Then suddenly a deep, oily voice jarred through her wandering thoughts.  “You are very pensive!” exclaimed the Duke Scorpa, appearing beside her.

Nina started violently, for, besides his unexpected appearance, there was something in this man’s personality that always sent a shudder through her.

“The Marchese di Valdo has been telling me that I am very gay,” she answered, not so much to give the duke the information as to contradict him.

“Then I am doubly sad, since you are gay with others, and absent-minded when I come.”  A lurking familiarity in his smile made Nina wince.  He ranged his horse so close that his boots brushed against hers, and she pulled aside quickly; he did not move close again, but he checked her attempt to pass him, keeping between her and the other riders.

“Why are you so cruel?” he murmured.  “Diana never had so many votaries as Venus.”

“I am not interested in mythology,” said Nina, her heart fluttering with fright.  “Please allow me to pass—­I want to join my uncle.”

“Sweet, pale little Diana,”—­he leaned over in his saddle and purred the words at her—­“where mythology failed was in not marrying Diana to Mars.  Exactly as—­you are going to marry me!”

“I will not!  I told you before I would not!  Let me pass!” She pulled the reins so taut that her horse reared as she urged him forward, but again the duke ranged his horse close beside her, heading off her attempt to get past.

“A woman’s ‘won’t’ as often means she will,” he answered deliberately.  “It is when she says she is not certain that her irrevocable decision is made.”

“I hate you, I utterly hate you!” cried Nina, her anger getting the better of her fear.

The duke laughed maliciously.  “I had scarcely hoped to make so deep a mark on your emotions!  If you hate me, then truly you will marry me!—­against your will, if need be,” he added, reining back his horse at last.  “I will wait to make you love me afterward.”

At this point Allegro returned with the handkerchief, and the duke let Nina pass.  Tornik, also, now joined her, the master of the hounds gave the signal, and again the riders were off.  Nina, between Tornik and Allegro, was protected from the duke’s approach, but she kept apprehensively glancing back.  She looked about for her uncle, but could not see him.

As a matter of fact, Sansevero’s horse had strained itself slightly in one of the jumps, and he had thought it best to drop out of the hunt.  He had gone only a short distance on his way toward Rome when he was joined by Scorpa, who said that he did not care to ride farther but would go back with Sansevero.  The prince was glad of his company until Scorpa began: 

“You have not yet given me a favorable answer to my proposal for Miss Randolph’s hand.”

The abruptness with which the subject was introduced irritated Sansevero, and he answered sulkily:  “I told you, when you first spoke to me, that it was a matter Miss Randolph would have to decide for herself.  An American girl never allows other people to arrange her marriage for her, and I found my niece not at all disposed to reconsider her answer.”