“Well, thank God. And how is your Excellency?”
“As well as most old women, dear Don Mario!”
“None are old but those that die. Your Excellency is so charitable, that you ought to be spared for a hundred years to come.”
Donna Rosa kept up the conversation as though she had no idea of the real object of this visit; and Don Mario, still hugging his bottle, awaited the favourable moment for presenting his request without appearing troublesome. From time to time, after wriggling on his chair, as if in pain, for a few minutes, he would rise, and with “Excuse me, my lady!” wipe the dust from a table, or stoop to pick up a flake of wool, or bit of thread from the floor, and throw it out of the window,—as though the sight of these things actually made him feel ill.
“Oh! never mind, Don Mario!”
“The Lord has commanded us to be clean.... I had come....”
“How does your brother like his new employment?” Donna Rosa interrupted him, one day.
“Very much indeed.”
“You ought to try and get appointed inspector of weights yourself. There is one wanted at the Archi mill.”
“But the addition, madam! the addition! Ignazio knows how to do it!”