“And new convictions,” interrupted Del Ferice; “you who were always arguing about convictions!”

“I had none; that is the reason I argued about them.  I have plenty now—­I argue no longer.”

“You are wise,” retorted Ugo.  “Those you have got will never bear discussion.”

“Excuse me,” answered Gouache; “if you will take the trouble to be introduced to his Eminence Cardinal Antonelli—­”

Donna Tullia held up her hands in horror.

“That horrible man!  That Mephistopheles!” she cried.

“That Macchiavelli!  That arch-enemy of our holy liberty!” exclaimed Del Ferice, in theatrical tones.

“Exactly,” answered Gouache.  “If he could be induced to devote a quarter of an hour of his valuable time to talking with you, he would turn your convictions round his finger.”

“This is too much!” cried Del Ferice, angrily.

“I think it is very amusing,” said Donna Tullia, “What a pity that all Liberals are not artists, whom his Eminence could engage to paint his portrait and be converted at so much an hour!”

Gouache smiled quietly, and went on with his work.

“So he told you to go and turn Zouave,” remarked Donna Tullia, after a pause, “and you submitted like a lamb.”

“So far was the Cardinal from advising me to turn soldier, that he expressed the greatest surprise when I told him of my intention,” returned Gouache, rather coldly.

“Indeed it is enough to take away even a cardinal’s breath,” answered Madame Mayer.  “I was never, never so surprised in my life!”

Gouache stood up to get a view of his work, and Donna Tullia looked at him critically.

“Tiens!” she exclaimed, “it is rather becoming—­what small ankles you have, Gouache!”

Anastase laughed.  It was impossible to be grave in the face of such utterly frivolous inconsistency.

“You will allow your expression to change so often, Donna Tullia!  It is impossible to catch it.”

“Like your convictions,” murmured Del Ferice from his corner.  Indeed Ugo did not know what to make of the scene.  He had miscalculated the strength of Donna Tullia’s fears as compared with her longing to possess a flattering portrait of herself.  Rather than leave the picture unfinished, she exhibited a cynical indifference to danger which would have done honour to a better man than Del Ferice.  Perhaps, too, she understood Gouache well enough to know that he might be trusted.  Indeed any one would have trusted Gouache.  Even Del Ferice was less disturbed at the possibility of the artist’s repeating any of the trivial liberal talk which he had listened to, than at the indifference to discovery shown by Donna Tullia.  To Del Ferice, the whole thing had been but a harmless play; but he wanted Madame Mayer to believe that it had all been in solemn earnest, and that she was really implicated in a dangerous plot; for it gave him a stronger hold upon her for his own ends.