“You can explain to your colleagues that you have let the apartment in the palace to me, and that as I pay my rent regularly you cannot turn me out without notice.”  Malipieri smiled indifferently.

“Surely,” said the Baron, affecting some surprise, “if I ask you, as a favour, to move somewhere else, you will do so!”

To tell the truth, he was not prepared for Malipieri’s extreme forbearance, for he had expected an outbreak of temper, at the least, and he still feared a positive refusal.  Instead, the young man did not seem to care a straw.

“Of course,” he said, “if you ask it as a favour, I cannot refuse.  When should you like me to go?”

“You are really too kind!” The Baron was genuinely delighted and almost grateful—­as near to feeling gratitude, perhaps, as he had ever been in his life.  “I should hate to hurry you,” he continued.  “But really, since you are so very good, I think the sooner you can make it convenient to move, the better it will be for every one.”

“I could not manage to pack my books and drawings so soon as to-morrow,” said Malipieri.

“Oh, no! certainly not!  By all means take a couple of days about it.  I could not think of putting you to any inconvenience.”

“Thanks.”  Malipieri smiled pleasantly.  “If I cannot get off by the day after to-morrow, I shall certainly move the day after that.”

“I am infinitely obliged.  And now that this unpleasant matter is settled, owing to your wonderful amiability, do tell me how the work is proceeding.”

“Fairly well,” Malipieri answered.  “You had better come and see for yourself before I go.  Let me see.  To-morrow I shall have to look about for a lodging.  Could you come the day after to-morrow?  Then we can go down together.”

“How far have you got?” asked Volterra, with a little less interest than might have been expected.

“I am positively sure that there is an inner chamber, where I expected to find it,” Malipieri answered, with perfect truth.  “Perhaps we can get into it when you come.”

“I hope so,” said the Baron, watching the other’s face from the corner of his eye.

“I have made a curious discovery in the course of the excavation,” Malipieri continued.  “The pillar of masonry which you showed me is hollow after all.  It was the shaft of an oubliette which must have opened somewhere in the upper part of the house.  There is a well under it.”

“Full of water?”

“No.  It is dry.  We shall have to pass through it to get to the inner chamber.  You shall see for yourself—­a very singular construction.”

“Was there nothing in it?”

“Several skeletons,” answered Malipieri indifferently.  “One of the skulls has a rusty knife driven through it.”

“Dear me!” exclaimed the Baron, shaking his fat head.  “Those Conti were terrible people!  We must not tell the Baroness these dreadful stories.  They would upset her nerves.”