"The devil take you!" shouted the other, dragging at the girl. "She will have reasons enough! But the man who brought her, and paid me well too, said, 'Ship her to Ostia and place her in safe hands there, and take care she don't get back again.' He had his reasons too, I fancy, and reasons that he backed with good arguments. The baggage! She has been up to some mischief! If she was the blessed innocent she pretends to be now, why did she not make a fuss when the man brought her? But what do you think? then she was as quiet as a mouse, only cried and sobbed, and kissed the man till it made him quite sad, and he promised to come and see her in Ostia; and now, why should she take a fancy to run away--the cat! as soon as I turned my back--and struggled and screamed half along the street when I wanted to do my duty and place her in safety again? Tell me that if you can! No! away with the witch, and hold your jaw; and _accidenti_ on any one who gets in my way." "I _cannot_, I _will_ not go back," cried the girl's voice: "this man is false; he insulted me shamefully; he breaks his agreement; save me!" "Who will believe you, you liar! who only lie to get away, and to abuse me? Away with your hands, I say, and back to the cabin." "Halt!" thundered a voice suddenly. The contending parties turned round startled, and saw Theodore breaking through the crowd to place his hand on the girl's arm. "She is mine." he cried, "and goes with me." There was a pause. Caterina had recognized the young man instantaneously. Wavering between joy and bitter doubt, she stood with downcast eyes. "Do you take us for children?" cried the sailor, "to think that we are going to be made fools of by the first fellow who comes by? If you want a sweetheart, you will find plenty on the Corso for gold and good words. Who told you to thrust your oar in, and with a style as if you had the best right in the world?" "I have," said Theodore, loudly and firmly; "I have--for she is my wife!" "His wife!" ran through the crowd. The nearest drew back a step. "Your wife! that you must prove--or it may be,--halt!" interrupted the sailor. "Tell us her name, sir, her name! a husband generally knows so much of his wife, even though he don't know what she is about in the streets late at night." "Caterina," said Theodore, "do you know me?" "Yes," answered the girl. "Caterina!" murmured the sailor; "it is right--so the other one called her." "You will go with me, Caterina?" said Theodore--"you will tell me the reason why you have left me, and forced me to seek you up and down the streets of Rome in anger and fear? So! to Ostia? and he was going to meet you there? It is enough--come!" He spoke so sternly, and with a face in which sorrow and anger were so plainly written that no one doubted him for a moment. "It is her husband," they whispered: "she was going to run off with the other. God pity him, when he falls into his hands, as she has done!"