'It is now only four minutes to three,' he observed, 'and he is already gone. He came a good deal before his time, or I should have been in the antechamber to receive him and take him into my room, out of harm's way, where I could have explained matters to him. As it is, I was obliged to show him out with some apology for the mistake.'
'How false you are!' exclaimed Vittoria, her nostrils quivering.
'Because I refuse to ruin you, and our own future position here? I think I am wise, not false. Yes, I myself assured him last night that he did not kill our brother, but one of the Pagliuca di Bauso. I took the hand that did it, and shook it—to save your position in Roman society. You seem to forget that poor Ferdinando had turned himself into an outlaw—in plain language, he was a brigand.'
'He was worth a score of his brothers,' said Vittoria, who was not afraid of him. 'You talk of saving my position. It is far more in order to save your own chance of marrying the American girl with her fortune.'
'Oh yes,' answered Tebaldo, with perfect calm. 'I include that in the general advantages to be got by what I say. I do not see that it is so very false. On the one hand, Ferdinando was my brother. I shall not forget that. On the other, to speak plainly, he was a criminal. You see I am perfectly logical. No one is obliged to acknowledge that he is related to a criminal—'
'No one is obliged to lie publicly, as you do,' broke in Vittoria, rather irrelevantly. 'As you make me lie—rather than let people know what kind of men my surviving brothers are.'
'You are not obliged to say anything. You do not go out into the world just now, because you have to stay with our mother. I will wager that you have not once told the lie you think so degrading.'
'No—I have not, so far. No one has forced me to.'
'You need only hold your tongue, and leave the rest to me.'