airs and
graces in addition, fortunately, to the same old smile. Later on he
spent the obligatory two years in barracks, in a regiment of
Bersaglieri, and came back to Avenel's service plus a still more
varied knowledge of the world, a waxed moustache, and a superficial
tendency to atheism. He was always delighted to air his views, and he
fixed the shocked waiter now with a glittering eye as he proceeded to
recite his unbelief at some length.

"God is merely man's idea of himself at his best, and the devil is his
idea of other people at their worst," he concluded.

"Would you spend a night alone in this haunted house?"

"_Sicuro!_"

"Perhaps you will have to if your master takes the place. He has gone
to look at it."

Vincenzo gulped down the last of his coffee. "I must go," he said, but
he was much too Italian to understand that a man in a hurry need not
count his change twice over or bite every piece of silver to make
sure of it.

It was nearly one o'clock when, having outdistanced the pack of
beggars that followed at his heels through the narrow streets of the
town, he came out upon the broad, tree-shadowed upper road. He had
stopped for a moment in the shelter of the high wall of the Capuchin
convent to light a cigarette, and thereafter he went on unseeingly, in
a brown study. Had he or had he not paid two soldi more than he should
have done for the packet? A Calabrian would cheat, if possible, of
course.

When, after much mental arithmetic, Vincenzo solved the problem to his
own satisfaction the little scrap of bad tobacco in its paper lining
was smoked out. He looked at his watch, a Christmas present from Jean,
and seeing that it was past the hour he began to wonder. There were no
ghosts, and in any case they were not dangerous in broad daylight.
There were no ghosts, but what was the signorino doing all this while
in an empty house? The car was there, drawn up at the side of the road
under the trees, and Vincenzo fussed round it, pulling the tarpaulin
covers more over the seats; he had them in place when it occurred to
him to look underneath for the fur rug. It was not there.

"_Dio mio!_" he cried excitedly. "It has been stolen."

Someone passing by must have seen it and taken it, probably someone
with a cart, as it would be heavy to carry. The thief could not have
gone far, and Vincenzo thought that if he drove the car towards Castel
Gandolfo he might catch him, whoever he was--charcoal-burner from