I know not whether the good lady lost patience with his persistence; at all events, she broke out, with a certain sharpness, “Understand this—understand this: Christina will never consider you—your name, your illustrious traditions—in any case in which she doesn’t consider, much more, herself!”
The Prince appeared to study, for a moment, this somewhat ambiguous yet portentous phrase; then he slowly got up, with his hat in his hand, and walked about the room, softly, solemnly, as he were suffering from his long thin feet. He stopped before one of the windows, and took another survey of South Street; then, turning, he suddenly inquired, in a voice into which he had evidently endeavoured to infuse a colder curiosity, “Is she admired in this place? Does she see many people?”
“She is thought very strange, of course. But she sees whom she likes. And they mostly bore her to death!” Madame Grandoni added, with a laugh.
“Why then do you tell me this country pleases her?”
Madame Grandoni left her place. She had promised Christina, who detested the sense of being under the same roof with her husband, that the Prince’s visit should be kept within narrow limits; and this movement was intended to signify as kindly as possible that it had better terminate. “It is the common people that please her,” she replied, with her hands folded on her crumpled satin stomach and her humorous eyes raised to his face. “It is the lower orders, the basso popolo.”
“The basso popolo?” The Prince stared, at this fantastic announcement.
“The povera gente,” pursued the old lady, laughing at his amazement.
“The London mob—the most horrible, the most brutal—?”
“Oh, she wishes to raise them.”
“After all, something like that is no more than I had heard,” said the Prince gravely.