rway, there were lamps suspended at the windows of all houses, so
that men could walk along no less securely and commodiously than by
day,--_fu gran magnificenza_.

Along those illuminated streets Tito Melema was walking at about eight
o'clock in the evening, on his way homeward. He had been exerting
himself throughout the day under the pressure of hidden anxieties, and
had at last made his escape unnoticed from the midst of after-supper
gaiety. Once at leisure thoroughly to face and consider his
circumstances, he hoped that he could so adjust himself to them and to
all probabilities as to get rid of his childish fear. If he had only
not been wanting in the presence of mind necessary to recognise
Baldassarre under that surprise!--it would have been happier for him on
all accounts; for he still winced under the sense that he was
deliberately inflicting suffering on his father: he would very much have
preferred that Baldassarre should be prosperous and happy. But he had
left himself no second path now: there could be no conflict any longer:
the only thing he had to do was to take care of himself.

While these thoughts were in his mind he was advancing from the Piazza
di Santa Croce along the Via dei Benci, and as he neared the angle
turning into the Borgo Santa Croce his ear was struck by a music which
was not that of evening revelry, but of vigorous labour--the music of
the anvil. Tito gave a slight start and quickened his pace, for the
sounds had suggested a welcome thought. He knew that they came from the
workshop of Niccolo Caparra, famous resort of all Florentines who cared
for curious and beautiful iron-work.

"What makes the giant at work so late?" thought Tito. "But so much the
better for me. I can do that little bit of business to-night instead of
to-morrow morning."

Preoccupied as he was, he could not help pausing a moment in admiration
as he came in front of the workshop. The wide doorway, standing at the
truncated angle of a great block or "isle" of houses, was surmounted by
a loggia roofed with fluted tiles, and supported by stone columns with
roughly carved capitals. Against the red light framed in by the outline
of the fluted tiles and columns stood in black relief the grand figure
of Niccolo, with his huge arms in rhythmic rise and fall, first hiding
and then disclosing the profile of his firm mouth and powerful brow.
Two slighter ebony figures, one at the anvil, the other at the bellows,
se