The old woman smiled, showing her yellow teeth and wished me _buona sera_, to which I replied in her own tongue, for the position of servants in Italy is far different from their position with us. Your Tuscan house-woman is part of the family, and after a few years of faithful service is taken into the family council, consulted upon everything, controls expenditure, makes bargains, and is, to her _padrone_, quite indispensable. Old Marietta was a typical _donna di casa_, one of those faithful patient women with a sharp tongue to all the young men who so continuously ran after the young _padrona_, and only civil to me because I was a friend of the "signore." She was shrewd enough to continue to be present at our leave-taking, though it was doubtful whether she knew English sufficiently to understand what passed between us. I saw that Marietta intended I should go, therefore I wished her young _padrona_ adieu. She held her breath for a moment as our hands clasped, and I saw in her brown eyes a look of blank despair. "Be courageous," I said, in a low voice. "The future may not hold for you such terrors as you believe." "Future!" she echoed. "I have no future. _Addio_." And I went down the wide, ill-lit stone staircase full of dismal foreboding, and out from the secret lair of the thief who was notorious, but whom the police of Europe had always failed to arrest. CHAPTER TWENTY NINE. CONTAINS ANOTHER SURPRISE. I dined at a small table alone in the big crowded _table-d'hote_ room of the hotel. About me were some of the most exclusive set in Italy, well-dressed men and women, Roman princes, marquises and counts, with a fair sprinkling of the Hebrew fraternity. At the table next mine sat a young prince of great wealth together with the fair American girl to whom he was engaged to be married, and the young lady's mother. The prince and his fiancee were speaking Italian, and the old lady from Idaho City, understanding no other language but her own, seemed to be having anything but an amusing time. All this, however, interested me but little. I was reflecting upon the events of that afternoon, trying to devise some means by which to solve the enigma that was now driving me to desperation. My well-beloved was in a deadly peril. How could I save her? I saw that rapid and decided action was necessary. Should I return to England and watch the actions of the man I had known as Lieutenant Shacklock, or should I go on to Rome and try and discover something both regarding the object of Miller's journey there and the part of the Italian who, prior to his death, had consigned to me that mysterious packet?