The mistress of the inn crossed herself devoutly.

“Guiosto cielo!—­Would Heaven punish a Cardinal?”

“Certainly!  If a Cardinal is a heretic!”

The stout padrona clasped her hands and shuddered.

“Not possible!”

“Quite possible!” And Gherardi drained his coffee-cup.  “And when so great a personage of the Church is a renegade, he incurs two punishments—­the punishment of God and the punishment of the Church!  The one comes first—­the other comes—­afterwards!  Buena notte!”

And throwing down the money for his refreshment, Gherardi cast another glance around him, muffled himself up in his coat and went out into the night.  Florian Varillo breathed again.  But he was not left in peace for long.  The padrona summoned her husband from the kitchen where he performed the offices of cook, to read the halfpenny sheets of news her visitor had left with her.

“Look you!” she said in a low voice, “The wicked Monsignor who has thee, my poor Paolo, in his clutches for debt, has just passed by and left evil tidings!—­that beautiful girl who painted the famous pictures in Rome, has been murdered!  Do you not remember seeing her once with her father at Frascati?”

Paolo, a round-faced, timid-looking little Piedmontese, nodded emphatically.

“That do I!” he answered—­“Fair as an angel—­kind-hearted too,—­and they told me she was a wonder of the world.  Che, che!  Murdered!  And who could have murdered her?  Someone jealous of her fame!  Poor thing—­she is engaged to be married too, to another artist named Florian Varillo.  Gran Dio!  He will die of this misery!” And they bent their heads over the paper together and read the brief announcement headed “Assassinamento di Angela Sovrani!”

A sudden crash startled them.  Varillo had sprung up from his table in haste and overset his glass.  It fell, shivering to atoms on the floor.

“Pardon!” he exclaimed, laughing forcedly,—­“A thousand apologies!  My hand slipped—­it was an accident—­”

“Do not trouble yourself, Signor,” said the landlord, Paolo, cautiously going down on his fat knees to pick up the fragments—­“It was an accident as you say.  And truly one’s nerves get shaken nowadays by all the strange things one is always hearing!  Myself, I tremble to think of the murder of the Sovrani—­the poor girl was so innocent of evil—­and see you!—­we might all be murdered in our beds with such villains about . . .”

He broke off, surprised at the angry oath Varillo uttered.

“Per Dio!  Can you not talk of something else?” he said hoarsely,—­ “There is a murder nearly every day in Rome!”