And Sybil, with an ecstatic sigh, said again: "How I do wish Dorothy were here!" And Thrall commented: "Your lovers have cause for jealousy of that young sister, I fancy, Miss Lawton?" But, with careless frankness, Sybil answered: "I never had a lover in my life! So Dorrie can have caused no jealousy, you see!" and turned her whole attention back to Nonna Angelique, who was checking off costumes on her fingers. And she would have been an astonished girl had she been told that her brusquely spoken words had made this man's heart leap in his breast, as no seductive wile of most tactful coquetry could have done; and the fact that he had no right to heed the words of any maid, however sweet or fair, did nothing to check that hurried thumping at his ribs. For, like many other men, he had something of the explorer's spirit about him--something that responded eagerly to the charm of the strange, the vague, the new,--something that makes the would-be explorer of the terra incognita ignore all thought of danger, and dream only of the beauty of virgin forests, strange flowers, and fabled fountains of youth and love eternal! No one could have guessed that the calm-faced, stately gentleman, looking on at the selection of Juliet's finery, was mentally repeating those candid, girlish words: "I never had a lover in my life!" "Ah, no!" he thought; "no more had Juliet ever had a lover in her life, up to an hour before that 'trifling, foolish banquet,' given by old Capulet. Yet, ere its end, swift love had grown so great that she had declared already for the grave, if 'twere a passion unrequited!" Then old Angelique broke in upon his thought, and claimed attention with: "The cloak, now, Mr. Thrall--the cloak for the visit to old Laurence's cell? Shall it be black or brown or gray?" "Gray!" he answered, readily. "Dark gray, I think, gives a hint of mystery. Though, 'tis true, Juliet seeks the Friar with her parents' knowledge, still it is with secret purpose. So gray and very large and full and hooded, Nonna Angelique, so that a young maid might slip like a shadow by high walls and through Verona's streets to the cloisters of the convent without revealing a trace of beauty or of rich attire." "C'est bon! c'est bon!" nodded Lefebvre, taking a prodigious pinch of snuff, and entering in a greasy little note-book "One large, gray, circle cloak, hooded"--"c'est bon!" On Angelique's four fingers her grimy thumb checked off "Cloak for Friar's cell--gray. Chamber scene--white, of course, but flowing, loose, long, light as air. For tomb--white also, but heavy, rich, eh? The satin gown for County Paris bride, and only one spot of color, eh? The jewelled sheath of the dagger, at the waist. Oh, yes! oh, yes! all that is clear, but--but, my Mr. Manager, how shall it be for the ball--for that first time to meet the Romeo--eh?"