“You know Italian?”
“Having travelled in Italy, I am not altogether unfamiliar,” he answers.
I then put to him a simple Italian sentence.
“What does that mean, and is it educated or uneducated?” I ask.
“It means something that I should not care for his lordship to hear, and is the remark of a thoroughly uneducated person,” he retorts.
The court roars, and some even cheer the witness. For myself, I am compelled to join the laughter—the impudence is so colossal.
“My lord,” I say to the judge, “this distinguished scholar has so delicate a mind that I should only scandalize him by asking further questions.”
So the butler retires with such an air of self-satisfaction that I could have shot him, and the gagged cook takes his place.
This young woman is not ill-looking, and is very abashed at having to make this public appearance. It appears that her glimpse of the burglar was brief, as with commendable prudence he rapidly fastened her night-shift over her head, but in that glimpse she recognized my mustache!
“Could she tell how it felt?” I ask.