What Angioletto himself was to say is more to the purpose. I think it much to his credit that his first ascertainable emotion after the buffet of assault was one of wildest exultation at the prospect. It shows that he had never for a moment distrusted the meek little partner of his fortunes. Whisps of such doubt did afterwards float across his pretty morning picture, but he put them away at once. Next came worldly wisdom. True Tuscan that he was, his instinct was to decline perilous rapture if waiting might bring it on easy terms. For a long time he weighed instant joy against policy. Finally, as he was more Italian than Tuscan, and more boy than either, he decided to jump the danger. The vision of Bellaroba shy in the rose-garden, of himself crowning her soft hair, bending over her, kissing her upturned face; of the Countess behind one thicket looking for him, and the Count behind another looking for Bellaroba—it was too much to resist!

"Madama," he said, "it is hardly for me to advise in such delicate matters. I should not, by right, dare say what I am about to say upon your invitation. Yet if I were his nobility, Count Guarino Guarini, not the least of my pleasant moments would be that in which I could say, 'I have a noble lady to wife, for she honours me as I have honoured her.'"

That was a very dextrous remark, vastly pleasing to the Countess. She kissed the speaker then and there, wrote her letter hot-head, talked about it all that day, and worked herself into such a fever of curiosity that she cut short her villeggiatura by six weeks, so as the sooner to see the girl who could inspire her with such admirable ideas of her own magnanimity. She even grew quite enthusiastic upon her husband's account, almost sentimental about him. This much the wily Angioletto (who did not study character for nothing) had allowed for in his calculations.

It is by no means certain that the Countess was as wise as her guide. The facts which induced the letter were these. Guarini had chanced upon an early mass at San Cristoforo and Bellaroba kneeling at her prayers. She, all unconscious of any presence but her own and her Saviour's, was looking up to the Mother who had made Him so, dim-eyed, and smiling rather tenderly. Her lips framed petitions for the coming home of Angioletto. She had hooded her head as he commanded, and it became her as he had foreseen. With her added cares of wifely duty this gave a sober look to her untameable childish bloom; she was almost a business-like beauty now. To Guarino the pathetic appealed more nearly; to him she seemed a pretty nun, a wood-bird caged. He never took his eyes off her—she caught him in a soft mood and ravished him. A little saint in bud, he swore; a wholesome, domestic little household goddess, meek and very pure, who would carry home her beauties unaware and oil the tousled heads of half a dozen brothers and sisters. Homeliness is neither Italian word nor virtue; but just as it describes Bellaroba, so an inkling of its charm thrilled the young lord who saw her. Could one cage such a gossamer thing? Fate had done it, why not he? At least he could not lose sight of her. He tracked her to the house under the wall, saw the door scrupulously shut upon her, wandered up and down the street for half an hour, returned a laggard to his palace—and yet had her full in vision. She possessed him until mass-time following: the same things happened. Guarino was hit hard; he took certain steps and got information which tallied with his better instincts. It guided also his subsequent efforts, for obviously the more direct remedies would not meet his case. Therefore, he wrote to the Countess, as you have seen. Her reply delighted him, and the rest was very easy. Borso signed the order of appointment, boggling only at her name. "Buonaroba I know," said he. "What am I to think of Bellaroba, Guarino?"

"Your Grace shall be pleased to think that his daughter has chosen her for her own person," said the Count.

"Hum," said Borso, and signed the parchment.

Then came another scrawl for "my love Angilotto," in which the miraculous news was told.

"Olimpia took it very ill," she wrote, "but the Signor Capitano talked her happier—at least, he stayed a long time. I hope you will think it all for the best. I am very good, and kiss you many times,

"Your Belaroba."

Olimpia had indeed been very cross, as Captain Mosca would have testified. She had not, at any rate, talked him any happier: that he would have upheld with an oath. The experienced man knew the whip of sleet on his bare skin; but this was worse than any winter campaign; it left him dumb and without the little ease which shivering gives you. It had not been a question so much of talking as of keeping his feet. Olimpia, when the news came, had raged like a shrieking wind about the narrow house. "My dearest life! Soul of my soul!" was all the Captain had to fend the blast. It was no time for endearments—Olimpia raved herself still. Tears, floods of them, followed, whereat the Captain melted also and wept. He did foolishly. Demoniac gusts of laughing caught and flung him to the rafters, chill rages froze him where he fell. He lost his little store of wit, sagged like a broken sunflower, and was finally pelted from the door by a storm of Venetian curses, in which all his ancestors, himself, and any descendants he might dare to have, were heavily involved. Bellaroba, trembling in her bed, heard him go with a sinking heart. "Olimpia will come and murder me now," she said to herself.