“See, Signor Carlo,” she said; “I was right.  Luigi, you will be a spy no more?”

Carlo Ammiani happened to be rolling a cigarette-paper.  She put out her fingers for it, and then reached it to Luigi, who accepted it with singular contortions of his frame, declaring that he would confess everything to her.  “Yes, signorina, it is true; I am a spy on you.  I know the houses you visit.  I know you eat too much chocolate for your voice.  I know you are the friend of the Signora Laura, the widow of Giacomo Piaveni, shot—­shot on Annunciation Day.  The Virgin bless him!  I know the turning of every street from your house near the Duomo to the signora’s.  You go nowhere else, except to the maestro’s.  And it’s something to spy upon you.  But think of your Beppo who spies upon me!  And your little mother, the lady most excellent, is down in Baveno, and she is always near you when you make an expedition.  Signorina, I know you would not pay your Beppo for spying upon me.  Why does he do it?  I do not sing ‘Italia, Italia shall be free!’ I have heard you when I was under the maestro’s windows; and once you sang it to the Signor Agostino Balderini.

“Indeed, signorina, I am a sort of guardian of your voice.  It is not gold of the Tedeschi I get from the Signor Antonio Pericles.”

At the mention of this name, Agostino and Vittoria laughed out.

“You are in the pay of the Signor Antonio-Pericles,” said Agostino.

“Without being in our pay, you have done us the service to come up here among us!  Bravo!  In return for your disinterestedness, we kick you down, either upon Baveno or upon Stresa, or across the lake, if you prefer it.—­The man is harmless.  He is hired by a particular worshipper of the signorina’s voice, who affects to have first discovered it when she was in England, and is a connoisseur, a millionaire, a Greek, a rich scoundrel, with one indubitable passion, for which I praise him.  We will let his paid eavesdropper depart, I think.  He is harmless.”

Neither Ugo nor Marco was disposed to allow any description of spy to escape unscotched.  Vittoria saw that Luigi’s looks were against him, and whispered:  “Why do you show such cunning eyes, Luigi?”

He replied:  “Signorina, take me out of their hearing, and I will tell you everything.”

She walked aside.  He seemed immediately to be inspired with confidence, and stretched his fingers in the form of a grasshopper, at which sight they cried:  “He knows Barto Rizzo—­this rascal!” They plied him with signs and countersigns, and speedily let him go.  There ensued a sharp snapping of altercation between Luigi and Beppo.  Vittoria had to order Beppo to stand back.