Baynton eyed him suspiciously as he spoke, and as he sipped his wine continued to regard him with a keen glance.
“And how did you manage to get a Neapolitan passport?”
“Our Minister, Sir Horace Upton, managed that for me.”
“Oh, you are known to Sir Horace, then?”
“Yes.”
A quick interchange of looks between my lord and his friend showed that they were by no means satisfied that the young sculptor was simply a worker in marble and a fashioner in modelling-clay.
“Have you heard from Sir Horace lately?” asked Lord Selby.
“I received this letter to-day, but I have not read it;” and he showed the unopened letter as he spoke.
“The police may, then, have some reasonable suspicions about your residence here,” said his Lordship, slowly.
“My Lord,” said Massy, rising, “I have had enough of this kind of examination from the Podestà himself this morning, not to care to pass my evening in a repetition of it. Who I am, what I am, and with what object here, are scarcely matters in which you have any interest, and assuredly were not the subjects on which I expected you should address me. I beg now to take my leave.” He moved towards the garden as he spoke, bowing respectfully to each.