love him; I used only to want you to love
me."

"And did you expect me to come again so soon?" said Tito, inclined to
make her prattle. He still felt the effects of the agitation he had
undergone--still felt like a man who has been violently jarred; and this
was the easiest relief from silence and solitude.

"Ah, no," said Tessa, "I have counted the days--to-day I began at my
right thumb again--since you put on the beautiful chain-coat, that
Messer San Michele gave you to take care of you on your journey. And
you have got it on now," she said, peeping through the opening in the
breast of his tunic. "Perhaps it made you come back sooner."

"Perhaps it did, Tessa," he said. "But don't mind the coat now. Tell
me what has happened since I was here. Did you see the tents in the
Prato, and the soldiers and horsemen when they passed the bridges--did
you hear the drums and trumpets?"

"Yes, and I was rather frightened, because I thought the soldiers might
come up here. And Monna Lisa was a little afraid too, for she said they
might carry our kids off; she said it was their business to do mischief.
But the Holy Madonna took care of us, for we never saw one of them up
here. But something has happened, only I hardly dare tell you, and that
is what I was saying more Aves for."

"What do you mean, Tessa?" said Tito, rather anxiously. "Make haste and
toll me."

"Yes, but will you let me sit on your knee? because then I think I shall
not be so frightened."

He took her on his knee, and put his arm round her, but looked grave: it
seemed that something unpleasant must pursue him even here.

"At first I didn't mean to tell you," said Tessa, speaking almost in a
whisper, as if that would mitigate the offence; "because we thought the
old man would be gone away before you came again, and it would be as if
it had not been. But now he is there, and you are come, and I never did
anything you told me not to do before. And I want to tell you, and then
you will perhaps forgive me, for it is a long while before I go to
confession."

"Yes, tell me everything, my Tessa." He began to hope it was after all
a trivial matter.

"Oh, you will be sorry for him: I'm afraid he cries about something when
I don't see him. But that was not the reason I went to him first; it
was because I wanted to talk to him and show him my baby, and he was a
stranger that lived nowhere, and I thought you wouldn't care so much
about my talking to him