It chanced that she came exactly at the right moment. As they approached the house they heard even louder cries and lamentations and railings than Piccino had heard in the morning. It appeared that old Beppo had repented his leniency and had come back for the donkey. He would not let it stay another night. He wanted to work it himself. He had brought his piece of rope and had fastened it to the pretty gray head already, while Piccino’s mother, Rita, wept and gesticulated and poured forth maledictions. The neighbors had come back to sympathize with her and find out what would happen, and the children had begun to cry and Annibale to swear, so that there was such a noise filling the air that if Lady Aileen had not been a cool and determined person she might have been alarmed. But she was not. She did not wait for Mr. Gordon to command order, but walked straight into the midst of the altercation. “What is the matter?” she demanded in Italian, “what is all this noise about?” Then, after their first start of surprise at seeing the grand lady, who was so plainly one of the rich _forestieri_, Rita and all her neighbors began to explain their wrongs at once. They praised the donkey and reviled Annibale, and proclaimed that old Beppo was a malefactor without a soul, and a robber of the widow and the fatherless. “Far better,” cried Rita, “that my children should be without a father. An idle, ugly brute, who takes their bread out of their poor mouths. To sell their one friend who keeps them—the donkey!” Old Beppo looked both sheepish and frightened when Lady Aileen turned upon him as he was beginning to try to shuffle away with his property at the end of his rope halter. “Stay where you are!” she said. “_Illustrissima_,” mumbled Beppo, “a thousand excuses. But I have work to do, and the donkey is mine. I have bought it. It is my donkey, _illustrissima_.” Lady Aileen knew Italy very well. She drew out her purse, that he might see it in her hand, before she turned away from him. “Stay where you are,” she said. “I shall have something to say to you later.” Then she turned to Rita. “Stop making a noise,” she said. “I want to talk to you.” “What could the illustrious signora have to say to a wretched woman?” Rita wept. “All her children must starve; she must starve herself; death from cold and hunger lay before them!” “No such thing,” said Lady Aileen. “I will buy your donkey back, and give you food and fuel for the winter—for more than one winter—if you will let me have what I want.” Rita and the neighbors exclaimed in chorus. If she could have what she wanted, the most illustrious signora! What could she want that a hovel could hold, and what could such poor creatures refuse her? Lady Aileen made a gesture towards Piccino, who had gone to stand by the donkey, and had big tears on his eyelashes as he fondled its nose.