THE DOUBLE SECRET.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9636, 30 October 1909, Page 2

THE DOUBLE SECRET.

CHAPTER X.—Continued. "The kind that always sets a young man's biood leaping—some grand appeal to arms. I think it all the Italian heart was stirrsd as one man for a United Italy, and the old cry of the Senate ar.d people of Rome rang through the streets, then I would find a cause worth living or dying for." ""May the saints shield us! Ihis is treason and heresy! You will be a revolutionist, and get yourself into trouble!" cried the old priest, now really excited by his nephew's errors. "These words savjr of rebellion!" "Don't, put yourself in a heat," said Granittr, sitting up. "I shall not rebel. lam much more likely to abandon my sapnosed vocation by falling in love -or, so to say, I might find it rather my vocation to be a husband ai,d father." "Per liacco! what black-eyed con tadina has ensured you?" "Nore! and, my uncle, there is not a ecntadiua that could do it. Our girls have too high cheek bones and too dark gkins. I must fall in love with somebody more beautiful than myself, and that would be hard to find eh? The painters paint m* 1 , and the novelists descr-be me for a hero, and the poets sirg me as tire ideal young Italy. Where can I find a mate? No, no, I have in my mind some daughter of the North—a creature made of sunshine, and blue skies and rose leaves!" "Caramba! Your imagination runs away with you, my son. As for your vanity, it would serve you right if you fell*in love with half a dozen such angels, and they all jilted you! "I wruldn't be jilted, and 1 wouldn't be hindered. I read in a fool book about a youth whose cruel par> ents kept him from his lady, and the pair wore the willow and went melancholy, as did Mr Hamlet and Miss Ophelia, in Signor Shakespeare's play. Nc, 1 give up my lady, nor would I be deceived and die on her grave, nor she on mine, like the Romeo and Juliet, of Signor Shakespeare also. I'd have the lady., and if I couldn't live in peace in the cities, I'd take to the hills; a good carbine and a hors°, and I would be a knight of the mad. Ah! let me once fall in love, and nothing should stop my getting the bride of my choice." He tossed his novel across the greensward, sprang to his feet, crossed li< arms and leaned against the white wall of the Campo Santo. His uncle burtt into a laugh, and left him

Hardly had he left him, still leaningjwith lazy grace against the wall, when the neatest duor of the baptistery sung open, and out into ihe sunlight came a daughter of the North. It was as if the grim wizened sacritism had been old Charon returning to the land of the living some spirit too life-full to detain among the dead. She sprang out from those white marble tomb-like portals buoyant and fair as an embodied spring, and ran from the tapestry door as if glad to return to native light, and half alarmed at the silent whiteness of the marble cloisters', her step, while swift, fell on the gicenswaid "softer than asleep," and thus springing out, she stood closely face to face witfi Granitto; and never since young Romeo looked into Juliet's eyes did a fairer or more foolish coupie fall in love at first sight. Granitic saw the realised id al of all his dreams, and Lady Lina Harcour't stood face to face witlj him whose portrait had for more than half a year been her treasure. "Oh, how beautiful, how charming!" had Lady Lina cried, as she darted into the May sunshine from the bapistery door, and Granitto, who understood some Engilsb, had repeated the words sotto voce with all his soul. The rash thought came into his mind that iae would offer himself as a guide through the Campo Santo, but his eyes happened to see beyond the white plumes wreathimr her leg horn hat the tall figure of Du?ald Probyn, and Granitto's soul was filled with wrath at the young Engilsh man on whom fortune seemed never tired of "showering favours. But Granitto stood his ground; he knew Probyn, and meant to get from him an introduction, even though the act would be something like borrowing the key ol a garden from which he meant to steal the fruit, He occupied the time, and prevented embarrassment by bowing, and then stepping forward pick up the book which he had flung on the grass. Happy fortune, he found beside the

v by duncan McGregor 7 {, Author of "Kennedy's Foe," '-Ishnmel Rcforme V "A Game of Three," "Edcsi's Peril." / Etc., etc.

book a delicate pink blossom which earlands the springtime fields of Italy. He gathered it and offered it ta Lady Lina with a low bow, fay ing:

"Lady, a memento from the Campo Santo of Pisa!"

Lady Lina took the flower with a blush and a curtsy; she had teased her father and Dugald to take herself and Pauline to Pisa on a day-when Aunt Villhorpe had a raging headache, and Lady Astraea had been called to see a sick friend, long resident in Florence; and Lady Lina's reason for desiring to tea is also speedily was not that she thirsted to behold its beauties, but she had been told when that fatal picture came from Prohyn's notebook into her hands, that ic was tha picturo of a student at Pisa. To Piss, therefore. Lady Lina would go, and trust to kindjy fortune to see this this ynunc Apolb, whom no one had ever suggeated to her as a mate. And now, wonder of wonders, hardly had she with careless eyes viewed the treasure of the bapistery than she came face to lace with the one man in the world to ht;r—so, shy holding his flower, she turned her face aside and waited for her pnrty. They came. Dugald Probyn, Lord Harcourt, and Pauline. Granitto, though full of envy at Probyn, sprang toward him with all an Italian's enthusiasm.

"My dear friend! what good fortune has brought the English states' man, the man of legations and lofty business, here from Florence to blesa the eyes of a poor student?" At which effusion Probyn, being an unsuspicious young fellow, and these golden apples not being his to guard, shook the student's hand and said: "My dear Arriano, you are the very man to guide us through the Campo Santi, show us the Leaning Tower, and rell us all about the two hundred years while Pisa was constructing her crown of beauty." "You load me with honour," said Granitto, bowing, while Lady Lina Slushed.

Then Dugald Probyn presented Granitto Marie Arriano, Pisan student of the ancient Guelph family, wherewith by a hundred or so removes, the present royal householder of England is connected, to Lord Thomas Harcourt, somewhere about the 24th lord of that ancient and honourable line. Lcrd. Harcourt looked with favour on the handsome countenance (f Arrieno; whooever saw that shining youth instinctively regarded him as the type <if Italy, reborn in the nineteenth century to greatness. 'Thus, lookine with kinon2ss on Gra.nitto, Lord Harcourt presented him first to Lady Lina and then to Pauline, and yet though he thus piesented him and dppired the favour of his company durii g their further rambles through the ftondeis of Pisa, Lord Harcuurt was mindful of Mrs prejudices—p< r haps he 'shaied them—and did not invite his new acquaintance to visit him at Palazzo Ridolfi. But that afternoon ramble was a long one, and the sun was setting before the party turned away. What interest the Lady Lina discovered in antiquities and traditions! Low enraptured was she with recondite architectural discussions how enthusiastic over GozzohN frescoes with th.ir suol-freezing themesj The voice of Arriano was music to her car, and her eyes were inspiration. He said to her, as they examined a fresco, that the angel in the corner mighi be her portrait and that he wished she would come to morrow and more closely examine the bapistery, and she. fighed and said to him that that was impossible, as they were going to set off for Florence next day at nine o'clock. What was there wonderful in the fact that among these who saw them off was Granitto Marie Arriano, and i that he had a ten minutes' conversation on the steps of the carriage ! while the hnplitiea of an Italian departure were being settled? He now bad found a face that came betwen him and his book, 'and made the prospect of the priesthood odious to him. He preferred with al! his poul a weddigf ring to a bishop's ring; the beauty of Lady Lina out&hone the beauty of the Italian liberties, which hitherto had gained his warmest thoughts. With his tempera men*, to love was to pursue, and to pursue was to obtain, especially when he divinej that the object of his adoration was graciously disposed to meet his advances. I TO BE CONTINUED.!