The true Queen of Naples, at this moment, was La Felina. This complete calmness was soon succeeded by a thunder of applause. A thousand voices uttered a long shout of commingled bravos and hurras. La Felina was on the stage. This delirium produced by a single person, this passionate worship expressed by an almost furious admiration, those thousand hearts hung to the lips of a single person, is found only on the stage, and was one of the triumphs which Naples decreed to the greatest artist in Italy. A report was in circulation, also, which added to this almost furious admiration. It was said, that she was about to retire for ever, and that this was her last appearance. The eyes of love have a secret and admirable instinct, enabling them to see what persons who are indifferent cannot discover. Among this eager and compact crowd, the glances of La Felina were immediately attracted to a point of the hall, to a single box in which Monte-Leone sat. To him Felina acted and sang, and she was sublime. At the moment when Paer's heroine appeared, a single voice was heard above all others, and the person who had uttered it, having exhausted all the powers of his soul, during the whole time Felina was on the stage, stood with his eyes fixed on her, as if he had been fascinated by some charm he could not shake off. "Poor Taddeo," said the Count, when he saw him, "why does she not love him?" The first act was concluded by a torrent of bouquets, which the audience threw at the feet of their favorite actress. The curtain fell. This was the moment expected by the associate of Monte-Leone. Faithful to his promise, the Count leaned forward in his box, naturally as possible, and looked around the brilliant assembly. He then placed his hand on his heart, and disappeared in the recess of his box. Before, however, he left, he heard a confused and joyous murmur, which rose from the parquet to the boxes, and became lost in the arch of the gilded ceiling. "_They were there_," said Monte-Leone, "and Pignana must be satisfied. I have done all he asked literally." A few friends joined the Count in his box. "Indeed, dear Monte-Leone," said one of these, with whom he was most intimate, a friend of his childhood, "You have resumed your old habits." "What do you mean?" "That, scarcely out of prison, I saw you from my box beginning a new intrigue by exchanging signs with some fair unknown. This, too, at San Carlo. This is bold, indeed, unless the hand on your heart is the resumption of an old intrigue, interrupted, perhaps, by your imprisonment." "I do not understand you, Barberini," said the Count, not a little annoyed. "I made no sign to any one." "Perhaps so: if you please, I was mistaken. But if I am, it is all the better; for it proves to me that you no longer adhere to the plans you once confided to me. I was delighted, too, at what I heard yesterday evening." "Of what plans do you speak?" replied the Count, moved, in spite of himself, by this half-confidence.