"You might have prevented it, and you could still do something before matters come to the worst, and they burn the roof over our heads!" exclaimed Aunt Rikchen; "but I cannot see my hand before my eyes; I cannot distinguish a church-tower from a knitting-needle."
"The old song!" said Ferdinanda.
"Every bird sings as he has learned," exclaimed Aunt Rikchen; "and if my ways do not please you, it is only because in these days every chicken is wiser than the hen; for if I am not your mother, I have worried myself as much as two mothers about you, and have asked myself a hundred thousand times what is to come of it? But perhaps Providence may have willed it so; it is always, one way or another, kinder to you than to other people. And I am not at all sure that your father has not always intended it so, for I always had my suspicions of that thick red pencil, when no one else was allowed to touch his plans with a finger; and any old woman can see how highly he thinks of him, and he is extremely brave and good, and it would keep the family together, if you were wise and married him before in these bad times everything flies up the chimney."
"Reinhold?"
"Did you think I meant the Emperor of Fez and Morocco? But you only pretend to be astonished, and jump up off your chair in order to make a poor old thing like me tremble in all her limbs, as if my nerves were not already sufficiently dérangés--that is what you call it, is not it?"
"I got up because it is high time for me to go," said Ferdinanda. "Good-bye, aunt." She had gone a few steps towards the door, when the portière which covered it was slowly drawn aside.
"Mi perdona, Signora! Signora Frederica, your most obedient servant!" Ferdinanda stood still in horror.
"What did Antonio come for at this moment?"
"Mi perdona!" repeated Antonio. "I fear that the ladies did not hear me knock at the door, so I ventured to walk in." And he pointed carelessly in his easy Italian fashion to some books which he held in his hand.
"This is not the day for our lesson," said Ferdinanda.