"But the mask, the mask! If you heard the policeman call my name, you must have heard him speak of one Leddy Lightfinger."
"I did indeed. And is it not possible that I am that very person?"
Hillard dropped his hand toward his watch. "Why do you hate Italy?"
She sat straight, and what little he could see of her mouth had hardened.
"There will be no retrospection this evening, if you please," her voice rather metallic.
The mystery lifted its head again. One does not hate a country without a strong and vital reason. Was Giovanni partly right, after all? Was this a kind of trap, a play to gain his interest? Was her singing under his window purely accidental? She hated Italy. The State or the Church? More likely the State. And what had the State done to her or she to the State? A conspirator, in need of funds and men? If this was the case, she was not going about her cause scientifically. Italy had no hold upon anything of his save his love of beauty. Perhaps her reason for hating Italy was individual and singular: as she would have hated any other country, had her unhappiness originated there.
"Will you not sing?" he asked. This was an inspiration. Music might assist in melting her new reserve.
"You recollect, then, that I possess a voice?"
"It is all I have to recollect. Tell me, whither is all this to lead?"
"To the door, and into the fog again."