“There has been an earthquake in Calabria.”
The Englishman nodded; he had heard it, he always heard the news before the rest of us!
“Another earthquake! Not a bad one?” I cried.
“The paper naturally makes the most of it, though it does not seem to have done much damage,” Athol reassured us.
“Poor people, how they have suffered!” Vera sighed comfortably. After a few more comments the subject was dropped and we began again to abuse the powers that be for the shocking breaches that have been made in the ancient walls of Rome. Bits of our talk come back to me now as from an immeasurable distance. It is as if that conversation over the fire in Vera’s library had taken place in another planet during another existence.
“The wall that Belisarius defended fifteen hundred years ago against the Goths without the gates has been demolished by the Goths within the gates!” exclaimed Athol.
“It’s a world’s crime,” I said, “because Rome belongs to the world; it’s just as much ours as the Italians’!”
“Ah! so you like to think!” said the only Italian present, indulgently.
“I have heard you say it yourself, Lombardi, when you wanted something of us outlanders,” Athol came to my rescue.
“Remember, the petition to have the streets put through was got up by an Englishman, who owned property near by that he thought would be improved,” Vera defended.