THE PRIMA DONNA 'Whover is in my box is my guest,' said the countess, adding a convulsive imperative pressure on Carlo's arm, to aid the meaning of her deep underbreath.

She was a woman who rarely exacted obedience, and she was spontaneously obeyed.

No questions could be put, no explanations given in the crash, and they threaded on amid numerous greetings in a place where Milanese society had habitually ceased to gather, and found itself now in assembly with unconcealed sensations of strangeness.

A card lay on the table of the countess's private retiring-room: it bore the name of General Pierson.

She threw off her black lace scarf.
'Angelo Guidascarpi is in Milan,' she said.