man, even in former days, and it had seemed to him of late that he
could never be really angry again. Nothing could ever again be of
enough importance to make it worth while. If a man of his own class had
insulted him, he would have directed his double, as it were, to resent
the offence, but he himself would have remained utterly indifferent.

The one-eyed cobbler was not in his place, as it was Sunday. If he had
been there, Griggs would very possibly have told him to watch Stefanone
and to try and keep him in the wine shop until he should grow heavy over
his wine and fall asleep. In that state he would at least be harmless.
But the cobbler was not there. Griggs went up to his rooms to wait until
a later hour, when he might hope to find Francesca.

Stefanone, being left alone, sat down again, pulled his hat over his
eyes once more and felt in his pocket for his clasp-knife. His mind was
by no means clear, for he had eaten nothing, he had swallowed a good
deal of strong wine, and he had made up his mind that he must kill his
enemy on that day or never. The intention was well-defined, but that was
all. He had put off his vengeance too long. It was true that he had not
yet caught Dalrymple alone in a quiet street at night, that is to say,
under the most favourable circumstances imaginable; but more than once
he might have fallen upon him suddenly from a doorway in a narrow lane,
in which there had been but a few women and children to see the deed, if
they saw it at all. He knew well enough that in Rome the fear of being
in any way implicated in a murder, even as a witness, would have made
women, and probably men, too, run indoors or out of the way, rather than
interfere or pursue him. He told himself therefore that he had been
unreasonably cautious, and that unless he acted quickly Lord Redin,
being warned by Griggs, would take measures of self-defence which might
put him beyond the reach of the clasp-knife forever. Stefanone's ideas
about the power of an 'English lord' were vague in the extreme.

He had not been exactly frightened by Griggs's sudden accusation that
morning, but he had been made nervous and vicious by the certainty that
his intentions had been discovered. Peasant-like, not being able to hit
on a plan for immediate success, he had excited himself and stimulated
his courage with drink. His eyes were already a little bloodshot, and
the flush on his high cheek bones showed that he was in the first stage
of d