took Miss Desmond out of the way. They
did not want her to have anything to say
to the princess. They are too'——I cannot
remember the word, but I know it
meant——"

"Strait-laced?" suggested Veronica,
with flashing eyes, and quickly-heaving
bosom.

"Ecco! Precisely! And now what did
he mean by saying that the friends in
question were too tight-laced?"

"He meant—— He meant to be
insolent, and odious, and insulting! How
could Lord George permit such audacious
impertinence in your presence?"

"Eh?" exclaimed Cesare, greatly amazed.
"I had no idea! I thought it was a jest!
Lorgiorgio called out to the man to take some
wine and stop his mouth. The others did
not laugh, it is true," he added reflectively.
"And they looked at me oddly."

"I will not stay another day in this
hateful, barbarous, boorish den!" cried
Veronica. And then she burst into a
passion of angry tears.

"Diavolo!" muttered Cesare, staring at
her in much consternation. "Explain to
me, cara mia, what it means exactly, this
accursed tight-lacing!"

"I have told you enough," returned
Veronica, through her tears. "Don't for
Heaven's sake begin to tease me! I cannot
bear it."

"Listen, Veronica," said Cesare, stroking
down his moustache with a quick,
lithe movement of the hand that was
strangely suggestive of cruelty, "you must
answer me. Ladies do not understand these
things. But if your red-faced chaser of the
fox permitted himself an impertinence in
my presence at the expense of my wife—he
must receive a lesson in good manners."

"Cesare! I hope you have no absurd
notion in your head of making a scandal."

"No: I shall merely correct one."

"Cesare! Cesare! you surely are not
indulging in any wild idea of——Oh, the
thing is too ridiculous to be thought of.
Entirely contrary to our modern manners
and customs——"

"Giuro a Dio!" exclaimed her husband,
seizing her wrist, "don't preach to me, but
answer, do you hear?"

The sudden explosion of animal fury in
his face and voice frightened her so
thoroughly, that she was for the moment
incapable of obeying him.

"Oh, for Heaven's sake, Cesare! Don't
look so! You—you startle me. What is
it you want? Oh my poor head, how it
throbs! Wait an instant. Well—the
foolish word means—means—I hardly
know what I'm saying—it means strict,
prudish, collet-monté. What that man
was saying I dare say he was not quite
sober—was that the Sheardowns were too
prudish and particular to like Maud to
associate with me. There, I have told you.
And I'll never forgive you, Cesare, for
behaving in this way to me, never!"

Cesare dropped her wrist. "Che, che!"
he said. "Is that all? Diamine, it seems
to me that the impertinence was to those
others, not to you. Do we want the visits
of prudes and 'colli torti'! And you cry
for that? Women, women, who can
understand you?"

Veronica gathered her draperies together
and swept out of the room with her face
buried in her handkerchief. She told her
maid that she had a violent headache. And
her maid told Dickinson that she was
sure "monsieur and madame" had been
having a dreadful quarrel; which
announcement Mr. Dickinson received with
the profoundly philosophical remark; "Oh!
Well, you know, they'd have had to begin
some time or other."

And the prince lit a cigar, and leaned out
of window to smoke it, partly penitent and
partly cross. And as he smoked, he could
not help thinking how very much pleasanter
and jollier it had been at Hammick Lodge,
than it was in the best sitting-room of the
Crown; and how utterly impossible it was
to calculate on the capricious and unreasonable
temper of his wife.

NUMBER SEVEN.

NUMBER seven is more favoured in the
world than any other digit. It is true that,
in a certain conventional sense, Number
One is said to occupy more of each man's
attention; but, this selfish aspect set aside,
the palm must certainly be given in all
other respects to Number Seven. The favoritism
of this number is variously explained:
Ingpen, in 1624, satisfied himself of the
super-excellence of Number Seven in the
following ingenious way: "It is
compounded of one and six, two and five, three
and four. Now every one of these being
excellent of themselves (as hath been
demonstrated), how can this number but be
far more excellent, consisting of them all,
and participating as it were of all their
excellent virtues?" Number Seven was
largely used by the Hebrew Biblical writers,
both in the plain ordinary sense and in a