He was putting his arms about the boy to lift him when a slippery-sloppery step was heard on the stairs, followed by a hurried knock at the door.

It was the old Garibaldian porter, breathless, bareheaded, and in his slippers.

"Father!" cried Elena.

"It's she. She's coming up."

At the next moment a lady in evening dress was standing in the hall. It was Donna Roma. She had unclasped her ermine cloak, and her bosom was heaving with the exertion of the ascent.

"May I speak to Mr. Rossi?" she began, and then looking beyond Elena and seeing him, where he stood above the sleeping child, a qualm of faintness seemed to seize her, and she closed her eyes for a moment.

David Rossi's face flushed to the roots of his hair, but he stepped forward, bowed deeply, led the way to the sitting-room, and, with a certain incoherency in his speech, said:

"Come in! Elena will bring the lamp. I shall be back presently."

Then, lifting little Joseph in his arms, he carried him up to bed, tucked him in his cot, smoothed his pillow, made the sign of the cross over his forehead, and came back to the sitting-room with the air of a man walking in a dream.

VIII

Being left alone, Roma looked around, and at a glance she took in everything--the thin carpet, the plain chintz, the prints, the incongruous furniture. She saw the photograph on the piano, still standing open, with a cylinder exposed, and in the interval of waiting she felt almost tempted to touch the spring. She saw herself, too, in the mirror above the mantel-piece, with her glossy black hair rolled up like a tower, from which one curly lock escaped on to her forehead, and with the ermine cloak on her shoulders over the white silk muslin which clung to her full figure.

Then she heard David Rossi's footsteps returning, and though she was now completely self-possessed she was conscious of a certain shiver of fear, such as an actress feels in her dressing-room at the tuning-up of the orchestra. Her back was to the door and she heard the whirl of her skirt as he entered, and then he was before her, and they were alone.

He was looking at her out of large, pensive eyes, and she saw him pass his hand over them and then bow and motion her to a seat, and go to the mantel-piece and lean on it. She was tingling all over, and a certain glow was going up to her face, but when she spoke she was mistress of herself, and her voice was soft and natural.

"I am doing a very unusual thing in coming to see you," she said, "but you have forced me to it, and I am quite helpless."

A faint sound came from him, and she was aware that he was leaning forward to see her face, so she dropped her eyes, partly to let him look at her, and partly to avoid meeting his gaze.

"I heard your speech in the piazza this morning. It would be useless to disguise the fact that some of its references were meant for me."

He did not speak, and she played with the glove in her lap, and continued in the same soft voice:

"If I were a man, I suppose I should challenge you. Being a woman, I can only come to you and tell you that you are wrong."

"Wrong?"

"Cruelly, terribly, shamefully wrong."

"You mean to tell me...."

He was stammering in a husky voice, and she said quite calmly:

"I mean to tell you that in substance and in fact what you implied was false."

There was a dry glitter in her eyes which she tried to subdue, for she knew that he was looking at her still.

"If ... if...."--his voice was thick and indistinct--"if you tell me that I have done you an injury...."

"You have--a terrible injury."

She could hear his breathing, but she dared not look up, lest he should see something in her face.

"Perhaps you think it strange," she said, "that I should ask you to accept my assurance only. But though you have done me a great wrong I believe you will accept it."

"If ... if you give me your solemn word of honour that what I said--what I implied--was false, that rumour and report have slandered you, that it is all a cruel and baseless calumny...."

She raised her head, looked him full in the face.

"I _do_ give it," she said.

"Then I believe you," he answered. "With all my heart and soul, I believe you."

She dropped her eyes again, and turning with her thumb an opal ring on her finger, she began to use the blandishments which had never failed with other men.

"I do not say that I am altogether without blame," she said. "I may have lived a thoughtless life amid scenes of poverty and sorrow. If so, perhaps it has been partly the fault of the men about me. When is a woman anything but what the men around have made her?"

She dropped her voice almost to a whisper, and added: "You are the first man who has not praised and flattered me."

"I was not thinking of you," he said. "I was thinking of another, and perhaps of the poor working women who, in a world of luxury, have to struggle and starve."

She looked up, and a half-smile crossed her face.

"I honour you for that," she said. "And perhaps if I had earlier met a man like you my life might have been different. I used to hope for such things long ago--that a man of high aims and noble purposes would come to meet me at the gate of life. Perhaps you have felt like that--that some woman, strong and true, would stand beside you for good or for ill, in your hour of danger and your hour of joy?"

Her voice was not quite steady--she hardly knew why.

"A dream! We all have our dreams," he said.

"A dream indeed! Men came--he was not among them. They pampered every wish, indulged every folly, loaded me with luxuries, but my dream was dispelled. I respected few of them, and reverenced none. They were my pastime, my playthings. And they have revenged themselves by saying in secret ... what you said in public this morning."

He was looking at her constantly with his wistful eyes, the eyes of a child, and through all the joy of her success she was conscious of a spasm of pain at the expression of his sad face and the sound of his tremulous voice.

"We men are much to blame," he said. "In the battle of man with man we deal out blows and think we are fighting fair, but we forget that behind our foe there is often a woman--a wife, a mother, a sister, a friend--and, God forgive us, we have struck her, too."

The half-smile that had gleamed on Roma's face was wiped out of it by these words, and an emotion she did not understand began to surge in her throat.

"You speak of poor women who struggle and starve," she said. "Would it surprise you to hear that _I_ know what it is to do that? Yes, and to be friendless and alone--quite, quite alone in a cruel and wicked city."

She had lost herself for a moment, and the dry glitter in her eyes had given way to a moistness and a solemn expression. But at the next instant she had regained her self-control, and went on speaking to avoid a painful silence.

"I have never spoken of this to any other man," she said. "I don't know why I should mention it to you--to you of all men."

She had risen to her feet, and he stepped up to her, and looking straight into her eyes he said:

"Have you ever seen me before?"

"Never," she answered.