GIORGIO

"It is not a good plan to leave the square from the steps in front of
the two great columns," Rafael explained, as he went toward the
landing-place opposite the Doge's palace, where he always moored his
boat.

"Why is it not a good plan?" asked Edith.

"Because it might later make us run into a mud-bank," he answered
merrily. "Whenever any one is executed in Venice, it has to be done
between those two columns, and that has made the spot most unlucky.
People used to gamble there before it was the place for executions,
but now, of course, no one thinks of such a thing."

"I should hope not," said Mrs. Sprague, "nor anywhere else."

"The only Doge that was ever beheaded, landed between those columns,"
continued Rafael, "and since then there are people who would not dare
to use the steps, for fear it might bring them ill-luck."

"I am going to get into your boat from those very steps," said Edith,
walking toward them.

Her mother, who was already seated in the boat, looked troubled. "He
may be right, Edith," she called to her daughter. "You know that I am
afraid of the water, and you promised not to take any chances if I
would bring you to Italy."

But Edith insisted that she should get into the boat from the steps,
or not at all. "There is no danger," she said. "These Italians are too
superstitious. See how they are always closing one hand and pointing
down two of its fingers to ward off the evil eye. I am going to show
Rafael how foolish all these notions are."

The boy looked at her in anger. He had sometimes closed his own hand
in the way Edith described, when he met old Beppo, the brown monk from
one of the islands in the lagoon; and had often gone out of his way to
meet the hunchback, Tonio, because it is well-known in Venice that the
sight of a hunchback brings good luck.

Now, when he heard Edith speak so contemptuously of his cherished
beliefs, he felt a flame of resentment. Standing quietly in his boat,
he said, "Signorina, we go not from those landing-steps in my boat."

Edith saw that he meant what he said. "I am sorry that I hurt your
feelings," she said, with a pretty air of penitence; "but if you will
kindly take me from these steps, I will make a gift to the patron
saint of the fishermen, if we find a shrine at the Lido."

Rafael melted at once. "It is not that I was afraid," he told her, as
she stepped into the boat from the unlucky steps, "but I cannot have
the ways of my country