d unembarrassed
when she met any one, turned strangely red, and hurried away, so that I
thought at once, 'Hollo! at length her hour has struck,' but I said not
a word, and the meeting went out of my head.

"But about a week later, I stood before my shop-door in the twilight
deciphering a letter I had just received, in which a friend in Rome
told me he had read aloud my sonnets at a meeting of a poetical
society--the 'Arcadia'--and that amidst general approval I had been
elected honorary member, which so surprised and pleased me, that for
the moment I was not aware of what was going on about me, till I heard
_Il Rosso's_ voice so loud and threatening that it woke me out of all
my cogitations. Looking up I saw him standing by the fountain not ten
yards from my door, pale as a corpse, and quite unlike the smart fellow
he used to be, and not far from where he was,--the pitcher that she had
intended to fill left standing on the edge of the fountain, and her
left hand pressing her side,--stood Erminia, and as it happened no one
else was in sight. I wondered what both could be about, as they had
avoided each other for months past. But _Il Rosso_ did not keep me long
in suspense. 'Hear me, Erminia,' he said, as though he were reading out
a sentence of death to some convicted criminal in the hearing of all
the world: 'It is lucky that we have met here. True we have no longer
any dealings with each other, but as I once loved you, even though you
trampled my love under your feet, I would still warn you. Take heed to
yourself, Erminia, and be careful what you do. I know one who has sworn
your death if any stranger ever carries off what you have refused to
your own people; and if we are not good enough to make you an
honourable wife, we are at least men enough to help a lost girl out of
the world; and so tell your fine gentleman to look out against
accidents, for the bullets we cast hereabouts can hit as well as those
of Swedish lead; and so God be with you, Erminia. I have nothing
further to say.'

"He pressed his hat on his brows, threw a glance around, and went off
with a quick step. The girl said not a word, and as for me I was so
bewildered by his passionate outburst, that not till she had lifted her
pitcher to her head, and was preparing to leave, did I regain the power
of speech. 'Erminia,' I said, going close up to her, 'who does he mean
by the stranger?' 'He is a fool,' she replied without looking at me,
but blushing deep