He seldom took the train to Florence because, on account of his position, the obsequious officials treated him with so much ceremony. He was a modest man, who at heart hated all bowing officialdom, much preferring to drive through the rich vineyards of the Arno valley to being received at the station by all the officials and having the ordinary traffic stopped on his arrival.
The Florence Club, an institution run upon English lines, is one of the most exclusive in Europe. It occupies the whole of a huge flat in the new Piazza Vittorio Emmanuele, handsomely appointed, with fine spacious rooms overlooking the busy centre of Florentine life. Its members are mostly men of the highest social standing in Italy, together with a select few of rich English and Americans, to whom membership gives the hall-mark of rank in that complex cosmopolitan world. In winter and spring its rooms are well-filled and its bridge-tables are well patronised, but in summer and autumn, when all Florence is away in the mountains or at the sea, it is deserted and handed over to the care of a couple of waiters, who scarcely see a member from one week’s end to the other.
The Deputy Ricci had telegraphed that he had no time to come up to San Donato, as he could only spend three hours in Florence; therefore the club was the most convenient place where they could meet and consult undisturbed. The urgency of Ricci’s message had aroused the other’s apprehensions that something was amiss.
“Ah!” cried the deputy in relief as the Minister entered the small card-room where he stood impatiently awaiting him. “I began to fear that my telegram had not reached you.” And the pair having shaken hands, Ricci went to the door and locked it.
Then when they crossed to the window, which gave a view of the wide-open piazza with its colossal statue in the centre, Ricci said—
“I left Rome this morning at nine, and I return by the express at six. I came here purposely to see you.”
“Has something occurred?” asked His Excellency quickly, glancing at the dark face of the Piedmontese lawyer who sat in the Chamber of Deputies and made politics his living.
“Yes,” was Ricci’s answer in a low half-whisper. “You recollect our conversation when we met last—about the impending crisis?”
“Yes. You promised, for certain considerations, to turn the political tide in my favour.”
“I have tried to do so, but have failed,” said the other in a deep, serious voice.