The mystery seemed clearer now. He was an old lover--perhaps once a favorite--of madam’s. It was hardly worth the trouble of talking to the fellow; and Paul Desfrayne felt half-enraged with himself for having done so. But now that he wished the conversation ended, or, rather, that he had not begun it, Gilardoni seemed determined to continue it. “Idle gossip all, I doubt not,” Captain Desfrayne said carelessly. “You, who come from her native village, would be more likely than anybody else to guess who the lucky individual might happen to be, and where he might be found; for if she had married any one after she quitted her village, it would have been somebody of importance.” “Somebody to talk about--somebody to be proud of,” Gilardoni cried, his eyes flashing with a strange light. “If she had married a poor man----” He stopped suddenly; Captain Desfrayne laughed. “Yes,” he said. “If she had married a poor man, she would have hated and despised him. Perhaps she did marry a poor man, and is not able to marry the Russian prince,” he added, knocking the ash carelessly from his cigar. “She would have hated and despised him,” Gilardoni repeated slowly, with intense acrimony in his accent. “Do _you_ know whether she is married or not?” he abruptly demanded, the keen, furtive, eager, inquiring look in his eyes again. “Come, I think we have talked enough about Madam Guiscardini,” answered Captain Desfrayne, in almost a harsh tone, rising from his couch. “I don’t see that there can be any particular interest for you or for me in the subject.” He felt quite sure now that this was some early lover, who so madly adored the brilliant operatic star that he could not bear the thought that she should belong to another, although she never could be his. He felt disappointed and vexed with himself for permitting his eager curiosity to carry him so far from his customary reserve and dignity as to lead him into gossiping with his servant, a fellow whom until yesterday he scarcely knew existed. In a softer tone he dismissed his new attendant, telling him some of the people about the house would show him the room where he was to sleep. Gilardoni quitted the room with a profound inclination, and Captain Desfrayne, almost to his relief, was left alone. “The affair is very simple,” he muttered to himself, as he walked to the window and threw it open to breathe the delicious air of the fair June night--“very simple. These Italians are so susceptible, and so revengeful. Probably _la_ Lucia flirted with him in her early days, before the dawn of splendor and riches came upon her and led her to think----Pooh! the story is commonplace to nausea--insipid. I don’t care to know anything about her more than I already know. What good would it do me?”