"But I should grieve to think that this Signore's wife should have left him permanently for so foolish a quarrel. For, though their lives seemed filled with a silly sort of bickering, I believed from what I saw that there was really no lack of love between them, and I cannot conceive that they will be any happier apart. Indeed, had she been indifferent to her husband, could she have felt a trivial inconstancy, implying no grievous wrong, of such importance? But, indeed, it is absurd to use the word _inconstancy_ at all in such a case, though we may condemn the ill-taste of all vulgar trifling with the solemn obligations of conjugal duty. I wish I might have spoken, to laugh in their faces and make a jest of the whole affair. But silence was my lot. "I have hung here, as I suppose, for six months past, and have often striven to speak, but none has heard me till now. Think, dear Signore, how I have suffered! Think how I have longed to speak and be heard, when my Madeline, my darling--who loves me, and says she loves me--has talked to her great dog of her lover that was killed in the war...." Mr. Pelly interrupted. "Are you referring to young Captain Calverley?" he said. "Because, if so, it is not certain that he _is_ dead. Besides, I suppose you know that Miss Upwell and the Captain were not engaged?" And then the old gentleman fancied he heard a musical laugh come from the picture. "How funny and cold you English are!" said the voice. "Was _I_ engaged to my darling, my love, that only time he pressed me to his bosom; that only time I felt his lips on mine? Was I not the bond-slave for life to the evil heart and evil will of that old monument of Sin, soaked deep in every stain of Hell? Was I not called his _wife_? Yet my heart and my soul went out to my love in that kiss, and laughed in their freedom in mockery of the laws that could put the casket that held them in bond, and yet must perforce leave them free. And when that young soldier tore himself away from my Madeline--I saw them here myself; there by the shiny fish, in the glass case--was their parting kiss less real than ours was, that hour when I saw him last, my own love of those years gone by?" "A--it isn't a subject I profess to understand much about," said Mr. Pelly. He blew his nose and wiped his spectacles, and was silent a moment. Then he said, "But whatever the sentiment of the young lady herself may be, there can be no doubt about her mother's. In fact, she has herself told me that she is most anxious that it should not be supposed that there was any engagement. So I trust--if you ever do have the opportunity of speaking to anyone on the subject--that you will be careful not to give the impression that such was the case. I do not, perhaps, fully realise the motives that influence Lady Upwell--a--and Sir Stopleigh,--of course it's the same thing...."