about the man except that he is an enemy of his
Holiness."

"He intends to present a petition to the Pope this morning,
nevertheless."

"Impossible!"

"Haven't you heard of it? These are his followers with the banners and
badges."

He pointed to the line of working-men who had ranged themselves about
the cab, with banners inscribed variously, "Garibaldi Club," "Mazzini
Club," "Republican Federation," and "Republic of Man."

"Your friend Antichrist," tipping a finger over his shoulder in the
direction of the palace, "has been taxing bread to build more
battleships, and Rossi has risen against him. But failing in the press,
in Parliament and at the Quirinal, he is coming to the Pope to pray of
him to let the Church play its old part of intermediary between the poor
and the oppressed."

"Preposterous!"

"So?"

"To whom is the Pope to protest? To the King of Italy who robbed him of
his Holy City? Pretty thing to go down on your knees to the brigand who
has stripped you! And at whose bidding is he to protest? At the bidding
of his bitterest enemy? Pshaw!"

"You persist that David Rossi is an enemy of the Pope?"

"The deadliest enemy the Pope has in the world."

II

The subject of the Frenchman's denunciation looked harmless enough as he
sat in his hackney carriage under the shadow of old Baron Leone's gloomy
palace. A first glance showed a man of thirty-odd years, tall, slightly
built, inclined to stoop, with a long, clean-shaven face, large dark
eyes, and dark hair which covered the head in short curls of almost
African profusion. But a second glance revealed all the characteristics
that give the hand-to-hand touch with the common people, without which
no man can hope to lead a great movement.

From the moment of David Rossi's arrival there was a tingling movement
in the air, and from time to time people approached and spoke to him,
when the tired smile struggled through the jaded face and then slowly
died away. After a while, as if to subdue the sense of personal
observation, he took a pen and oblong notepaper and began to write on
his knees.

Meantime the quick-eyed facile crowd around him beguiled the tedium of
waiting with good-humoured chaff. One great creature with a shaggy mane
and a sanguinary voice came up, bottle in hand, saluted the downcast
head with a mixture of deference and familiarity, then climbed to the
box-seat beside the driver, and in deepest bass