"Because I say that you are not," she replied. "But tell me, Hector," she added, abruptly changing the subject, "were you at San Carlo last year?"
"No, cousin."
"In that case you did not hear the famous Lelio?"
She said these last words with significant emphasis; but she had not the impudence to look me in the face immediately, and I had time to recover from the emotion caused me by that blow full in the face.
"I neither heard him nor saw him," said the guileless cousin, "but I heard a great dea! about him. He's a great artist, so I understand."
"Very great," replied La Grimani, "a full head taller than you. See! he is about this gentleman's height.—Do you know him, signor?" she added, turning to me.
"I know him very well, signora," I replied tartly; "he is a very handsome fellow, a very great actor, an admirable singer, a very clever talker, a bold and spirited adventurer, and, furthermore, a fearless duellist, which is not amiss."
The signora looked at her cousin, then glanced at me, with an indifferent air, as if to say: "It's of little consequence to me." Then she went off into another paroxysm of inextinguishable laughter, which was altogether unnatural, and in which neither her cousin nor myself joined. I returned to my pursuit of the dominant chord on the keyboard, and Signor Ettore moved about impatiently, making his new boots squeak on the floor, as if he were utterly disgusted with the conversation being carried on between a mere workman like myself and his noble fiancée.
"Look you, cousin, you mustn't believe what he says about Lelio," observed the signora, abruptly ceasing her convulsive laughter. "So far as the man's great beauty is concerned, I cannot contradict him for I didn't look at him; and, besides, an actor can always appear young and handsome with his paint and his false hair and moustaches. But as to his being an admirable singer and a good actor, that I deny. In the first place he sings false, in the second place he acts detestably. His declamation is too loud, his gestures commonplace, the expression of his features stiff and conventional. When he weeps, he makes wry faces; when he threatens, he roars; when he is majestic, he is tedious; and, in his best moments, when he holds himself back and doesn't speak, one might apply to him the refrain of the ballad:
"'Brutto è quanto stupido.'