for any penal reasons, but
because only the opposite window had the luxury of glass in it: the
weather was not warm, and a round hole four inches in diameter served
all the purposes of observation. The hole was, unfortunately, a little
too high, and obliged the small observer to stand on a low stool of a
rickety character; but Tessa would have stood a long while in a much
more inconvenient position for the sake of seeing a little variety in
her life. She had been drawn to the opening at the first loud tones of
the strange voice speaking to Monna Lisa; and darting gently across her
room every now and then to peep at something, she continued to stand
there until the wood had been chopped, and she saw Baldassarre enter the
outhouse, as the dusk was gathering, and seat himself on the straw.

A great temptation had laid hold of Tessa's mind; she would go and take
that old man part of her supper, and talk to him a little. He was not
deaf like Monna Lisa, and besides she could say a great many things to
him that it was no use to shout at Monna Lisa, who knew them already.
And he was a stranger--strangers came from a long way off and went away
again, and lived nowhere in particular. It was naughty, she knew, for
obedience made the largest part in Tessa's idea of duty; but it would be
something to confess to the Padre next Pasqua, and there was nothing
else to confess except going to sleep sometimes over her beads, and
being a little cross with Monna Lisa because she was so deaf; for she
had as much idleness as she liked now, and was never frightened into
telling white lies. She turned away from her shutter with rather an
excited expression in her childish face, which was as pretty and pouting
as ever. Her garb was still that of a simple contadina, but of a
contadina prepared for a festa: her gown of dark-green serge, with its
red girdle, was very clean and neat; she had the string of red glass
beads round her neck; and her brown hair, rough from curliness, was duly
knotted up, and fastened with the silver pin. She had but one new
ornament, and she was very proud of it, for it was a fine gold ring.

Tessa sat on the low stool, nursing her knees, for a minute or two, with
her little soul poised in fluttering excitement on the edge of this
pleasant transgression. It was quite irresistible. She had been
commanded to make no acquaintances, and warned that if she did, all her
new happy lot would vanish away, and be like a hi