t
Aurora would wave it aside with a careless, "You know I couldn't read it
if I wanted to." At the end of the murmured conference Aurora would say,
"Will you go and get my porte-monnaie? It's in my top drawer," and when
this had been brought, her dimpled hand would take from it and give to
Clotilde bills of twenty, of fifty, of a hundred francs, hardly
appearing to count. Sometimes she would say: "I'm afraid I haven't
enough. I shall have to make out a check."

Gerald's _flair_, and knowledge of his Florence, enabled him
perfectly to divine what was in question. He was only puzzled as to why
these transactions should not have taken place at a more private hour,
and acutely observed that they took place when they could, this being
when Estelle was out of the way. Clotilde also had _flair_.

After Clotilde had retired, Aurora one morning, having imperfectly
understood what her money was wanted for, puckered her brows over the
letters that, through an oversight, had remained in her hands. She held
one out to Gerald to translate. It was from the united chorus-singers of
Florence, a simple, direct, and ingenuous appeal for a gratuity. Another
letter was from a poor young girl who wished for money to buy her
wedding outfit. Another from a poor man out of work.

Gerald could have laughed. But he did not; nor made any remark. He did
not dislike seeing those voracious maws stuffed with a fat morsel. He
knew as much of the real poverty in Florence as of the innocent
impudence of many poor, with their lingering medieval outlook upon the
relations of the poor and the rich. He sided with those against these.
Singularly, perhaps, he regarded himself as belonging among the latter,
the rich. He was glad the chorus-singers and the _sposina_ and the
worried _padre di famiglia_ were going to be made glad by rich
crumbs from Aurora's board. But he could not help uneasiness for the
future, when the famished locusts, still approaching single scout,
should precipitate themselves in battalions, when the whole of Florence
should have got the glad tidings and gathered impetus....

Well, Clotilde was there. Clotilde would know pertinent discourses to
hold to the brazen beggars when their shamelessness passed bounds.
Meanwhile Gerald could see that she enjoyed this distributing of good
things among her fellow-citizens. Not that she was strongly disposed to
charity. He did not believe she gave away anything of her own, but she
loved to see Auro