“That’s just the answer I should have made. A week, a month—it was all the same to me.”
“I think it is more than a month,” said the young man.
“It’s probably six. How did you make her acquaintance?”
“By a letter—an introduction given me by a friend in England.”
“The analogy is complete,” I said. “But the friend who gave me my letter to Madame de Salvi died many years ago. He, too, admired her greatly. I don’t know why it never came into my mind that her daughter might be living in Florence. Somehow I took for granted it was all over. I never thought of the little girl; I never heard what had become of her. I walked past the palace yesterday and saw that it was occupied; but I took for granted it had changed hands.”
“The Countess Scarabelli,” said my friend, “brought it to her husband as her marriage-portion.”
“I hope he appreciated it! There is a fountain in the court, and there is a charming old garden beyond it. The Countess’s sitting-room looks into that garden. The staircase is of white marble, and there is a medallion by Luca della Robbia set into the wall at the place where it makes a bend. Before you come into the drawing-room you stand a moment in a great vaulted place hung round with faded tapestry, paved with bare tiles, and furnished only with three chairs. In the drawing-room, above the fireplace, is a superb Andrea del Sarto. The furniture is covered with pale sea-green.”
My companion listened to all this.
“The Andrea del Sarto is there; it’s magnificent. But the furniture is in pale red.”
“Ah, they have changed it, then—in twenty-seven years.”