I may find out whether I love you enough to marry
you!"

"And he almost persuaded you that he was right," said Regina. "Is that
what happened?"

"That--and something else."

"Will you tell me, heart of my heart?"

In the falling twilight he told her all that had passed through his
mind, from the moment when he had seen Settimia's handwriting on the
note. Then Regina's lips moved.

"He shall pay!" she was saying under her breath. "He shall pay!"

"What are you saying?" Marcello asked.

"An Ave Maria," she answered. "It is almost dark."

CHAPTER XIV

The little house in Trastevere was shut up, but the gardener had the
keys, and came twice a week to air the rooms and sweep the paths and
water the shrubs. He was to be informed by Settimia of Regina's return
in time to have everything ready, but he did not expect any news before
the end of September; and if he came regularly, on Tuesday and Saturday,
and did his work, it was because he was a conscientious person in his
way, elderly, neat, and systematic, a good sort of Roman of the old
breed. But if he came on other days, as he often did, not to air the
rooms, but to water and tend certain plants, and to do the many
incomprehensible things which gardeners do with flower-pots, earth, and
seeds, that was his own affair, and would bring a little money in the
autumn when the small florists opened their shops and stands again, and
the tide of foreigners set once more towards Rome. Also, if he had made
friends with the gardeners at the beautiful villa on the Janiculum, that
was not Corbario's business; and they gave him cuttings, and odds and
ends, such as can be spared from a great garden where money is spent
generously, but which mean a great deal to a poor man who is anxious to
turn an honest penny by hard work.

The immediate result of this little traffic was that the gardeners at
the villa knew all about the little house in Trastevere; and what the
gardeners knew was known also by the porter, and by the other servants,
and through them by the servants of other people, and the confidential
valet told his master, and the maid told her mistress; and so everybody
had learned where "Consalvi's Regina" lived, and it was likely that
everybody would know when she came back to Rome, and whether Marcello
came with her or not.

He had not taken Folco's advice, much to the latter's disappointment and
annoyance. On the contrary, he and Regina had left the Engadine v