them with a spindle, who stood winding and mumbling in the doorway,
and who would as soon have let in the devil as the air. Master,
mistress, la bella Carolina, and I, went all through the palazzo.
I went first, though I have named myself last, opening the windows
and the lattice-blinds, and shaking down on myself splashes of
rain, and scraps of mortar, and now and then a dozing mosquito, or
a monstrous, fat, blotchy, Genoese spider.

When I had let the evening light into a room, master, mistress, and
la bella Carolina, entered. Then, we looked round at all the
pictures, and I went forward again into another room. Mistress
secretly had great fear of meeting with the likeness of that face -
we all had; but there was no such thing. The Madonna and Bambino,
San Francisco, San Sebastiano, Venus, Santa Caterina, Angels,
Brigands, Friars, Temples at Sunset, Battles, White Horses,
Forests, Apostles, Doges, all my old acquaintances many times
repeated? - yes. Dark, handsome man in black, reserved and secret,
with black hair and grey moustache, looking fixedly at mistress out
of darkness? - no.

At last we got through all the rooms and all the pictures, and came
out into the gardens. They were pretty well kept, being rented by
a gardener, and were large and shady. In one place there was a
rustic theatre, open to the sky; the stage a green slope; the
coulisses, three entrances upon a side, sweet-smelling leafy
screens. Mistress moved her bright eyes, even there, as if she
looked to see the face come in upon the scene; but all was well.

'Now, Clara,' master said, in a low voice, 'you see that it is
nothing? You are happy.'