I had stepped into the gondola by this time, my first thought being how best to straighten out the quarrel.

“Now tell me, Luigi—­speak slowly, so I do not miss a word.  First, where is Loretta?”

“She was putting on her best clothes when I left—­ those she bought herself.  She will touch nothing Vittorio gave her.  She is going back to her mother in an hour.”

“But what happened?  Has Francesco—?”

“Francesco has not stopped one minute since the wedding.  He has been talking to the fish-people,—­ to everybody on the side street, saying that Loretta was his old shoes that he left at his door, and the fool Vittorio found them and put them on—­that sort of talk.”

“And Vittorio believes it?”

“He did not at first,—­but twice Francesco came to see Loretta with messages from her mother, and went sneaking off when Vittorio came up in his boat, and then that night some one would tell him—­’that fellow meets Loretta every day;’ that he was her old lover.  These people on the Giudecca do not like the San Giuseppe people, and there is always jealousy.  If Vittorio had married any one from his own quarter it would have been different.  You don’t know these people, Signore,—­how devilish they can be and how stupid.”

“That was why he threw the ring in her face?”

“No and yes.  Yesterday was Sunday, and some people came to see her from San Giuseppe, and they began to talk.  I was not there; I did not get there until it was all over, but my wife heard it.  They were all in the garden, and one word led to another, and he taunted her with seeing Francesco, and she laughed, and that made him furious; and then he said he had heard her mother was a nobody; and then some one spoke up and said that was true—­fools all.  And then Loretta, she drew herself up straight and asked who it was had said so, and a woman’s voice came—­’Francesco,—­he told me—­’ and then Vittorio cried—­’And you meet him here.  Don’t deny it!  And you love him, too!—­’ and then the fool sprang at her and caught her hand and tore the ring from her finger and spat on it and threw it on the ground.  He is now at his father’s house.”

“And she said nothing, Luigi?” The story seemed like some horrible dream.

“No, nor shed a tear.  All she did was to keep repeating—­’Francesco!  Francesco!  Francesco!’ I got there at daylight this morning and have been there ever since.  I told her I was coming for you.  She was sitting in a chair when I went in,—­bolt up; she had not been in her bed.  She seems like one in a trance—­looked at me and held out her hand.  I tried to talk to her and tell her it was all a lie, but she only answered—­’Ask Francesco,—­it is all Francesco,—­ask Francesco.’  Hurry, Signore,—­ we will miss her if we go to her house.  We will go at once to our canal and wait for her.  They have heard nothing down there at San Giuseppe, and you can talk to her without being interrupted, and then I’ll get hold of Vittorio.  This way, Signore.”