From suicide I consider myself in honour debarred. But I keep a loaded pistol in my drawer.&rdquo; </p> <p> Madame la Generale D&rsquo;Hubert lifted up her hands in despair after perusing that answer. </p> <p> &ldquo;You see? He won&rsquo;t be reconciled,&rdquo; said her husband. &ldquo;He must never, by any chance, be allowed to guess where the money comes from. It wouldn&rsquo;t do. He couldn&rsquo;t bear it.&rdquo; </p> <p> &ldquo;You are a brave homme, Armand,&rdquo; said Madame la Generale, appreciatively. </p> <p> &ldquo;My dear, I had the right to blow his brains out; but as I didn&rsquo;t, we can&rsquo;t let him starve. He has lost his pension and he is utterly incapable of doing anything in the world for himself. We must take care of him, secretly, to the end of his days. Don&rsquo;t I owe him the most ecstatic moment of my life? . . . Ha! ha! ha! Over the fields, two miles, running all the way! I couldn&rsquo;t believe my ears! . . . But for his stupid ferocity, it would have taken me years to find you out. It&rsquo;s extraordinary how in one way or another this man has managed to fasten himself on my deeper feelings.&rdquo; </p> <p> <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> </p> <div style="height: 4em;"> <br /><br /><br /><br /> </div> <h2> IL CONDE </h2> <h3> A PATHETIC TALE </h3> <p> &ldquo;<i>Vedi Napoli e poi mori</i>.&rdquo; </p> <p> The first time we got into conversation was in the National Museum in Naples, in the rooms on the ground floor containing the famous collection of bronzes from Herculaneum and Pompeii: that marvellous legacy of antique art whose delicate perfection has been preserved for us by the catastrophic fury of a volcano. </p> <p> He addressed me first, over the celebrated Resting Hermes which we had been looking at side by side. He said the right things about that wholly admirable piece. Nothing profound. His taste was natural rather than cultivated. He had obviously seen many fine things in his life and appreciated them: but he had no jargon of a dilettante or the connoisseur. A hateful tribe. He spoke like a fairly intelligent man of the world, a perfectly unaffected gentleman. </p> <p> We had known each other by sight for some few days past. Staying in the same hotel&mdash;good, but not extravagantly up to date&mdash;I had noticed him in the vestibule going in and out. I judged he was an old and valued client. The bow of the hotel-keeper was cordial in its deference, and he acknowledged it with familiar courtesy. For the servants he was Il Conde. There was some squabble over a man&rsquo;s parasol&mdash;yellow silk with