"You have a bad case of nerves!" he sneered, as he pulled the lower part of the mask away from his face. "This thing persists in pressing against my mouth. You'd think it was alive." "Your eyes are wild!" she managed to gulp. "You never looked at me like this, Tom. Oh! Your eyes are hot and cruel! Like Tony's at times!" "Like Tony's, eh?" he jeered in a voice that had lost all its tenderness. "I wish he had stayed on the other side," he continued vehemently. "I wish he had broken his neck, when he fell into that shop in Padua. If I never saw the beggar again, it would be too soon." Blinking her amazement, she seemed on the point of saying something, changed her mind and turned to the door. "Listen, lady!" He seized her arm and roughly yanked her back. "Don't be too nice to Tony. Don't encourage him. The rotter has a way with women." "Tom!" She fought vainly to break his hold. "You're bruising my arm! Let me go! You're hurting me! Let me go! Please!" "Not too many dances with Tony!" He glared at her. "Mind, Nita! I don't like the way he looked at you this afternoon. Nor the way he held your hands. I felt like slamming him." "What in the world has got into you, Tom?" she almost wailed, as she wriggled free. "You never----" Her strained voice broke. "Why--why," she stammered her bewilderment, "I actually believe you're jealous of Tony!" "Jealous of Tony and every other man!" he confessed throatily. "I'd kill you, Nita, before I'd let Tony or anybody else have you." His hand dropped to the haft of the slender dagger at his waist. "I swear it!" There was no doubting his sincerity. His eyes blazed at her challengingly through the thin slits in the mask. "This thing seems to be blending with my skin." He tugged impatiently at the silk that rippled to his agitated breathing like a thing alive. "It seems to work convulsively against my mouth." With a stifled cry, Nita staggered from the room like a stricken thing. For a split second her husband stood glowering after her, fighting for breath like a spent runner. Then he came to life and darted in her wake. He reached the top of the broad stairway, as his wife poised at the bottom like a bird on the point of trying out its wings. The next instant, what appeared to be a skeleton, shrouded from head to foot in the habiliments of the grave and wearing a mask in the form of a grinning skull, detached itself from the swirling phantasmagoria of nymphs, priests, satyrs, ballet dancers, monks, pirates, harlequins, tramps, pierrettes, sailors, imps and other bizarre creatures, to bow over Nita's hand and whirl her away in a dreamy Strauss waltz. "Dancing with him already!" Romani growled, as he leisurely descended the stairs. "They'd better not drive me too far!" All the while his fingers were fondling the hilt of his dagger. "They----" He broke off abruptly, while his angry gaze searched the hilarious throng for the dainty shepherdess and her gruesome partner.