of gossip. There was not that constant coming
and going of visitors in every degree of intimacy which might have been
expected in the house of a woman of Bianca Corleone's beauty and
position. The world is easily tired of unhappy people, and men soon
weary of worshipping a goddess who never smiles upon them. As for the
fact that Pietro Ghisleri was frequently at the villa, society refrained
from throwing stones, in consideration of the extreme brittleness of its
own glass dwelling. Ghisleri was disliked in Naples, because he was a
Tuscan; but Bianca, as a Roman, might have been more popular.

It need hardly be said that she preferred the isolation she enjoyed to a
gayer existence. To Veronica it seemed as though she herself had never
before known what liberty was. The whole mode of life was different from
anything to which she had been accustomed. The villa was near the
country, and its own grounds were not small. Bianca was passionately
fond of dogs and horses, for her father bred horses on his lands in the
Roman Campagna, and she had been accustomed to animals from her
childhood. She taught Veronica to ride, and the fearless young girl was
a good pupil. They rode out together early in the morning, westward,
towards Baiae, and up to the king's preserves, and often through some
lands of Veronica's which lay in the rich Falernian district within an
easy distance. A groom followed them. Ghisleri very rarely joined the
party.

Bianca Corleone had another accomplishment which was very unusual at
that time, and is still uncommon, among Italian women. She could fence,
and was fond of the exercise. She had been a delicate child, and it had
long been feared that her lungs were weak, so that she had been
encouraged from her earliest youth in everything which could contribute
towards increasing her strength. Her brother, Gianforte, had even as a
boy been a good fencer. He was devotedly attached to his only sister,
and as she had not gone to the convent school until she had been fifteen
years old, they had been constantly together until then, he being only a
couple of years older than she. One day she had taken up one of his
foils, laughing at the idea, and had made him show her how to hold it;
and he had forthwith amused her by teaching her to fence, on rainy days
in Rome, when she could not ride. It had seemed to do her good, and her
father had allowed her to have regular lessons, until she could handle a
foil very fairly, for