one of the parish churches to see
some pictures which are hung there. There had been a marriage service
performed, and as the sacristan moved about explaining the pictures, he
laid his hand upon an open book which looked like a register of some
kind. I idly asked him what it was, and he showed it to me; it was
amusing to look at the names of the people, and I turned over the leaves
curiously. Suddenly my attention was arrested by a name I knew--'Giovanni
Saracinesca,' written clearly across the page, and below it, 'Felice
Baldi,'--the woman he had married. The date of the marriage was the 19th
of June 1863. You remember, perhaps, that in that summer, in fact during
the whole of that year, Don Giovanni was supposed to be absent upon
his famous shooting expedition in Canada, about which he talks so much.
It appears, then, that two years ago, instead of being in America, he was
living in Aquila, married to Felice Baldi--probably some pretty peasant
girl. I started at the sight of the names. I got permission to have an
attested copy of it made by a notary. I found the priest who had married
them, but he could not remember the couple. The man, he said, was dark,
he was sure; the woman, he thought, had been fair. He married so many
people in a year. These were not natives of Aquila; they had apparently
come there from the country--perhaps had met. The banns--yes, he had
the book of banns; he had also the register of marriages from which he
sometimes issued certified extracts. He was a good old man, and seemed
ready to oblige me; but his memory was very defective. He allowed me to
take notary's copies of the banns and the entry in the list, as well as
of the register. Then I went to the office of the Stato Civile. You know
that people do not sign the register in the church themselves; the names
are written down by the priest. I wanted to see the signatures, and the
book of civil marriages was shown to me. The handwriting was Giovanni's,
I am sure--larger, and a little less firm, but distinguishable at a
glance. I took the copies for curiosity, and never said anything about
it, but I have kept them. That is the history. Do you see how serious a
matter it is?"

"Indeed, yes," answered Donna Tullia, who had listened with intense
interest to the story. "But what could have induced him to marry that
woman?"

"One of those amiable eccentricities peculiar to his family," replied Del
Ferice, shrugging his shoulders. "The interesting