Very strange his manner was,--very! And very ill he
looked, too. Everybody has been saying that be looked ill,--that he
looked old,--that there must be something wrong with him. Wrong with
a vengeance! So this was the cause of it all: the Marchese Lamberto
is in love! Bah!--Bah!!--Bah!!!--(with crescendo expression of
disgust). Poor devil! Well, I was in love once, or fancied myself
so. But then. I was twenty-five years old. Un altro paio di maniche!
And I very soon found out my mistake. But he, at his time of life!
And such a woman! Well, the Emperor Justinian married Theodora. So,
I suppose we Ravennati have authority for madness in that kind. And
that poor good fellow, the Marchese Ludovico, too! It is too bad.
And all because such a creature as that is cunning enough to know
how to drive a hard bargain for the painted face she has to sell.
But that is the sort of woman who can make that sort of conquest. A
good woman now, who would have made him an honoured and good wife,
would never have made such a blind, abject slave of him. He is
bewitched! He is mad! and ought not to be allowed to carry out so
insane a project! Perhaps it may still be possible to induce him to
hear reason. It was very odd, that way, that just at last he
promised me he would think of it again before he finally decided.
Very odd.
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