Nay, it was hardly to be wondered at that Miss Burgoyne should be indignant with so lukewarm and reluctant a lover, who received her coy advances with coldness, and was only decently civil to her when they talked of wholly indifferent matters. The mischief of it was that, in casting about for some key to the odd situation, she took it into her head to become jealous of Nina; and many were the bitter things she managed to say about foreigners generally, and about Italians in particular, and Italian singers, and so forth. Of course Miss Ross was never openly mentioned, but Lionel understood well enough at whom these covert innuendoes were hurled; and sometimes his eyes burned with a fire far other than that which should be in a lover's eyes when contemplating his mistress. Indeed, it was a dangerous amusement for Miss Burgoyne to indulge in. It was easy to wound; it might be less easy to efface the memory of those wounds. And then there was a kind of devilish ingenuity about her occult taunts. For example, she dared not say that doubtless Miss Nina Ross had gone away back to Naples, and had taken up with a sweetheart, with whom she was now walking about; but she described the sort of young man calculated to capture the fancy of an Italian girl. "The seedy swell of Naples or Rome--he is irresistible to the Italian girl," she said, on one occasion. "You know him; his shirt open at the neck down almost to his chest--his trousers tight at the knee and enormously wide at the foot--a poncho-looking kind of cloak, with a greasy Astrachan collar--a tall French hat, rather shabby--a face the color of paste--an odor of cigarettes and garlic--dirty hands--and a cane. I suppose the theatre is too expensive, so he goes to the public gardens, and strolls up and down, and takes off his hat with a sweep to people he pretends to recognize; or perhaps he sits in front of a _cafe_, with a glass of cheap brandy before him, an evening journal in his hands, and a toothpick in his mouth." "You seem to have made his very particular acquaintance," said he, with a touch of scorn. "Did he give you his arm when you were walking together in the public gardens?" "Give _me_ his arm?" she exclaimed. "I would not allow such a creature to come within twenty yards of me! I prefer people who use soap." "What a pity it is they can't invent soap for purifying the mind!" he said, venomously; and he went out, and spoke no more to her during the rest of that evening.