ule, in honour of his lady, was drinking for
the last time out of his golden cup, a young voice over my shoulder
demanded two soldi. I turned and thought I recognised the speaker;
surely he must have left his dolphin in the Great Harbour where the
Phoenician traders used to moor their ships, and put on his sailor suit
at the Custom House.

"Very well, Cupid," I replied, "I don't mind giving you two soldi, but
why do you ask as though you were entitled to them? And why do you wear
that red tam-o'-shanter? And how old are you, if you please?"

He said he was seven and the cap was his uniform; he was collecting the
pennies for the chairs. So I gave him two soldi and another for himself
and saw him scamper happily away and join a knot of brother Cupids who
were playing together round a lamp-post. He showed them the soldo I had
given him for himself and the meeting became as ebullient and full of
excitement as the Arethusa herself.

He reappeared while Siebel, with the voice of a clarinet, was beginning
to tell the flowers what they were to say to Margherita. This time he
brought a foreign penny and wanted to know why they had refused to take
it at the marionette theatre. I looked at it and said:

"If you want to know about this coin, mount your dolphin again and direct
his course to distant Argentina, the people of that country will tell you
all about it and will give you its full value. You will have a
delightful voyage and, if I were not such a bad sailor, I believe I
should ask you to take me with you."

It seemed, however, that his dolphin was tired and I was to give him ten
centimes down and done with it. He was such a jolly little fellow that
just for the pleasure of seeing him smile again I gave him the soldi in
exchange for his coin and he danced away in delight.

Margherita in prison was crazily recalling the strains of the waltz she
had heard--Ah, what ages ago it seemed!--when she was yet a happy girl,
as pure as Arethusa in Hellas, and through the waltz I heard the young
voice again over my shoulder. He was asking me to give him bronze for an
Italian nickel piece of twenty centesimi. It was a bad one. I told him
so and accused him of attempting to utter counterfeit coin. He laid his
two hands on his breast, raised his elbows, threw back his head with
conscious innocence and swore on the honour of his mother that the coin
was good. He did it so well--so beautifully--that for a moment I was
tem