"Oh, no,
that is not right!" she broke in. "I have been assured that she has five
hundred thousand _dollars_ a year. Dollars! And there are five _lire_ in
every dollar, remember."
"Dollars!" echoed the princess--and her voice rose several notes above
normal pitch; in fact, she nearly screamed. "I am very certain you are
misinformed." But her skepticism barely covered her real chagrin because
her nephew was a cadaverous nonentity, with little to recommend him to a
title hunter. As she looked at the girl in question, however, there was
a decided relish in her next remark:
"I think Giovanni Sansevero will carry off that prize! See the way she
is smiling up at him. Ah! and now they are dancing together. Certainly
they make a suitable looking couple."
The duchess straightened her dumpy figure to its greatest possible
height. For once she forgot herself. "Would any one marry a Sansevero
when there is a Scorpa to choose!"
"It has happened," chuckled the princess.
The threatening break in their habitual politeness was averted by the
arrival of a third old lady, the Marchesa Valdeste. As her husband was
the receiver of the "_Gran Collare de l'Anunziata_," a distinction that
gave him the rank of cousin to the king, the duchess and the princess
both rose for a moment in deference.
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