“I’m giving you your last chance, Cosimo,” he said. “You’d better pay up.”
“If you don’t take your hands off me,” exclaimed Rontivogli in French, “I’ll have you put into the street.” The look in his black eyes suggested the glitter of a stiletto.
Blickenstern shook him gently. “If you don’t pay that note,” he replied with unruffled good nature, “I’ll publish it and the contract also. I’m leaving the country, and don’t care what they think of me here. But you—I hear you’re about to marry?”
Rontivogli grew yellow under the bronze of his clear, pale skin. “I tell you, I can’t pay the note. You know it. You drove me out of New York with your dogging and dunning me. In a few weeks I can pay, and will.”
“Yes—when you’re married.” Blickenstern laughed loudly and not hollowly—here was a joke he could see. “What do you think I am—an imbecile? Don’t I know that as soon as you’re married you can snap your fingers—and will?”
Rontivogli disengaged himself and readjusted his close-fitting coat. “I’m certain you will not lay yourself liable to arrest for blackmail,” he said with calm contempt, and went on to his carriage.
Blickenstern looked after him, nodding and laughing. “Just wait!” he said, addressing his fellow-German, and including the curious loungers in the office.
Frothingham searched for Blickenstern—he had a vague idea of taking him to call at the Popes’. But he could not find him. He did see Rontivogli, however—one glance was enough to tell him that Blickenstern’s threats had devoured his high spirits and were eating into his courage. He waited impatiently for the explosion—a five-days’ wait, for it did not come until the following Tuesday. That morning, as Hutt went out of his bedroom after fixing his bath, Joe Wallingford called from their common sitting room:
“Almost,” answered Frothingham.