, either,' Ortensia answered. 'How
did you hurt your thumb?'

'That is a long story, my lady. But why do you also dislike the place
already? You have only looked out of the window once.'

'I saw the castle, and I thought it was of bad augury, for it looks like
a great prison.'

'There are prisons in it without any light, very deep down,' said Pina
quietly. 'The Pope's Legate lives in the upper part. The Legate is the
Papal Governor, you know, my lady.'

'I did not know. But the ugly castle is not the real reason why I do not
like Ferrara. I could not tell any one else, but I think I can tell you,
Pina.'

She turned her head half round under the nurse's hands, looked up
sideways, and then hesitated. It was not easy to explain.

'What is it, my lady?' asked the serving-woman. 'You can tell old Pina
anything.'

'It is all so different from what I thought it would be,' Ortensia said
in a rather low voice, and again a blush rose in her cheek.

'I think I understand,' Pina said, steadily combing out the heavy auburn
hair.

'You see,' Ortensia explained, 'we all four got into the gondola
together, and there was that long row to the land, and that dreadful
night in the cart on the road to Padua--and then the half-hour at
daybreak, while he was getting the carriage, and then the journey
here--and last night--and now----'

She did not finish the sentence, hoping that Pina would really
understand.

'Yes,' the woman said quietly. 'You have not been alone together for a
moment since we left Venice, and that is not what you expected.'

'No,' Ortensia answered in the hurt tone of a disappointed child, 'I
thought it was going to be quite different! And now we shall start again
and drive all day and half the night, and then it will be just the same,
I suppose!'

'Once in Florence, or even in Bologna, there will be no more hurry,'
said Pina in a consoling tone. 'Besides, my lady, you can be properly
married then.'

'Of course, of course! We shall be married as soon as we can, but all
the same----'

'All the same, it would be pleasant to spend half-an-hour together
without old Pina always listening and looking on!'

The nurse smiled and shook her head, but Ortensia could not see her, and
did not think her tone was very encouraging; it sounded as if 'old Pina'
thought it was going to be her duty to play chaperon two or three days
longer, which was not at all what Ortensia wished.

'If he had even shown that he was a