_antichità_, to the richer English and American tourists. He kept a
greedy eye on the artistic possessions still remaining in the hands of
impoverished native owners; he knew the exact moment of debt and
difficulty in which to bring a foreign gold to bear; he was an adept in
all the arts by which officials are bribed, and pictures are smuggled.
And sometimes these accomplishments of his resulted in large accessions
of cash, so that all the family lived on the fat of the land, bought
gorgeous attire, and went to Livorno, or Viareggio, or the Adriatic
coast, for the summer. And sometimes there was no luck, and therefore
no money. Owners became unkindly patriotic and would not sell. Or some
promising buyer, after nibbling for months, went off finally unhooked.
Then the apartment in the Via Giugno showed the stress of hard times. The
girls wore their old clothes to rags; the mother did all the work of the
house in a bedgown and slippers; and the door of the apartment was never
opened more than a few inches to any applicant, lest creditors should get
in.

And the golden intervals got fewer, and the poverty more persistent, as
the years went on. Till at last, by the providence--or malice--of the
gods, a rich and apparently prodigal Englishman, Edmund Melrose, hungry
for _antichità_ of all sorts, arrived on the scene. Smeath became rapidly
the bond-slave of Melrose, in the matter of works of art. The two made
endless expeditions together to small provincial towns, to remote villas
in the Apuan or Pisan Alps, to _palazzi_ in Verona, or Lucca, or Siena.
Melrose indeed had not been long in finding out that the little artist
was both a poor judge and a bad agent. Netta's cheek always flamed when
she thought of her father's boastings and blunderings, and of the way
in which Edmund had come to treat him. And now the Smeath family were
just as poor as ever again. Her little sisters had scarcely a dress to
their backs; and she was certain her mother was both half-starved and