"Make the Signorino a dress-coat? I? Oh, no, Signorino."
Marietta shook her head.

"I feared as much," he acknowledged. "Is there a decent tailor
in the village?"

"No, Signorino."

"Nor in the whole length and breadth of this peninsula, if you
come to that. Well, what am I to do? How am I to dine with a
cardinal? Do you think a cardinal would have a fit if a man
were to dine with him in a dina giacca?"

"Have a fit? Why should he have a fit, Signorino?" Marietta
blinked.

"Would he do anything to the man? Would he launch the awful
curses of the Church at him, for instance?"

"Mache, Signorino!" She struck an attitude that put to scorn
his apprehensions.

"I see," said Peter. "You think there is no danger? You
advise me to brazen the dina giacca out, to swagger it off?"

"I don't understand, Signorino," said Marietta.

"To understand is to forgive," said he; "and yet you can't
trifle with English servants like this, though they ought to