"My father died in banishment. He was a Liberal—he was Prince Prospero Volonna."
"As I thought. Who was the other man?"
"He was a distant kinsman of my father's, and I have lately discovered that he was the principal instrument in my father's deportation. He was my guardian, a Minister and a great man in Italy. It is the Baron Bonelli, your Holiness."
"Just so, just so!" said the Pope, tapping his foot in obvious heat. "But go on, my child. Who is your husband?"
"My husband is a different kind of man altogether."
"Ah!"
"He has done everything for me, Holy Father—everything. Heaven knows what I should have been now without him."
"God bless him! God bless both of you!"
"I came to know him by the strangest accident. He is a Liberal too, and a Deputy, and thinking of the corruptions of the Government, he pointed to me as the mistress of the Minister. It was not true, but I was degraded, and ... and I set out to destroy him."
"A terrible vengeance, my child. Only the Minister could have thought of it."