d that he was a Roman Catholic. How, I don't know. So I added,
"But I've never had the slightest reason to give it a thought."

"That must be," he said softly, "because you never met, Senorita--may I
say this?--one single gentleman w'at is Catholic."

"That's rather clever of you," I said. "Perhaps that _is_ why."

The Italian character struck me as having interesting phases, but I did
not allow this impression to appear. I looked indifferently out of the
window. Italian sunsets are very becoming.

"The signora, your mother, has told me that you have no brothers or
sisters, Mees Wick. She made me the confidence--it was most kind."

"There never has been any secret about it, Count."

"Then you have not even one?" Count Filgiatti's eyes were full of
melancholy sympathy.

"I think," I said with coldness, "that in a matter of that kind, momma's
word should hardly need corroboration."

"Ah, it is sad! With me what difference! Can you believe of eleven? And
the father with the saints! And I of course am the eldest of all."

"Dear me," I said, "what a responsibility!"

"Ah, you recognise! you understand the--the necessities, yes?"

At that moment the train stopped at Civita Vecchia, and the Senator
awoke and put his hat on. "The Eternal City," he remarked when he
descried that the name of the station was not Rome, "appears to have an
eternal railway to match. There seems to be a feeding counter here
though--we might have another try at those slices of veal boiled in
tomatoes and smothered with macaroni that they give the pilgrim stranger
in these parts. You may lead the world in romance, Count, but you don't
put any of it in your railway refreshments."

As we passed out into the smooth-toned talkative darkness, Count
Filgiatti said in my ear, "Mistra and Madame Wick have kindly consented
to receive my visit at the hotel to-morrow. Is it agreeable to you also
that I come?"

And I said, "Why, certainly!"

CHAPTER XI.

We descended next morning to realise how original we were in being in
the plains of Italy in July. The Fulda people and the Miss Binghams and
Mrs. Portheris had prevented our noticing it before, but in the Hotel
Mascigni, Via del Tritone, we seemed to have arrived at a point of arid
solitude, which gave poppa a new and convincing sense of all he was
going through in pursuit of Continental culture. We sat in one corner of
the "Sala di mangiari" at a small square table, and in all the length