“Well,” he said, “it is a very bad time for selling land.  But to oblige you, because you are a customer, I will give you eight hundred francs for your little place.  That is really much more than I can afford.”

“Eight hundred francs!” I exclaimed, in despair.  “But I have paid you nearly twice as much for it in the last three years!  What do you take me for?  To sell such a gem of a vineyard for eight hundred francs?  If you offer me thirteen hundred I will discuss the matter with you.”

“I have known you a long time, Signor Grandi, and you are an honest man.  I am sure you do not wish to deceive me.  I will give you eight hundred and fifty.”

Deceive him, indeed!  The very man who had received fifteen hundred from me said I deceived him when I asked thirteen hundred for the same piece of land!  But I needed it very much, and so, bargaining and wrangling, I got one thousand and seventy-five francs in bank-notes; and I took care they should all be good ones too.  It was a poor price, I know, but I could do no better, and I went home happy.  But I dared not tell Mariuccia.  She is only my servant, to be sure, but she would have torn me in pieces.

Then I wrote to the authorities at the university to say that I was obliged to leave Rome suddenly, and would of course not claim my salary during my absence.  But I added that I hoped they would not permanently supplant me.  If they did I knew I should be ruined.  Then I told Mariuccia that I was going away for some days to the country, and I left her the money to pay the rent, and her wages, and a little more, so that she might be provided for if I were detained very long.  I went out again and telegraphed to Nino to say I was going at once in search of the Liras, and begging him to come home as soon as he should have finished his engagement.

To tell the truth, Mariuccia was very curious to know where I was going, and asked me many questions, which I had some trouble in answering.  But at last it was night again, and the old woman went to bed and left me.  Then I went on tiptoe to the kitchen, and found a skein of thread and two needles, and set to work.

I knew the country whither I was going very well, and it was necessary to hide the money I had in some ingenious way.  So I took two waistcoats—­one of them was quite good still,—­and I sewed them together, and basted the bank-notes between them.  It was a clumsy piece of tailoring, though it took me so many hours to do it.  But I had put the larger waistcoat outside very cunningly, so that when I had put on the two, you could not see that there was anything beneath the outer one.  I think I was very clever to do this without a woman to help me.  Then I looked to my boots, and chose my oldest clothes,—­and you may guess, from what you know of me, how old they were,—­and I made a little bundle that I could carry in my hand, with a change of linen, and the like.  These things I made ready before I went to bed, and I slept with the two waistcoats and the thousand francs under my pillow, though I suppose nobody would have chosen that particular night for robbing me.