g of tenderness in his blood by the way.

Vittoria's dwelling-place was near the Duomo, in a narrow thoroughfare
leading from the Duomo to the Piazza of La Scala, where a confectioner of
local fame conferred upon the happier members of the population most
piquant bocconi and tartlets, and offered by placard to give an emotion
to the nobility, the literati, and the epicures of Milan, and to all
foreigners, if the aforesaid would adventure upon a trial of his art.
Meanwhile he let lodgings. It was in the house of this famous
confectioner Zotti that Vittoria and her mother had lived after leaving
England for Italy. As Vittoria came under the fretted shadow of the
cathedral, she perceived her mother standing with Zotti at the
house-door, though the night was far advanced. She laughed, and walked
less hurriedly. Ammiani now asked her if she had been alarmed. 'Not
alarmed,' she said, 'but a little more nervous than I thought I should
be.'

He was spared from putting any further question by her telling him that
Luigi, the Motterone spy, had in all probability done her a service in
turning one or other f the machinations of the Signor Antonio. 'My
madman,' she called this latter. 'He has got his Irma instead of me. We
shall have to supply her place tomorrow; she is travelling rapidly, and
on my behalf! I think, Signor Carlo, you would do well by going to the
maestro when you leave me, and telling him that Irma has been caught into
the skies. Say, "Jealous that earth should possess such overpowering
loveliness," or "Attracted in spite of themselves by that combination of
genius and beauty which is found united nowhere but in Irma, the spirits
of heaven determined to rob earth of her Lazzeruola." Only tell it to him
seriously, for my dear Rocco will have to work with one of the singers
all day, and I ought to be at hand by them to help her, if I dared stir
out. What do you think?'

Ammiani pronounced his opinion that it would be perilous for her to go
abroad.

'I shall in truth, I fear, have a difficulty in getting to La Scala
unseen,' she said; 'except that we are cunning people in our house. We
not only practise singing and invent wonderful confectionery, but we do
conjuring tricks. We profess to be able to deceive anybody whom we
please.'

'Do the dupes enlist in a regiment?' said Ammiani, with an intonation
that professed his readiness to serve as a recruit. His humour striking
with hers, they smiled together in the bri