massive iron gates, worked by some
cunning artizan of the old Florentine time,
rusty and bent, and partly off their hinges.
One-half of the gate stands open. It must
have stood open this many a long day—
many a long year, perhaps—for the grass
has grown around it thickly, and one side
of it is partly buried in the soil, and a
colony of wild-flowers has sprung up in
the shelter of its crooked shadow. On
either side of the gate hangs down a
tangled mass of leaves and branches
clothing the unsightly wall, and nearly hiding
a marble tablet—moss-grown and
discoloured—whereon are graven the words
"Villa Chiari," surmounted by an elaborate
coat of arms. The ivy, dog-rose, and
honeysuckle, are all matted together, so as
to form a thick screen over the tablet. But
it matters the less, in that this is not the
grand entrance to the house. No one
enters by this old gate, save the contadini
belonging to the adjacent farm. On the
other side is a good road, well engineered,
and mounting by due zigzags to a green
painted gateway, and a gravelled sweep
before the portico.

But that is a long way off, and there are
some acres of garden ground between the
road that "leads nowhither" and that
which officially conducts to Villa Chiari.

In the old times many a lady's palfrey,
and many a churchman's ambling mule,
and many a rich litter borne by lackeys,
and holding a luxurious Medicean noble,
may have passed along the old steep way.
Then, the fine scroll-work of the iron gates
cast the black tracery of its shadow on fair
faces and bright hair glistening in the
sunshine, and made them fairer and more
bright by contrast. And they, too, have
gone their way along the road that "leads
nowhither," and the sculptured marble is
white above their tombs, and the wild
flowers twine fearlessly around the
unhinged gate.

We pass the gateway and find ourselves
in a neglected garden—neglected in this
part of it, that is; for near the house the
walks are rolled and weeded, and the flower-
beds are as trim and bright as patterns in a
kaleidoscope. But here are paths all
overgrown with greenery; tangled thickets of
laurestinum, lilac, rose, and oleander. There
is a pergola, or trellis, covered with vines.
And the eglantine and clematis and clinging
honeysuckle have usurped its support,
and pushed their fragrant faces peeringly
in here and there amid the leaves and the
grape blossoms. From the bosky gloom of
a grove of acacia and ilex-trees, thickly
undergrown with laurel and lilac, comes
the mellow fluting trill of a nightingale,
like the perfume out of the heart of a rose.
Now and again is heard the flutter of
wings, as some little brooding bird stirs in
his noonday dream, and then is still again.
Onward we wander beneath the freshness
of the pergola; then out again into the fiery
air. Still onward, past a broken marble
basin, once a fountain, where a tiny stream
of water drips out of a crevice and makes a
green track in the parched herbage; and
where a harmless snake is sunning himself
asleep. And we come to a deep blot of
shadow that shows against the glare of the
ground, like a black mountain tarn amid
snow. The shadow is thrown from an ancient
cypress that stands, lonely as a sentinel,
upon the brink of the precipice, at the end
of the road that "leads nowhither." And
in the shadow sits a lady, young and
beautiful, looking out at the far-away Appenine,
and quite alone.

CHAPTER II. VILLA CHIARI.

THE lady sitting in the shadow was
Veronica. She wore a Tuscan hat with a
wide flapping brim, such as the peasant
women wear. And beneath it, her eyes
gleamed and her cheeks glowed brighter
than ever. She had wrapped a white
burnous as fine as gossamer around her
shoulders, and sat huddled together under
the cypress with her elbows resting on
her knees, and her cheeks resting on her
hands. It was shady beneath the
cypress, but it was not cool. No spot to
which the hot sun-impregnated air had free
access could be cool. Still, Veronica sat
there looking out at the far-away barren
Appenine, with her elbows resting on her
knees, and her cheeks resting on her hands.

A man came through the garden towards
her; a short, thick-set, grey-haired man,
staid and respectful, who bared his head in
the sunshine as he addressed her.

"Signora!" said the grey-haired man;
and then stood still and waited.

Veronica neither turned her head nor
her eyes towards him. But her colour rose
a very little, and through her parted lips
the breath came quicker.

"Miladi!" said the grey-haired man.
No shade of difference could be discovered
in his tone. It was the same to him,
whether he used the one title or the other.
If this lady preferred the English one, why
should she not have it? He had learned