“Si, aunt.” She blushed, and left the room, closing the door gently.
“And I the bearer of a message to him! O Maria! what penance more? All fasts kept, aves and paternosters said faithfully, and my reward—a broken leg!”
Marianna lost no time in delivering the precious missive to Armando, whom she found waiting in the gorge at the wonted place. Without stopping to answer his anxious inquiries, she placed the fateful packet in his hands.
“From Bertino,” she said.
“Ah, joy!” he cried, tearing open the envelope. “What I have waited for so long! Surely it is the model for my great work, for the bust that shall make me famous in America. Bones of St. George!”
He had taken out the portrait of Juno, and stood glaring at it.
“She has a nose,” Marianna remarked.
“True,” said Armando thoughtfully. “I wonder if this is American beauty.”
Then he began reading the letter aloud. At the part that told him it was a portrait of the wife of the President of the United States he leaped for gladness, and Marianna started away to tell all the village. Armando caught her arm.
“Not a word!” he said; “not a word until the work is done—nay, until it is delivered to her Majesty La Presidentessa.”