The Villa Steno, as the inscription in gold upon the black marble door indicated, told the entire story of the Countess's fortune--that fortune appraised by rumor, with its habitual exaggeration, now at twenty, now at thirty, millions.

She had in reality two hundred and fifty thousand francs' income.

But as, in 1873, Count Michel Steno, her husband, died, leaving only debts, a partly ruined palace at Venice and much property heavily mortgaged, the amount of that income proved the truth of the title, "superior woman," applied by her friends to Alba's mother.

Her friends likewise added: "She has been the mistress of Hafner, who has aided her with his financial advice," an atrocious slander which was so much the more false as it was before ever knowing the Baron that she had begun to amass her wealth.

This is how she managed it: At the close of 1873, when, as a young widow, living in retirement in the sumptuous and ruined dwelling on the Grand Canal, she was struggling with her creditors, one of the largest bankers in Rome came to propose to her a very advantageous scheme.