“It would kill the old Marchese as dead as a door-nail, for one thing,” said another of the group of young men.

“And serve him right too.  If it is really true that he has contemplated being guilty of such a monstrous piece of injustice and folly,” said the same man, who had before expressed a similar opinion.

Just then a servant of the Circolo came into the room and put a note into the hands of the Baron Manutoli.

“It is from Ludovico, asking me to go to him.  So there’s an end to our game of billiards, Signor Conte,” said Manutoli to one of the group; “I must go at once.”

“But you’ll come back here after you’ve seen him, won’t you?  You’ll come back and tell us all about it, Manutoli?” said two or three of the group which had been discussing the topic.

“I don’t know, I shall see.  I will, if I can—­if it’s not too late.  It may be that I shall be detained with him.  I suppose that he has had no means of communicating with any of his people since the police folk clapped their hands on him.”

“Do look in here for a moment, Manutoli.  We shall all be anxious to hear about him, poor fellow,”, said another of the young men, who had pressed around Signor Manutoli as soon as it was known from whom his note had come.

“If I can I will.  It is likely enough he may want me to go somewhere else for him.  We shall see.  A rivederci, Signori.”

CHAPTER VII

A Prison Visit

The note which had been given to the Baron Manutoli begged him to come with as little delay as possible to the Palazzo del Governo.

Adolfo Manutoli was a somewhat older man than the majority of those who had formed the group which had been discussing the all-absorbing topic of the day at the Circolo; and he was Ludovico di Castelmare’s most intimate friend among the younger members of the society in which he lived.  It was a friendship strongly approved by the Marchese Lamberto, as might have been perceived by his selection of Manutoli to accompany him on the occasion of meeting La Lalli on her first arrival in Ravenna, as the reader may possibly remember.  And the special ground of this approval was Manutoli’s strong advocacy of the projected marriage between Ludovico and the Contessa Violante, and his consequent disapproval and discouragement of his friend’s friendship and admiration for Paolina.  He was not a man who would have counselled or desired his friend to behave badly or unworthily to Paolina or to any woman; for he was a man of honour and a gentleman.  But, short of any conduct which could be so characterized, he would have been very glad to see the Marchese quit of an entanglement which alone stood in the way, as he conceived, of his forming an alliance so desirable in every point of view as the marriage with the great-niece of the Cardinal Legate.

“Can I be permitted to see the Marchese Ludovico, Signor Commissario?  He has requested me to come to him,” said the Baron, on arriving at the police-office.