"I have, as you may believe, thought the matter deeply over, for it was
evident to me that the news of my daughters' coming must have reached
their assailants beforehand. I was most unwilling to suspect treachery
on the part of any of my household, and came to the conclusion that the
warning was given in the way I have suggested.

"At the same time, Francisco, I thank you deeply for having mentioned
to me the suspicions you have formed, and although I think that you are
wholly mistaken, I certainly shall not neglect the warning, but shall
watch very closely the conduct of my daughters' gouvernante, and shall
take every precaution to put it out of her power to play me false, even
while I cannot, for a moment, believe she would be so base and
treacherous as to attempt to do so."

"In that case, signor, I shall feel that my mission has not been
unsuccessful, however mistaken I may be, and I trust sincerely that I
am wholly wrong. I thank you much for the kind way in which you have
heard me express suspicions of a person in your confidence."

The gravity with which the merchant had heard Francis' story vanished
immediately he left the room, and a smile came over his face.

"Boys are boys all the world over," he said to himself, "and though my
young friend has almost the stature of a man, as well as the quickness
and courage of one, and has plenty of sense in other matters, he has at
once the prejudices and the romantic ideas of a boy. Had Signora
Castaldi been young and pretty, no idea that she was treacherous would
have ever entered his mind; but what young fellow yet ever liked a
gouvernante, who sits by and works at her tambour frame, with a
disapproving expression on her face, while he is laughing and talking
with a girl of his own age. I should have felt the same when I was a
boy. Still, to picture the poor signora as a traitoress, in the pay of
that villain Mocenigo, is too absurd. I had the greatest difficulty in
keeping my gravity when he was unfolding his story. But he is an
excellent lad, nevertheless. A true, honest, brave lad, with a little
of the bluffness that they say all his nation possess, but with a heart
of gold, unless I am greatly mistaken."

At seven o'clock, Francis was just getting into his gondola to go round
again to Signor Polani's, when another gondola came along the canal at
the top of its speed, and he recognized at once the badge of the
Giustiniani. It stopped suddenly as it came abreast