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"And the one certain thing is, that the unlucky Diva lies dead, and was murdered by somebody. Upon my life, it is the queerest thing I ever heard of." "What do you think of it, Manutoli?" said one of the speakers in the foregoing dialogue to the Baron, who was an older man than most of the others there. "My notion is that the girl is the guilty party," said Manutoli.
"But where is the Marchese Ludovico?" asked the same young man, who had heard that the Marchese had fainted at the sight of the body. A general silence fell on the chattering group at this question: till Manutoli answered with a very grave face "Ah, you must ask the Commissary of Police that question, Signor Marco." "You don't mean that he is arrested," returned the youngster thus addressed.
And the lawyer was, when Manutoli came in, aiding his meditations by discussing the remaining half of a small cobwebbed bottle of the very choicest growth of the Piedmontese hills. "I owe you a thousand apologies, Signor Fortini, for coming to trouble you with business, and very disagreeable business too, here and at such an hour," began the Baron; "but the interest we all feel "
He can't understand the difference between believing and disbelieving," rejoined Spadoni triumphantly, and carrying the great bulk of the bystanders with him. "But as to the poor girl being dead, there is unhappily no shadow of doubt at all," said the Baron Manutoli; "I saw old Signor Fortini the lawyer just now, who told me that he was at the Porta Nuova when the body was brought in."
"Well, I don't know about that, I should have thought it likely enough by all accounts," said the Conte Leandro Lombardoni, whose face was looking more pasty and his eyes more fishy than usual. "Much you know about it. Why, in the name of all the saints, should it be likely? What should Ludovico faint for?" rejoined Manutoli, fiercely. "What for? Well, one has heard of such things.
"But, I say, Ludovico," rejoined Manutoli, "in the meantime, till our Leandro's poem shall have been read and duly appreciated, you are the only one who has been admitted to the privacy of La Lalli. What is your report to us Gentiles of the outer court? Is she really so unapproachable? And is she as adorable behind the scenes as before them?"
If you will put making love to her out of your head, I never knew a woman who was pleasanter company," said Ludovico. "And you really mean that you have never tried to make love to her in any way?" reiterated Manutoli. "I do mean it, upon my soul; but I don't care a rap whether you believe it or not," rejoined Ludovico. "And you are with her very frequently?" persisted Manutoli.
"Manutoli," said Ludovico, after the first expressions of astonishment and condolence had been spoken between the young men, "of course I knew I should see you here before long; and my note was to call you at once, instead of waiting to see you in the morning; because I want you to do something for me before you sleep this night something that I don't want to wait for till to-morrow morning."
So there's an end to our game of billiards, Signor Conte," said Manutoli to one of the group; "I must go at once." "But you'll come back here after you've seen him, won't you? You'll come back and tell us all about it, Manutoli?" said two or three of the group which had been discussing the topic. "I don't know, I shall see. I will, if I can if it's not too late.
But the same idea that occurred to you just now, that Paolina might not have liked to see me driving with La Bianca, has suggested itself to some other wiseacre, I beg your pardon, Manutoli, and it seems that an absurd notion a notion the monstrous absurdity of which is a matter of amazement to me has been engendered that my poor Paolina may have been the perpetrator of the crime. The idea!
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