I am personally responsible to the Count for all moneys due to him,
may I ask your Excellency to promise me that nothing shall be removed
from this apartment until my arrears of rent have been paid?"

"I promise that you shall receive what is due from me in two days. Is
not that enough?"

The pepper-and-salt tweeds bowed meekly before Roma's flashing eyes.

"Good-morning, sir."

"Good-morning, Excellency."

The man was hardly out of the house when a woman was shown in. It was
Madame Sella, the fashionable modiste.

"So unlucky, my dear! I'm driven to my wits' end for money. The people I
deal with in Paris are perfect demons, and are threatening all sorts of
pains and penalties if I don't send them a great sum straight away. Of
course if I could get my own money in, it wouldn't matter. But the dear
ladies of society are so slow, and naturally I don't like to go to their
gentlemen, although really I've waited so long for their debts that
if...."

"Can you wait one day longer for mine?"

"Donna Roma! And we've always been such friends, too!"

"You'll excuse me this morning, won't you?" said Roma, rising.

"Certainly. I'm busy, too. So good of you to see me. Trust I've not been
_de trop_. And if it hadn't been for those stupid bills of mine...."

Roma sat down and wrote a letter to one of the _strozzini_ (stranglers),
who lend money to ladies on the security of their jewels.

"I wish to sell my jewellery," she wrote, "and if you have any desire to
buy it, I shall be glad if you can come to see me for this purpose at
four o'clock to-morrow."

"Roma!" cried a fretful voice.

She was sitting in the boudoir, and her aunt was calling to her from the
adjoining room. The old lady, who had just finished her toilet, and was
redolent of perfume and scented soap, was propped up on pillows between
the mirror and her Madonna, with her cat purring on the cushion at the
foot of her bed.

"Ah, you do come to me sometimes, don't you?" she said, with her
embroidered handkerchief at her lips. "What is this I hear about the
carriage and horses? Sold them! It is incredible. I will not believe it
unless you tell me so yourself."

"It is quite true, Aunt Betsy. I wanted money for various purposes, and
among others to pay my debts," said Roma.

"Goodness! It's true! Give me my salts. There they are--on the
card-table beside you.... So it's true! It's really true! You've done
some extraordinary things already, miss, but this ..