"What does she think him?" murmured the girl. Then she turned away with him, and, with the lamb at their heels, they walked together back along the grassy road. "You look very serious," remarked her protector. "You are sure it is not fright?" She shook her head, holding up her bundle of letters. "Bad news?" "No, good," she answered, smiling bravely. "I hope good news will be infrequent," he answered. "You look like Iphigenia going to be sacrificed." "I will admit that there is a problem," said the girl. "There's a question about my doing something." "And you know it must be right to do it because you hate it?" he asked. She nodded. "Don't you think so, too? Now when you answer," she added triumphantly, "I shall know what kind of god you are." They had reached the turning of the ways, and he stopped, as if intending to leave her. "I cannot help you," he said sadly, "for I do not know the case. Only, I think it is best not to decide by any abstruse rule. Life is life's best teacher, and out of one's last experience comes insight for the next. But don't be too sure that duty and unhappiness are one." She left him, standing by the little wayside shrine with a strange look on his face. A tortured Christ hung there, casting the shadow of pain upon the passers-by. The expression in the brown eyes of the heathen god haunted her all the way down the hill, and throughout the day: they seemed to understand, and yet be glad. CHAPTER X It was nine o'clock as the Signorina descended the stairs. Through the open doorway morning met her, crisp and cool, with sunshine touching grass and green branch, still wet with dew. The very footfalls of the girl on the shallow marble steps were eager and expectant, and her face was gayer than those of the nymphs in the frescoes on the wall. At the bottom of the stairs, Giacomo met her, his face wreathed in smiles. "Bertuccio has returned," he announced. "Si, si, Signorina," came the voice of Assunta, who was pushing her way through the dining-room door behind Giacomo. She had on her magenta Sunday shawl, and the color of her wrinkled cheeks almost matched it. "What is Bertuccio?" asked the girl. "A kitten?" "A kitten!" gasped Assunta. "Corpo di Bacco!" swore Giacomo. Then the two brown ones devoted mind and body to explanation. Giacomo gesticulated and waved the napkin he had in his hand; Assunta shook her black silk apron: and they both spoke at once. "Il mio Bertuccio! It is my little son, Signorina, and my only, and the Signorina has never seen his like. When he was three years old he wore clothing for five years, and now he is six inches taller than his father." This and much more said Assunta, and she said it as one word. Giacomo, keeping pace and giving syllable for syllable, remarked:--