y, do you?"

"No," said Baldassarre, also thinking aloud, rather than consciously
answering, "I only know one man."

"His name is not Nofri, is it?" said Tessa, anxiously.

"No," said Baldassarre, noticing her look of fear. "Is that your
husband's name?"

That mistaken supposition was very amusing to Tessa. She laughed and
clapped her hands as she said--

"No, indeed! But I must not tell you anything about my husband. You
would never think what he is--not at all like Nofri!"

She laughed again at the delightful incongruity between the name of
Nofri--which was not separable from the idea of the cross-grained
stepfather--and the idea of her husband.

"But I don't see him very often," she went on, more gravely. "And
sometimes I pray to the Holy Madonna to send him oftener, and once she
did. But I must go back to my bimbo now. I'll bring it to show you
to-morrow. You would like to see it. Sometimes it cries and makes a
face, but only when it's hungry, Monna Lisa says. You wouldn't think
it, but Monna Lisa had babies once, and they are all dead old men. My
husband says she will never die now, because she's so well dried. I'm
glad of that, for I'm fond of her. You would like to stay here
to-morrow, shouldn't you?"

"I should like to have this place to come and rest in, that's all," said
Baldassarre. "I would pay for it, and harm nobody."

"No, indeed; I think you are not a bad old man. But you look sorry
about something. Tell me, is there anything you shall cry about when I
leave you by yourself? _I_ used to cry once."

"No, child; I think I shall cry no more."

"That's right; and I'll bring you some breakfast, and show you the
bimbo. Good-night."

Tessa took up her bowl and lantern, and closed the door behind her. The
pretty loving apparition had been no more to Baldassarre than a faint
rainbow on the blackness to the man who is wrestling in deep waters. He
hardly thought of her again till his dreamy waking passed into the more
vivid images of disturbed sleep.

But Tessa thought much of him. She had no sooner entered the house than
she told Monna Lisa what she had done, and insisted that the stranger
should be allowed to come and rest in the outhouse when he liked. The
old woman, who had had her notions of making him a useful tenant, made a
great show of reluctance, shook her head, and urged that Messer Naldo
would be angry if she let any one come about the house. Tessa did not
believe