"Oh, I will answer as much as you please," replied the artist, with an
evil smile.

"Very well. Why do you want to turn me out, after promising for years
that I should marry Lucia with your full consent when she was old
enough?"

"Why? because you have turned yourself out, to begin with. Secondly,
because Carnesecchi is a better match for my daughter than a beggarly
chiseller. Thirdly, because I please; and fourthly, because I do not
care a fig whether you like it or not. Are those reasons sufficient or
not?"

"They may satisfy you," answered Gianbattista. "They leave something to
be desired in the way of logic, in my humble opinion."

"Since I have told you that I do not care for your opinion--"

"I will probably find means to make you care for it," retorted the young
man. "Don Paolo is quite right, in the first place, when he tells you
that the thing is simply impossible. Fathers do not compel their
daughters to marry in this century. Will you do me the favour to explain
your first remark a little more clearly? You said I had turned myself
out--how?"

"You have changed, Tista," said Marzio, leaning back to sharpen his
pencil, and staring at the wall. "You change every day. You are not at
all what you used to be, and you know it. You are going back to the
priests. You fawn on my brother like a dog."