"Is the Padre Curato at home?"
"Of course he is at home," screamed the old woman, "At this hour!" she added, contemptuously.
"Ebbene—can I see him?"
"What! is the door shut?" returned the hag.
"No."
"Then why don't you come up without asking?" The old woman's head disappeared, and the window was shut with a clattering noise.
"She is a woman without education," remarked one of the ragged boys, making a face towards the closed window.
The Prince entered the door and stumbled up the dark stairs, and after some further palaver obtained admittance to the curate's lodging. The curate sat in a room which appeared to serve as dining-room, living-room, and study. A small table was spread with a clean cloth, upon which were arranged a plate, a loaf of bread, a battered spoon, a knife, and a small measure of thin-looking wine. A brass lamp with three wicks, one of which only was burning, shed a feeble light through the poor apartment. Against the wall stood a rough table with an inkstand and three or four mouldy books. Above this hung a little black cross bearing a brass Christ, and above this again a coloured print of San Bernardino of Siena. The walls were whitewashed, and perfectly clean,—as indeed was everything else in the room,—and there was a sweet smell of flowers from a huge pot of pinks which had been taken in for the night, and stood upon the stone sill within the closed window.
The curate was a tall old man, with a singularly gentle face and soft brown eyes. He wore a threadbare cassock, carefully brushed; and from beneath his three-cornered black cap his thin hair hung in a straight grey fringe. As the Prince entered the room, the old woman called over his shoulder to the priest an uncertain formula of introduction.
"Don Paolo, c'è uno—there is one." Then she retired, grumbling audibly.