tious at the hospital, only telling, in answer to
the questions of the brethren there, that he had been made a prisoner by
the French on his way from Genoa. But his age, and the indications in
his speech and manner that he was of a different class from the ordinary
mendicants and poor travellers who were entertained in the hospital, had
induced the monks to offer him extra charity: a coarse woollen tunic to
protect him from the cold, a pair of peasant's shoes, and a few
_danari_, smallest of Florentine coins, to help him on his way. He had
gone on the road to Arezzo early in the morning; but he had paused at
the first little town, and had used a couple of his _danari_ to get
himself shaved, and to have his circle of hair clipped short, in his
former fashion. The barber there had a little hand-mirror of bright
steel: it was a long while, it was years, since Baldassarre had looked
at himself, and now, as his eyes fell on that hand-mirror, a new thought
shot through his mind. "Was he so changed that Tito really did not know
him?" The thought was such a sudden arrest of impetuous currents, that
it was a painful shock to him; his hand shook like a leaf, as he put
away the barber's arm and asked for the mirror. He wished to see
himself before he was shaved. The barber, noticing his tremulousness,
held the mirror for him.

No, he was not so changed as that. He himself had known the wrinkles as
they had been three years ago; they were only deeper now: there was the
same rough, clumsy skin, making little superficial bosses on the brow,
like so many cipher-marks; the skin was only yellower, only looked more
like a lifeless rind. That shaggy white beard--it was no disguise to
eyes that had looked closely at him for sixteen years--to eyes that
ought to have searched for him with the expectation of finding him
changed, as men search for the beloved among the bodies cast up by the
waters. There was something different in his glance, but it was a
difference that should only have made the recognition of him the more
startling; for is not a known voice all the more thrilling when it is
heard as a cry? But the doubt was folly: he had felt that Tito knew
him. He put out his hand and pushed the mirror away. The strong
currents were rushing on again, and the energies of hatred and vengeance
were active once more.

He went back on the way towards Florence again, but he did not wish to
enter the city till dusk; so he turned asid