the sloping glass roof and shattered several panes.  As Giovanni came suddenly upon him, the man struggled to rise, and in the dim light Saracinesca recognised Del Ferice.  The truth flashed upon him at once.  The fellow had been listening, and had probably heard all.  Giovanni instantly resolved to conceal the fact from the Duchessa, to whom the knowledge that the painful scene had been overheard would be a bitter mortification.  Giovanni could undertake to silence the eavesdropper.

Quick as thought his strong brown hands gripped the throat of Ugo del Ferice, stifling his breath like a collar of iron.

“Dog!” he whispered fiercely in the wretch’s ear, “if you breathe, I will kill you now!  You will find me in my own house in an hour.  Be silent now!” Giovanni whispered, with such a terrible grip on the fellow’s throat that his eyeballs seemed starting from his head.  Then he turned and went out by the way he had entered, leaving Del Ferice writhing with pain and gasping for breath.  As he joined Corona, his face betrayed no emotion—­he had been so pale before that he could not turn whiter in his anger—­but his eyes gleamed fiercely at the thought of fight.  The Duchessa stood where he had left her, still much agitated.

“It is nothing,” said Giovanni, with a forced laugh, as he offered her his arm and led her quickly away.  “Imagine.  A great vase with one of Frangipani’s favourite plants in it had been badly propped, and had fallen right through the glass, outward.”

“It is strange,” said Corona.  “I was almost sure I heard a groan.”

“It was the wind.  The glass was broken, and it is a stormy night.”

“That was just the way that window fell in five years ago,” said Corona.  “Something always happens here.  I think I will go home—­let us find my husband.”

No one would have guessed, from Corona’s face, that anything extraordinary had occurred in the half-hour she had spent in the conservatory.  She walked calmly by Giovanni’s side, not a trace of excitement on her pale proud face, not a sign of uneasiness in the quiet glance of her splendid eyes.  She had conquered, and she knew it, never to be tempted again; she had conquered herself and she had overcome the man beside her.  Giovanni glanced at her in wondering admiration.

“You are the bravest woman in the world, as I am the most contemptible of men,” he said suddenly, as they entered the picture-gallery.

“I am not brave,” she answered calmly, “neither are you contemptible, my friend.  We have both been very near to our destruction, but it has pleased God to save us.”

“By you,” said Saracinesca, very solemnly.  He knew that within six hours he might be lying dead upon some plot of wet grass without the city, and he grew very grave, after the manner of brave men when death is abroad.

“You have saved my soul to-night,” he said earnestly.  “Will you give me your blessing and whole forgiveness?  Do not laugh at me, nor think me foolish.  The blessing of such women as you should make men braver and better.”