Meantime the Senator had been deliberating how to begin. He felt that he could not show his bundle of clothes to so fair and fine a creature as this, whose manners were so soft and whose smile so pleasant. He would do any thing first. He would try a roundabout way of making known his wishes, trusting to his own powers and the intelligence of the lady for a full and complete understanding. Just as he had come to this conclusion there was a timid knock at the door. "Come in," said the Senator, who began to feel a little awkward already. "_Epermesso_?" said a soft sweet voice, "_se puo entrare_?" and Signora Mirandolina Rocca advanced into the room, giving one look at the Senator, and then casting down her eyes. "_Umilissia serva di Lei, Signore, mi commandi_." But the Senator was in a quandary. What could he do? How begin? What gesture would be the most fitting for a beginning? The pause began to be embarrassing. The lady, however, as yet was calm--calmer, in fact, than when she entered. So she spoke once more. "_Di che ha Ella bisogna, Illustris simo_?" The Senator was dreadfully embarrassed. The lady was so fair in his eyes. Was this a woman who could contemplate the fact of soiled linen? Never. "Ehem!" said he. Then he paused. "_Servo, devota_," said Signora Mirandolina. "_Che c'e, Signore_." Then looking up, she saw the face of the Senator all rosy red, turned toward her, with a strange confusion and embarrassment in his eye, yet it was a kind eye--a soft, kind eye. "_Egli e forse innamorato di me_," murmured the lady, gathering new courage as she saw the timidity of the other. "_Che grandezza_!" she continued, loud enough for the Senator to hear, yet speaking as if to herself. "_Che bellezza_! _un galantuomo, certamente--e quest' e molto piacevole_." She glanced at the manly figure of the Senator with a tender admiration in her eye which she could not repress, and which was so intelligible to the Senator that he blushed more violently than ever, and looked helplessly around him. "_E innamorato di me, senza dubio_," said the Signora, "_vergogna non vuol che si sapesse_." The Senator at length found voice. Advancing toward the lady he looked at her very earnestly and as she thought very piteously--held out both his hands, then smiled, then spread his hands apart, then nodded and smiled again, and said-- "Me--me--want--ha--hum--ah! You know--me--gentleman--hum--me --Confound the luck," he added, in profound vexation. "_Signore_," said Mirandolina, "_la di Lei gentelezza me confonde_." The Senator turned his eyes all around, everywhere, in a desperate half-conscious search for escape from an embarrassing situation. "_Signore noi ci siamo sole, nessuno ci senti_," remarked the Signora, encouragingly. "Me want to tell you this!" burst forth the Senator. "Clothes--you know--washy--washy." Whereupon he elevated his eyebrows, smiled, and brought the tips of his fingers together.