"I shall know to-morrow before leaving Cannes, if you have no objection to my choosing him. Only," the young man added, "in that case it might be better to have him on the yacht." "I'll attend to that," said Miss Marsh. "But how and when introduce him to my uncle?" "This evening," Corancez replied, "while we are all in the train for Cannes. I will secure our lover at once, and not leave him till we are in the train--especially," he added, rising, "as we have been talking here too long, and though the walls have no ears, they have eyes. My dear," he murmured, passionately pressing the little hand of Madame Bonnacorsi, who also had risen, "I shall not talk with you again before the great day; give me a word to carry with me and live with until then." "God guard you, _anima mia_," she answered, in her grave voice, revealing all the passion that this skilful personage had inspired in her. "It is written here," he said gayly, opening his hand, "and here," he added, placing his hand upon his heart. Then, turning to the young girl:-- "Miss Flossie, when you need some one to go through fire for you, a word, and he will be ready _right away_." While Miss Marsh laughed at this joke upon one of the little idioms of the Yankee language, the Marquise followed him with the look of a passionate woman whose heart goes out to every motion of the man she loves. The Provençal moved toward his old friend with such grace and suppleness of carriage that the American girl could not refrain from remarking it. The young girls of that energetic race, so fond of exercise and so accustomed to the easy familiarities of the tennis court, are frankly and innocently sensible to the physical beauty of men. "How handsome he is, your Corancez," she exclaimed to the Marquise. "To me he is the Frenchman, the type that I used to picture to myself in Marionville when I read the novels of Dumas. How happy you will be with him." "So happy," the Italian murmured, but added, with a melancholy foreboding, "yet God will not permit it." "God permits everything that one wishes, if one wishes it hard enough, and it is just," Miss Florence interrupted. "No. I have had to tell Alvise too many lies. I shall be punished." "If you feel that way," said the American, "why don't you tell your brother? Do you wish me to do it? Five minutes of conversation, and you will not have a single lie on your conscience. You have the right to marry. The money is yours. What do you fear?" "You don't know Alvise," she said, and her face had a look of actual terror. "What if he should provoke him to a duel and kill him? No; let us do as we have planned, and may the Madonna protect us."