“At the theatre.  Ah! perhaps.  He was pleased and excited.  I did not specially remark him last night.  But, the truth is, I am not easy about him.”

“I feel very much persuaded, Signor Ludovico, that you are alarming yourself unnecessarily.  Your fears are excited by your affection for your uncle.  I doubt whether many nephews in your position, Signor Marchese, would feel as much anxiety about the health of an uncle whose heirs they were; not that I mean, of course, Signor, to insinuate that you are dependent on your uncle,” added Bianca, who felt considerable curiosity to know how matters stood in the Castelmare family in this respect.

“Faith, though, I am dependent on him,” returned Ludovico, with the most careless frankness.  “I have not a bajocco in the world but what comes to me from him.  But lo zio is more generous than uncles often are to their nephews who are to be their heirs.  And I am in no hurry to succeed to him, I assure you.”

“I am sure that would not be in your nature in any case, Signor Ludovico,” returned Bianca; “but there is some excuse for those being in a hurry whose future depends on the caprice of old people,” she added, fishing for further information.

“But my future does depend upon his caprice—­in one way, at all events.  Suppose my uncle should take it into his head to marry, and have a family.  There is nothing to prevent him.  Many an older man than he by a great deal has done so.  And if that were to happen, there is not a beggar in all Ravenna who is a poorer man than I should be.  Only that lo zio is about the most unlikely man to marry in all Italy, it is a thing that might happen any day.”

“Why should the Signor Marchese be so unlikely to marry?  One would say, to look at him, that it was not such an unlikely thing.  Suppose some designing woman were to make the attempt?”

“There does not exist the woman who could have the faintest shadow of success in such an enterprise, Signora.  If you could tell how often the thing has been tried!  He is seasoned, lo zio is.  Besides, he never was a man given much to falling in love at any time of his life.  I don’t think he is much an admirer of the sex, to tell you the truth.  No; there is no fear of that.”

There was a silence of some minutes, and Bianca seemed to have fallen into a reverie; till, suddenly, raising her eyes, which had fallen beneath their lashes, while she had been busy with her thoughts, she said, looking up archly into Ludovico’s face: 

“Your attention, at all events, was not so fully occupied by the performance last night, Signor, but that you had plenty of thoughts and eyes at command for other matters.”

“What do you mean, Signora?  I am sure I was not only an attentive but a delighted listener,” said he, while the tell-tale blood flushed his cheeks.

“Ah!  I saw which way your glances and thoughts were wandering.  We artists see more things in the salle than you of the world before the foot-lights think for.  A very pretty little brunette, in No. 10 on the upper tier, was quite equally aware of the direction of the Marchese Ludovico’s thoughts and looks.”