her arms round his neck, and
breaking into a happy laugh as she buried her face upon his shoulder. No
one who saw her in the world would have believed her capable of those
sudden and violent demonstrations--she was thought so very cold.

When Giovanni reached home, he was informed that his father had left Rome
an hour earlier by the train for Terni, leaving word that he had gone to
Aquila.

CHAPTER XXIX.

In those days the railroad did not extend beyond Terni in the direction
of Aquila, and it was necessary to perform the journey of forty miles
between those towns by diligence. It was late in the afternoon of the
next day before the cumbrous coach rolled up to the door of the Locanda
del Sole in Aquila, and Prince Saracinesca found himself at his
destination. The red evening sun gilded the snow of the Gran Sasso
d'Italia, the huge domed mountain that towers above the city of
Frederick. The city itself had long been in the shade, and the spring
air was sharp and biting. Saracinesca deposited his slender luggage with
the portly landlord, said he would return for supper in half an hour, and
inquired the way to the church of San Bernardino da Siena. There was
no difficulty in finding it, at the end of the Corso--the inevitable
"Corso" of every Italian town. The old gentleman walked briskly along the
broad, clean street, and reached the door of the church just as the
sacristan was hoisting the heavy leathern curtain, preparatory to locking
up for the night.

"Where can I find the Padre Curato?" inquired the Prince. The man looked
at him but made no answer, and proceeded to close the doors with great
care. He was an old man in a shabby cassock, with four days' beard on
his face, and he appeared to have taken snuff recently.

"Where is the Curator?" repeated the Prince, plucking him by the sleeve.
But the man shook his head, and began turning the ponderous key in the
lock. Two little ragged boys were playing a game upon the church steps,
piling five chestnuts in a heap and then knocking them down with a small
stone. One of them having upset the heap, desisted and came near the
Prince.

"That one is deaf," he said, pointing to the sacristan. Then running
behind, him he stood on tiptoe and screamed in his ear--"_Brutta
bestia_!"

The sacristan did not hear, but caught sight of the urchin and made a
lunge at him. He missed him, however, and nearly fell over.

"What education!--_che educazione_!" cried the old m