"I guess you're pretty satisfied with your location, Miss Royal"--said one of these, a pleasant-faced grey-haired man, who for four or five years past had wintered in Sicily with his wife, a frail little creature always on the verge of the next world--"It would be difficult to match this place anywhere! You only want one thing to complete it!"

Morgana turned her lovely eyes indolently towards him over the top of the soft feather fan she was waving lightly to and fro.

"One thing? What is that?" she queried.

"A husband!"

She smiled.

"The usual appendage!" she said--"To my mind, quite unnecessary, and likely to spoil the most perfect environment! Though the Marchese Rivardi DID ask me to-day what was the use of my pretty 'palazzo' and gardens without love! A sort of ethical conundrum!"

She glanced at Rivardi as she spoke--he was rolling a cigarette in his slim brown fingers and his face was impassively intent on his occupation.

"Well, that's so!"--and her American friend looked at her kindly--"Even a fairy palace and a fairy garden might prove lonesome for one!"

"And boresome for two!" laughed Morgana--"My dear Colonel Boyd! It is not every one who is fitted for matrimony--and there exist so many that ARE,--eminently fitted--we can surely allow a few exceptions! I am one of those exceptions. A husband would be excessively tiresome to me, and very much in my way!"