We found the lady sitting in an arm-chair, looking very tired.  She was young, beautiful, and melancholy-looking, and in her hands she held a brass crucifix some six inches long.  She laid it down when we came in, and got up and received us most graciously.  Her companion, who was arranging cockle-shells on his black mantle, did not stir; he seemed to say, by glancing at his wife, that we must confine our attentions to her.  He seemed a man of twenty-four or twenty-five years of age.  He was short and badly hung, and his face bore all the indications of daring, impudence, sarcasm, and imposture.  His wife, on the other hand, was all meekness and simplicity, and had that modesty which adds so much to the charm of feminine beauty.  They only spoke just enough French to make themselves understood on their journey, and when they heard me addressing them in Italian they seemed much relieved.

The lady told me she was a Roman, but I could have guessed as much from her accent.  I judged the man to be a Neapolitan or Sicilian.  Their passport, dated Rome, called him Balsamo, while she bore the names of Serafina Feliciani, which she still retains.  Ten years later we shall hear more of this couple under the name of Cagliostro.

“We are going back to Rome,” said she, “well pleased with our devotions to St. James of Compostella and to Our Lady del Pilar.  We have walked the whole way on foot, living on alms, so as to more surely win the mercy of the God whom I have offended so grievously.  We have had silver, and even gold money given us, and in every town we came to we gave what remained to the poor, so as not to offend God by lack of faith.

“My husband is strong, and has not suffered much, but I have found so much walking very fatiguing.  We have slept on straw or bad beds, always with our clothes on, to avoid contracting diseases it would be hard to rid one’s self of.”

It seemed to me that this last circumstance was added to make us wish to find out whether the rest of her body could compare with her hands and arms in whiteness.

“Do you think of making any stay?”

“My weariness will oblige us to stay here for three days; then we shall go to Rome by the way of Turin, where we shall pay our devotion to the Holy Sudary.”

“You know, of course, that there are several of them in Europe.”

“So we have heard, but we are assured that the Sudary of Turin is the true one.  It is the kerchief with which St. Veronica wiped the face of Our Lord, who left the imprint of His divine face upon it.”

We left them, well pleased with the appearance and manners of the lady pilgrim, but placing very little trust in her devotion.  I was still weak from my illness, and she inspired me with no desires, but the rest would have gladly supped with her if they had thought there was anything to follow.

Next day her husband asked me if I would come up and breakfast with them, or if they should come down and breakfast with me.  It would have been impolite to have replied neither, so I said that I should be delighted to see them in my room.