"Eh, that is precisely what I was saying just now," said Aunt Porredda. "Beautiful streets, if you will; but--when it comes to buying anything--the pennies have to be counted down! I've been told all about it! On my word, they say that there are no provisions stored in the houses as there are here, and you all know for yourselves that with no provisions in the house it is not easy to satisfy one's appetite!" Aunt Bachissia nodded affirmatively; she knew only too well what happens when there is nothing in a house to eat. "Is that true or not, Dr. Porreddu?" "True, perfectly true," said he, laughing, and eating, and waving his large, white hands with their long nails, in the air. "It is that that makes him such a leech, a regular vampire," said Uncle Efes Maria, turning to his guests. "I'll not have a drop of blood left in my veins. Body of the devil! how the money must go in Rome!" "Ah, if you only knew!" sighed Paolo. "Everything, every single thing is so frightfully dear. Twenty centimes for a single peach! There, I feel better now." "Twenty centimes!" exclaimed all the company in chorus. "Well, Aunt Bachissia, and then? After Costantino came back?" asked Paolo. "Well, Paolo Porru--you see I go on addressing you familiarly, even though you will be a doctor soon; when you were a little chap I used to go so far as to give you a cuff now and then----" "I have no recollection of it, but go on with your story," said the young man, while Grazia's nostrils fairly dilated with anger. "Well, as I said, Costantino disappeared for three years, and----" "He was working in the mines, all right; then he came back and was reconciled to his uncle. What then?"