Silvio dined at home that night with his father and Giacinta, and afterwards, contrary to his usual custom, Professor Rossano did not go to the Piazza Colonna for his cup of coffee and to read his evening paper. The Piazza Colonna, indeed, would have been nothing but an exaggerated puddle, with streams of muddy water running through it from the higher level of Montecitorio; and, besides, it would have been unwise to be abroad in the streets while the first rains after the summer were falling—the only time during the whole year when a genuine malarial fever, and not the "Roman fever" of the overfed and overtired tourist, might possibly be picked up within the walls of Rome.
Dinner had been over some time, and they were smoking and talking together in the drawing-room, when the hoarse cries of the news-venders calling the evening papers came from the street without, and a few minutes later a servant entered the room with copies of the newspapers, which he gave to the professor. Giacinta took up a book and began to read, while Silvio walked restlessly up and down the room, every now and then going to the window to see if the rain had stopped.
The professor turned over the pages of his newspapers in a vain endeavor to extract some news from them. There might be, and no doubt there were, important events happening in the world, even in the month of September—events more important, for instance, than the fall from his bicycle of a student, or the drinking by a servant-girl of a solution of corrosive sublimate in mistake for water. If there were more noteworthy matters to chronicle, however, they had escaped the notice of the press that evening. Professor Rossano was about to betake himself to other and more profitable reading, when a paragraph containing a telegram dated from Montefiano caught his eye and arrested his attention.
"So," he observed, suddenly, "it seems that our padrona di casa has got herself into trouble with the people at Montefiano, or, rather, I suppose that meddlesome abbé has got her into trouble with them. Look, Silvio," he added, pointing to the paragraph in question, "read this," and he handed the newspaper to his son.
Silvio took the paper quickly, and eagerly read the telegram. It was very short, and merely stated that in consequence of disorder among the peasantry on the estates belonging to Casa Acorari at Montefiano, and the fear of these disorders assuming more serious proportions, military assistance has been requested by the civil authorities; and that a detachment of infantry would in all probability be despatched from Civitacastellana if the situation did not become more satisfactory.
Silvio uttered an exclamation of dismay.
"What did I tell you, Giacinta?" he said. "I was certain from Bianca's last letter that some mischief was brewing. Now there will probably be a collision with the military authorities; and we all know what that means."
"Well," observed the professor placidly, "it is no affair of yours, Silvio, so far as I can see, if there are disturbances at Montefiano. Not but what you have done your best to add to their number! All the same," he continued, "it is a foolish thing, and a wrong thing, to drag the soldiery into these disputes if their intervention can possibly be avoided. I suppose the princess and the Abbé Roux are frightened. But surely there must be a fattore at Montefiano who can manage the people?"
"That is the point," returned Silvio. "The princess has dismissed the fattore because he objected to the raising of the rents; and the peasants are insisting on his being recalled."
The professor glanced at him. "It seems," he remarked, dryly, "that you know all about it."