Giovanni scowled.  “I warn you, Mademoiselle, be prudent!” A note of tension in his voice brought Nina to a sudden halt.

“There is no one here but Aunt Eleanor—­I doubt if even she can hear.”

“In Rome it would not be the first time if walls had ears.”

“I am sorry,” she said so simply, so candidly, that Giovanni was charmed.  He became light and amusing.  He elaborated the legends of the frescoes with the lives of the painters’ until she felt as though they were yet living.  Finally they reached the side of the room where the princess was waiting.  There was no impatience in her voice, but she looked tired, and Nina cried penitently: 

“Ah, Aunt Eleanor!  Why did you not call me sooner?  I get so carried away by all the things I see, and the tales Don Giovanni tells me, that I have no sense of time.”

They descended the stairs to the inner court of the Vatican, where they found their carriage, an old-fashioned C-spring landeau, all very dignified and perfectly appointed, and in striking contrast to the pony-cart in which the princess was trundled about at Torre Sansevero.

By the time they crossed the Ponte S. Angelo the color had come back a little into the princess’s face.  Nina, with no sign of fatigue, sat brightly alert, while Giovanni opposite, prattled ceaselessly, except for the interruption necessitated by his constantly taking off his hat as his sister-in-law bowed to passing acquaintances.

They had not far to go along the Corso Vittorio Emanuele before they came to the dingy pile of yellow stone that for centuries had borne the name of Palazzo Sansevero.  The landeau turned under one of its three broad archways, and entered the courtyard.  A plain stone stairway, worn and dingy like the rest of the facade, led into a vestibule of unpromising darkness.  The portiere, however, was very gorgeous and imposing in his knee breeches, white silk stockings, gold-trimmed coat, and his three-cornered hat with the prince’s cockade at the side.  He moved majestically down the steps, carrying a silver-headed mace, like a drum-major’s, and saluted as the “nobilities” entered the palace.  They ascended to a vast stone hall with a grand stairway at its further end, that quickly effaced the impression of the entrance.  From an antechamber, they passed through five or six rooms hung with tapestries and paintings, and adorned with sculptures, until they arrived at the one where the princess really lived.  This last was a huge, dignified, mellow, and splendid apartment, in every way worthy of the palace in which it stood, and of the great lady who occupied it now, no less than of all the great ladies who had occupied it in the past.  In its present furnishings there were deep sofas with light and table arrangement, so that one might lounge and read and at the same time be near the great open fire.  Many bibelots of silver and porcelain made a contrast to the other rooms, that were more like museum galleries; and everywhere—­here as in the country—­were flowers and the army of autographed photographs marching across tables and banked high against the walls.