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"What you feel at liberty to tell me, let me hear," he said to the old servant. Gianna told him in her picturesque, warmly-coloured phrase what had passed between Sior' Clelia and the little girl in the night; and what she had herself said to Adone at dawn; and how Nerina was lying asleep in the hay-loft, being afraid, doubtless, to come up to the house.
But I will go back to the stable and see." "And beg Sior' Clelia to come down to me." He was left alone a few minutes in the great old stone chamber, with its smell of dried herbs hanging from its rafters and of maize leaves baking in the oven.
He went away muttering: "Ill-minded conspirator, indeed!" But before I left, he had found me out. He was half out of his wits; he could neither question, nor answer, nor write, nor walk, nor wait. He had his eyes continually upon me, he rubbed his hands, and addressing himself to every one near him; "Sior si, Sior si; Yes, sir! Yes, sir!" he kept stammering out, "coming! coming!"
"If she thinks but one thing, that thing is false." "Maybe. I believe so myself, but, Sior' Clelia will not. Why do you send the child out at such hours?" "What did she say to my mother?" "Nothing; only that she had to go." "Faithful little soul!" "Aye! And it is when little maids are faithful like this that men ruin them.
Go to your chamber, Sior' Clelia, and entreat Heaven to soften your heart. There is sorrow enough in store for you without your creating misery out of suspicion and unbelief. This house will not long be either yours or Adone's." He left the kitchen and went out into the air; Clelia Alba was too proud, too dogged, in her obstinancy to endeavour to detain him or to ask him what he meant.
He had told us casually that he was nephew of a nobleman of a certain rich and ancient family in Venice, who sent him money while in the army, but this made no great impression on me; and though I knew there was enough noble poverty in Italy to have given rise to the proverb, Un conte che non conta, non conta niente, yet I confess that it was with a shock of surprise I heard our guide and servant saluted by a lounger in Valstagna with "Sior conte, servitor suo!"
On the wall near him is painted a bell-pull, with the legend, Sior Antonio Rioba. Rustics, raw apprentices, and honest Germans new to the city, are furnished with packages to be carried to Sior Antonio Rioba, who is very hard to find, and not able to receive the messages when found, though there is always a crowd of loafers near to receive the unlucky simpleton who brings them.
We were on an expedition to find Sior Antonio Rioba, who has been, from time immemorial, the means of ponderous practical jokes in Venice. Sior Antonio is a rough-hewn statue set in the corner of an ordinary grocery, near the Ghetto. He has a pack on his back and a staff in his hand; his face is painted, and is habitually dishonored with dirt thrown upon it by boys.
I had never been there before myself, and I thought it would be a good opportunity to verify a passage I was at work on. We always show people the cemetery at home." "That was considerate. And why did you go to Canarregio on Wednesday?" "I wished her to see the statue of Sior Antonio Rioba; you know it was the Venetian Pasquino in the Revolution of '48 " "Charming!"
"E poi, che commedia vederli arrabiarsi! Che ridere!" That is the Venetian notion of fun, and no doubt the scene is amusing. I was curious to see Sior Antonio, because a comic journal bearing his name had been published during the time of the Republic of 1848, and from the fact that he was then a sort of Venetian Pasquino.
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