the need of the lantern in Monna Lisa's ear, when Tito, who had opened the door, said, "Stay, Tessa-no, I want no lantern: go upstairs again, and keep quiet, and say nothing to Monna Lisa." In half a minute he stood before the closed door of the outhouse, where the moon was shining white on the old paintless wood. NO PLA eam of one sensatio gger into a base he ar other way. Tito had his hand gged against the gr dassarre, startled o sitting posture in va . He had not ye On one knee, when against the moon ht mass of curls and is reverie--not sha ips after the thirsty art that eager thirs back, the old man limbs, had sprung In the next mom Baldassarre, under en back on the stra en blade. The po In this last decisive moment, Tito felt a tremor upon him a sudden instinctive shrinking from a possible tigerglance, a possible tiger-leap. Yet why should he, a young man, be afraid of an old one? a young man with armour on, of an old man without a weapon? It was but a moment's hesitation, and Tito laid his hand on the door. Was his father asleep? Was there nothing else but the door that screened him from the voice and the glance which no magic could turn into ease? Baldassarre was not asleep. There was a square opening high in the wall of the hovel through which the moonbeams sent in a stream of pale light; and if Tito could have looked through the opening, he would have seen his father seated on the straw, with something that shone like a white star in his hand. Baldassarre was feeling the edge of his poniard, taking refuge in that sensation from a hopeless blank of thought that seemed to lie like a great gulf between his passion and its aim. Tito had felt one & ered under the w ph of deliverance red, and praised no devili vengeanc his father close to hi Ert at reconciliation had only the more the sense that he other a little whi airing rage, Tito sa He was in one of his most wretched moments of conscious helplessness: he had been poring, while it was light, over the book that lay open beside him; then he had been trying to recall the names of his jewels, and the symbols engraved on them; and though at certain other times he had recovered some of those names and symbols, to-night they were all gone into darkness. And this effort at inward seeing had seemed to end in utter paralysis of memory. He was reduced to a sort of mad consciousness that he was a solitary pulse of just rage in a world filled with defying baseness. He had clutched and unsheathed his dagger, and for a long while had been feeling its edge, his mind narrowed to one image, and the aded before the last of one sensation the sensation of plunging that into a base heart, which he was unable to pierce in rway.ode od mod saw i sed uldanse od had his hand on the door and was pulling it: it against the ground as such old doors often do, and arre, startled out of his dreamlike state, rose from g posture in vague amazement, not knowing where He had not yet risen to his feet, and was still kneelne knee, when the door came wide open and he saw, ainst the moonlight, with the rays falling on one ass of curls and one rounded olive cheek, the image verie--not shadowy close and real like water at fter the thirsty dream of it. No thought could come that eager thirst. In one moment, before Tito could k, the old man, with the preternatural force of rage abs, had sprung forward and the dagger had flashed the next moment the dagger had snapped in two, lassarre, under the parrying force of Tito's arm, had ack on the straw, clutching the hilt with its bit of plade. The pointed end lay shining against Tito's had felt one great heart-leap of terror as he had d under the weight of the thrust: he felt now the of deliverance and safety. His armour had been and vengeance lay helpless before him. But the aised no devilish impulse; on the contrary the sight her close to him and unable to injure him, made the reconciliation easier. He was free from fear, but nly the more unmixed and direct want to be free sense that he was hated. After they had looked at er a little while, Baldassarre lying motionless in g rage, Tito said in his soft tones, just as they had before the last parting on the shores of Greece, d e mio!" There was a pause after those words, but ment or sound till he said, me to ask your forgiveness!" oval Jilgim in he paused, that the healing balm of those words NO PLA ecisive words. As it w ble hatred grated on anced round with a s se words could hav Then he had come d d to himself that ings would only be dance of his mind was future possibilities it brought the pe ad been before, and ef. There was not certainty from wh re's mind was brok ach him. Tito felt Baldassarre as a mad, strongly on his No; except the gs in order to save ant. And one of mediately: it was ve "Do you mean to st He paused again. He had used the clearest and strongest words he could think of. It was useless to say more, until he had some sign that Baldassarre understood him. Perhaps his mind was too distempered or too imbecile even for that: perhaps the shock of his fall and his disappointed rage might have quite suspended the use of his faculties. Presently Baldassarre began to move. He threw away the broken dagger, and slowly and gradually, still trembling, began to raise himself from the ground. Tito put out his hand to help him, and so strangely quick are men's souls that in this moment when he began to feel his atonement was accepted, he had a darting thought of the irksome efforts it entailed. Baldassarre clutched the hand that was held out, raised himself and clutched it still, going close up to Tito till their faces were not a foot off each other. Then he began to speak, in a deep trembling voice, I nurtured you "I saved you forsook me you give me? You have made the world bitterness to me; but there is one draught of sweetness left that you shall know agony." The He let fall Tito's hand, and going backwards a little, first rested his arm on a projecting stone in the wall, and then sank again in a sitting posture on the straw. outleap of fury in the dagger-thrust had evidently exhausted him. the Tere so "No," said Baldass Not so," said Tito "I tell you, you ha Formed me off it thr "Then you mean t rious about this certa "Thave spoken," sa Tito turned and reding: he went up t de of her baby. "Tessa," he said. Tito stood silent. If it had been a deep yearning emotion which had brought him to ask his father's forgiveness, denial of it might have caused him a pang which would have excluded the rushing train of thought that followed those etween his hands. ten to me." words. As it was, though the sentence of unchangetred grated on him and jarred him terribly, his mind round with a self-preserving instinct to see how far ords could have the force of a substantial threat. he had come down to speak to Baldassarre, he had himself that if his effort at reconciliation failed, would only be as they had been before. The first of his mind was backward to that thought again, but re possibilities of danger that were conjured up along brought the perception that things were not as they n before, and the perception came as a triumphant There was not only the broken dagger, there was ainty from what Tessa had told him, that Baldasmind was broken too, and had no edge that could im. Tito felt he had no choice now: he must defy arre as a mad, imbecile old man; and the chances strongly on his side that there was hardly room for To; except the fear of having to do many unpleasant n order to save himself from what was yet more unt. And one of those unpleasant things must be done ately: it was very difficult.ov you mean to stay here?" he said. ," said Baldassarre, bitterly, "you mean to turn me t so," said Tito. "I only ask." ell you, you have turned me out. If it is your straw, ed me off it three years ago." en you mean to leave this place?" said Tito, more about this certainty than the ground of it. ave spoken," said Baldassarre. turned and re-entered the house. Monna Lisa was : he went up to Tessa, and found her crying by the er baby. ssa," he said, sitting down and taking her head his hands. "Leave off crying, little goose, and me." WHAT FLO What I For several days T atly, the next morn move any small articl would be agents comi aning to kiss her on t eep in her own room w ad where she was th om the noise of strang aking no sign of em king to her, and, in ad become a dull conti and bruised. Tito divi more; he only dare ere stone cold, to fet ad her. And in ev , the scene was near Some unobtrusive emed to have lost t oking at him. "Pati Over it, and forgivea e strongest." When bok as if nothing h to the position of th Tito felt that these were odious tasks; they were very evil-tasted morsels, but they were forced upon him. He heard Monna Lisa fasten the door behind him, and turned away, without looking towards the open door of the hovel. He felt secure that Baldassarre would go, and he could not wait to see him go. Even his young frame and elastic spirit were shattered by the agitations that had been crowded into this single evening. Baldassarre was still sitting on the straw when the shadow of Tito passed by. Before him lay the fragments of the broken dagger; beside him lay the open book, over which he had pored in vain. They looked like mocking symbols of his utter helplessness; and his body was still too trembling for him to rise and walk away. But the next morning very early, when Tessa peeped anxiously through the hole in her shutter, the door of the hovel was open, and the strange old man was gone. imself, and is strong |