“That is not the worse.”
“Why, what is the matter?”
“They have bought the cards,” yelled Pietro, and hammered the air furiously right and left.
“All the better,” said Gerard cheerfully.
“They flew at me for them. They were enraptured with them. They tried to conceal their longing for them, but could not. I saw, I feigned, I pillaged; curse the boobies.”
And he flung down a dozen small silver coins on the floor and jumped on them, and danced on them with basilisk eyes, and then kicked them assiduously, and sent them spinning and flying, and running all abroad. Down went Gerard on his knees, and followed the maltreated innocents directly, and transferred them tenderly to his purse.
“Shouldst rather smile at their ignorance, and put it to profit,” said he.
“And so I will,” said Pietro, with concentrated indignation. “The brutes! We will paint a pack a day; we will set the whole city gambling and ruining itself, while we live like princes on its vices and stupidity. There was one of the queens, though, I had fain have kept back. 'Twas you limned her, brother. She had lovely red-brown hair and sapphire eyes, and above all, soul.”
“Pietro,” said Gerard softly, “I painted that one from my heart.”
The quick-witted Italian nodded, and his eyes twinkled.