onio, in despair, "even the Church cannot save me
here. Heaven knows how he has accomplished it, but the old man has
managed to get the ear of the Pope's nephew; and it is this nephew who
has taken him under his protection, and given him hope that the Holy
Father will declare our marriage void; and not only that, but give him
a dispensation to enable _him_ to marry his niece."

"Stop!" cried Salvator. "Now--_now_ I understand the whole matter. It
is that nephew's hatred for _me_, Antonio, which threatens to ruin
everything. This nephew--this conceited, raw, boorish fellow--is one of
those beasts which the Goddess of Fortune is overwhelming with her
gifts in that picture of mine. That it was I who helped you to your
Marianna--more or less indirectly, of course--is known not only to this
nephew, but to every one in Rome. Season enough to persecute you, since
they cannot specify anything against _me_. Even were it not for my
affection for you, Antonio, as my best and dearest friend, I could not
but stand by you if it were for nothing else than that it is I who have
brought this mischance upon you. But, by all the saints, I do not see
how I am to set about spoiling the game of your enemies."

As he said this Salvator, who up to this point had been working away at
a picture without interrupting himself, laid his brushes, palette and
mahlstick down, got up from his easel, and, folding his arms across his
breast, strode 'several times up and down, whilst Antonio, in deepest
thought, contemplated the floor with fixed glance.

Presently Salvator halted before him, and cried, laughing: "Antonio,
there is nothing that _I_ can accomplish as against your powerful
enemies; but there is _one_ who can, and will, help you; and that is
Signor Formica."

"Alas!" cried Antonio; "do not jest with an unfortunate, for whom there
is no further salvation."

"Still determined to despair?" cried Salvator, who had suddenly risen
into the highest spirits. He laughed aloud: "I tell you, Antonio,
friend Formica will help in Florence quite as well as he did in Rome.
Go quietly home. Comfort your Marianna, and await the course of events
quite tranquilly. All I expect of you is that you will be ready and
prepared to do whatever Signor Formica--who happens to be here at this
moment--may require of you." Antonio promised obedience with all his
heart, hope and confidence at once beginning to glimmer up within him.

Signor Pasquale was not a little as