gone to America to look after her beloved piccola. Well, Angello had a long life, but he was not immortal." "Dame! perhaps his system is immortal. It ought to be if your singing is an example." "Ah, flatterer!" "No; upon my word your Figaro was delightful. It is such a relief to hear a voice without that awful tremolo. But come, are you ready? I want you to sup with me." "I will be delighted, Beltrami. Is the Marchesa in Paris?" "Eh! no, not this time. I am here _en garçon_ for a few days. Madame is in Florence, where you must come and visit us. We are wonderfully happy. Dame! who wouldn't be with health, wealth, and an angel of a wife? Ecco!" "You inherited the wealth of Madame Morone?" "Ma foi! yes. It was the only good turn she ever did me." "Oh!" I cried, with a revulsion of feeling, "you are becoming cynical again." "I always become cynical when I think of that demon." "Beltrami," I said after a pause, as we left the Opera House, "there is a question I have often wished to ask you." I felt the Marchese's arm tremble a little in mine, but he laughed in a nonchalant manner. "Eh! ask what you will, mon ami." "Did you put your hand through the curtains and change the position of those glasses?" Beltrami stopped and looked at me steadily with a grave look in his bright eyes. "Hugo, mon ami," he said slowly, "I neither deny nor affirm, what you say. Giulietta Morone was a demon who came into the world to work evil, and God, wearied of her crimes, sent her back to the hell from whence she came. I am not much given to religion, Hugo, as you know, but I believe in a God; and whosoever He chose as an instrument to destroy that which He permitted to exist, rest assured that such a one will be held guiltless for executing the just decree of Heaven!"