ittle
girl, becoming aware of my attention, glanced up at me, wondering, with a
pair of timid brown eyes.

"Are you carrying your basket to the Countess Salvi?" I asked.

The child stared at me. "To the Countess Scarabelli."

"Do you know the Countess?"

"Know her?" murmured the child, with an air of small dismay.

"I mean, have you seen her?"

"Yes, I have seen her." And then, in a moment, with a sudden soft
smile--"_E bella_!" said the little girl. She was beautiful herself as
she said it.

"Precisely; and is she fair or dark?"

The child kept gazing at me. "_Bionda--bionda_," she answered, looking
about into the golden sunshine for a comparison.

"And is she young?"

"She is not young--like me. But she is not old like--like--"

"Like me, eh? And is she married?"

The little girl began to look wise. "I have never seen the Signor
Conte."

"And she lives in Via Ghibellina?"

"_Sicuro_. In a beautiful palace."

I had one more question to ask, and I pointed it with certain copper
coins. "Tell me a little--is she good?"

The child inspected a moment the contents of her little brown fist. "It's
you who are good," she answered.

"Ah, but the Countess?" I repeated.

My informant lowered her big brown eyes, with an air of conscientious
meditation that was inexpressibly quaint. "To me she appears so," she
said at last, looking up.

"Ah, then, she must be so," I said, "because, for your age, you are very
intelligent." And having delivered myself of this compliment I walked
away and left the little girl counting her _soldi_.

I walked back to the hotel, wondering how I could learn something about
the Contessa Salvi-Scarabelli. In the doorway I found the innkeeper, and
near him stood a young man whom I immediately perceived to be a
compatriot, and with whom, apparently, he had been in conversation.

"I wonder whether you can give me a piece of information," I said to the
landlord. "Do you know anything about the Count Salvi-Scarabelli?"

The landlord looked down at his boots, then slowly raised his shoulders,
with a melancholy smile. "I have many regrets, dear sir--"

"You don't know the name?"

"I know the name, assuredly. But I don't know the gentleman."

I saw that my question had attracted the attention of the young
Englishman, who looked at me with a good deal of earnestness. He was
apparently satisfied with what he saw, for he presently decided to speak.

"The Count Scarabel