These volcanoes are often short-lived.
We looked after her until she had reached the door and had flung
herself across the threshold. Then I sent Luigi for my easel and began
work.

The events that have made the greatest impression upon me all my life
have been those which have dropped out of the sky,--the unexpected, the
incomprehensible,--the unnecessary--the fool things--the damnably
idiotic things.

First we heard a cry that caused Luigi to drop canvas and easel, and
sent us both flying down the quay toward the rookery. It came from
Loretta's mother;--she was out on the sidewalk tearing her hair;
calling on God; uttering shriek after shriek. The quay and bridge were
a mass of people--some looking with staring eyes, the children hugging
their mothers' skirts. Two brawny fishermen were clearing the way to
the door. Luigi and I sprang in behind them, and entered the house.

On the stone floor of the room lay the body of Francesco, his head
stretched back, one hand clutching the bosom of his shirt. Against the
wall stood Loretta; not a quiver on her lips; ghastly white; calm,--the
least excited person in the room.

"And you killed him!" I cried.

"Yes,--he thought I came to kiss him--I did, WITH THIS!" and she tossed
a knife on the table.

The days that followed were gray days for Luigi and me. All the light
and loveliness were gone from my canal.

They took Loretta to the prison next the Bridge of Sighs and locked her
up in one of the mouldy cells below the water line--dark, dismal
pockets where, in the old days, men died of terror.

Vittorio, Luigi, and I met there the next morning. I knew the chief
officer, and he had promised me an interview. Vittorio was
crying,--rubbing his knuckles in his eyes,--utterly broken up and
exhausted. He and Luigi had spent the night together. An hour before,
the two had stood at Francesco's bedside in the hospital of San Paulo.
Francesco was still alive, and with Father Garola bending over him had
repeated his confession to them both. He was madly in love with her, he
moaned, and had spread the report hoping that Vittorio would cast her
off, and, having no other place to go, Loretta would come back to him.
At this Vittorio broke into a rage and would have strangled the dying
man had not the attendant interfered. All this I learned from Luigi as
we waited for the official.

"This is a frightful ending to a happy life--" I began when the officer
appeared. "Let them talk to e