“Dio Santo!” he exclaimed at last, clasping his hands together and speaking low, so as not to be overheard by Enrica—­“that I should live to hear a Guinigi talk so!  Do you forget, marchesa, that it was under the banner of the blessed Holy Countenance (Vulturum di Lucca), miraculously cast on the shores of the Ligurian Sea, that your great ancestor Castruccio Castracani degli Antimelli overcame the Florentines at Alto Passo?”

“The banner didn’t help him, nor St. Nicodemus either—­I affirm that,” answered she, angrily.  Her temper was rising.  “I will not be contradicted, cavaliere—­don’t attempt it.  I never allow it.  Even my husband never contradicted me—­and he was a Guinigi.  Is the city to go mad, eat, drink, and hang out old curtains because the priests bid them?  Did you see Nobili’s house?” She asked this question so eagerly, she suddenly forgot her anger in the desire she felt to relate her injuries.  “A Guinigi palace dressed out like a booth at a fair!—­What a scandal!  This comes of usury and banking.  He will be a deputy soon.  Will no one tell him he is a presumptuous young idiot?” she cried, with a burst of sudden rage, remembering the crowds that filled the streets, and the admiration and display excited.  Then, turning round and looking Trenta full in the face, she added spitefully, “You may worship painted dolls, and kiss black crucifixes, if you like:  I would not give them house-room.”

“Mercy!” cried poor Trenta, putting his hands to his ears.  “For pity’s sake—­the palace will fall about your ears!  Remember your niece is present.”

And again he pointed to Enrica, whose head was bent down over her work.

“Ha! ha!” was all the reply vouchsafed by the marchesa, followed by a scornful laugh.  “I shall say what I please in my own house.  Poor Cesarino!  You are very ignorant.  I pity you!”

But Trenta was not there—­he had rushed down-stairs as quickly as his old legs and his stick would carry him, and was out of hearing.  At the mention of Nobili’s name Enrica looked stealthily from under her long eyelashes, and turned very white.  The sharp eyes of her aunt might have detected it had she been less engrossed by her passage of arms with the cavaliere.

“Ha! ha!” she repeated, grimly laughing to herself.  “He is gone!  Poor old soul!  But I am going to have my rubber for all that.—­Ring the bell, Enrica.  He must come back.  Trenta takes too much upon himself; he is always interfering.”

As Enrica rose to obey her aunt, the sound of feet was heard in the anteroom.  The marchesa made a sign to her to reseat herself, which she did in the same place as before, behind the thick cotton curtains of the Venetian casement.

CHAPTER VII.

COUNT MARESCOTTI.