will know the way to Castel Ventirose?"

But naturally, Signorino." Marietta nodded.

"And do you think, for once in a way, though not versatile, he
could be prevailed upon to divert his faculties from the work
of a gardener to that of a messenger?"

"A messenger, Signorino?" Marietta wrinkled up her brow.

"Ang--an unofficial postman. Do you think he could be induced
to carry a letter for me to the castle?"

"But certainly, Signorino. He is here to obey the Signorino's
orders." Marietta shrugged her shoulders, and waved her hands.

"Then tell him, please, to go and put the necessary touches to
his toilet," said Peter. "Meanwhile I'll indite the letter."

When his letter was indited, he found the piratical-looking
Gigi in attendance, and he gave it to him, with instructions.

Thereupon Gigi (with a smile of sympathetic intelligence,
inimitably Italian) put the letter in his hat, put his hat upon
his head, and started briskly off--but not in the proper
direction: not in the direction of the road, which led to the
village, and across the bridge, and then round upon itself to
the gates of the park. He started briskly off towards Peter's
own toolhouse, a low red-tiled pavilion, opposite the door of
Marietta's kitchen.