y from month to month and year to
year. In 1867, Padre Cristoforo of the Benedictine Monastery, looked
scarcely older than when he picked out a nurse for the Luttrell family
in 1854. He was a tall man, with a stooping gait and a prominent,
sagacious chin; deep-set, meditative, dark eyes, and a somewhat fine and
subtle sort of smile which flickered for a moment at the corner of his
thin-lipped mouth, and disappeared before you were fully conscience of
its presence. He was summoned one day from the monastery (where he now
filled the office of sub-Prior) at the earnest request of an old woman
who lived in a neighbouring village. She had known him many years
before, and thought that it would be easier to tell her story to him
than to a complete stranger. He had received her communication, and
stood by her pallet with evident concern and astonishment depicted upon
his face. He held a paper in his hand, at which he glanced from time to
time as the woman spoke.

"It was not my doing," moaned the old crone. "It was my daughter's. I
have but told you what she said to me five years ago. She said that she
did change the children; it was Lippo, indeed, who died, but the child
whom the English lady took to England with her was Vincenza's little
Dino; and the boy whom we know as Dino is really the English child. I
know not whether it is true! Santa Vergine! what more can I say?"

"Why did you not reveal the facts five years ago?" said the Father, with
some severity of tone.

"I will tell you, Reverend Father. Because Vincenza came to me next day
and said that she had lied--that the child, Dino, was her own, after
all, and that she had only wanted to see how much I would believe. What
was I to do? I do not know which story to believe; that is why I tell
both stories to you before I die."

"She denied it, then, next day?"

"Yes, Father; but her husband believed it, as you will see by that
paper. He wrote it down--he could write and read a little, which I could
never do; and he told me what he had written:--'I, Giovanni Vasari, have
heard my wife, Vincenza, say that she stole an English gentleman's
child, and put her own child in its place. I do not know whether this is
true; but I leave my written word that I was innocent of any such crime,
and humbly pray to Heaven that she may be forgiven if she committed it.'
Is that right, Reverend Father? And then his name, and the day and the
year."

"Quite right," said Padre Cristoforo. "