Antonio-Pericles has gold ears for everything that concerns the
signorina. "A patriot is she!" he says; and he is jealous of your
English friends. He thinks they will distract you from your studies; and
perhaps"--Luigi nodded sagaciously before he permitted himself to say--
"perhaps he is jealous in another way. I have heard him speak like a
sonnet of the signorina's beauty. The Signor Antonio-Pericles thinks
that you have come here to-day to meet them. When he heard that you were
going to leave Milan for Baveno, he was mad, and with two fists up,
against all English persons. The Englishman who is an Austrian officer
is quartered at Verona, and the Signor Antonio-Pericles said that the
Englishman should not meet you yet, if he could help it."

Victoria stood brooding. "Who can it be,--who is an Englishman, and an
Austrian officer, and knows me?"

"Signorina, I don't know names. Behold, that Beppo is approaching like
the snow! What I entreat is, that the signorina will wait a little for
the English party, if they come, so that I may have something to tell my
patron. To invent upon nothing is most unpleasant, and the Signor
Antonio can soon perceive whether one swims with corks. Signorina, I can
dance on one rope--I am a man. I am not a midge--I cannot dance upon
nothing."

The days of Vittoria's youth had been passed in England. It was not
unknown to her that old English friends were on the way to Italy; the
recollection of a quiet and a buried time put a veil across her features.
She was perplexed by the mention of the Austrian officer by Luigi, as one
may be who divines the truth too surely, but will not accept it for its
loathsomeness. There were Englishmen in the army of Austria. Could one
of them be this one whom she had cared for when she was a girl? It