The band was executing, with immense bravura, the complicated finale.  It ended with a tremendous crash.  He heard it unreal and remote, as if his ears had been stopped, and then the hard clapping of a thousand, more or less, pairs of hands, like a sudden hail-shower passing away.  The profound silence which succeeded recalled him to himself.

A tramcar resembling a long glass box wherein people sat with their heads strongly lighted, ran along swiftly within sixty yards of the spot where he had been robbed.  Then another rustled by, and yet another going the other way.  The audience about the band had broken up, and were entering the alley in small conversing groups.  The Count sat up straight and tried to think calmly of what had happened to him.  The vileness of it took his breath away again.  As far as I can make it out he was disgusted with himself.  I do not mean to say with his behaviour.  Indeed, if his pantomimic rendering of it for my information was to be trusted, it was simply perfect.  No, it was not that.  He was not ashamed.  He was shocked at being the selected victim, not of robbery so much as of contempt.  His tranquillity had been wantonly desecrated.  His lifelong, kindly nicety of outlook had been defaced.

Nevertheless, at that stage, before the iron had time to sink deep, he was able to argue himself into comparative equanimity.  As his agitation calmed down somewhat, he became aware that he was frightfully hungry.  Yes, hungry.  The sheer emotion had made him simply ravenous.  He left the seat and, after walking for some time, found himself outside the gardens and before an arrested tramcar, without knowing very well how he came there.  He got in as if in a dream, by a sort of instinct.  Fortunately he found in his trouser pocket a copper to satisfy the conductor.  Then the car stopped, and as everybody was getting out he got out, too.  He recognized the Piazza San Ferdinando, but apparently it did not occur to him to take a cab and drive to the hotel.  He remained in distress on the Piazza like a lost dog, thinking vaguely of the best way of getting something to eat at once.

Suddenly he remembered his twenty-franc piece.  He explained to me that he had that piece of French gold for something like three years.  He used to carry it about with him as a sort of reserve in case of accident.  Anybody is liable to have his pocket picked—­a quite different thing from a brazen and insulting robbery.

The monumental arch of the Galleria Umberto faced him at the top of a noble flight of stairs.  He climbed these without loss of time, and directed his steps towards the Cafe Umberto.  All the tables outside were occupied by a lot of people who were drinking.  But as he wanted something to eat, he went inside into the cafe, which is divided into aisles by square pillars set all round with long looking-glasses.  The Count sat down on a red plush bench against one of these pillars, waiting for his risotto.  And his mind reverted to his abominable adventure.