"Ah!" exclaimed Silvio. "Go on, Giacinta."
"The princess," proceeded Giacinta, "must be a strange woman. From what I can hear of her, I should doubt whether anybody knows her the least intimately, except the Abbé Roux. Oh no, Silvio, I do not mean to imply any intimacy of that nature between them," she added, hastily, suddenly becoming aware of the expression on her brother's face. "She is, I imagine, a curious mixture of worldliness and piety, but not worldliness in the sense of caring for society. She would have made an excellent abbess or mother-superior, I should think, for she loves power. At the same time, like many people who love to rule, she is weak, and allows herself to be ruled, partly because she is a fanatic as far as her religion is concerned, and partly—well, partly, I suppose, because she has a weak side to her nature."
Silvio looked at his sister, curiously.
"How did you learn all this?" he asked.
Giacinta shrugged her shoulders.
"You might ask—Why did I learn it?" she said. "I learned it because I wished to analyze the kind of psychologic atmosphere into which you might find yourself plunged!"
Silvio laughed. Giacinta often amused him; she was so like the professor in some ways.
"Perhaps," continued Giacinta, "had it not been that Prince Montefiano developed a conscience late in life, the princess would have been ruling nuns at this moment instead of managing the Montefiano estates."
A quick look of intelligence passed across Silvio Rossano's face. They were Romans, these two, of the sixth generation and more, and were accustomed to the Roman conversational habit of leaving i's to be dotted and t's to be crossed at discretion.
"Of course, she would not be very ready to give up her interest in them," he said.