After several unsuccessful attempts to turn the conversation into
happier channels, the princess met with some success in the topic of
John Derby and the miracles with which rumor credited him. Nina listened
with half-pathetic interest, but her hands trembled, and the few
mouthfuls she took almost refused to go down her throat. In her heart,
at that moment, everything gave way to Giovanni. She reproached herself
deeply for lack of belief in him. Always she had acknowledged that he
was charming, but the doubt of his sincerity had weighed against her
really caring for him. She had accepted John Derby's casual words, "The
Europeans do a lot of beautiful talking and picturesque posing, but when
it comes to real devotion you will find that one of your Uncle Samuel's
nephews will come out ahead."
All that was ended; there was no more question about what the Europeans
would do when it came to a test. Giovanni had done far more than say
beautiful, graceful things--he had proved to her that her honor was
dearer to him than his life, and she was stirred to the very depths of
her soul. In the midst of Eleanor's talk of John Derby, she tried to
imagine what John would have done in Giovanni's place. He would have
thrashed the man within an inch of his life--that she knew. But, manly
as that would have been, it could not compare with Giovanni's course in
silently waiting fourteen or fifteen hours and then deliberately going
out in the dull gray dawn and standing up at forty paces as a target for
Scorpa's bullet.
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