his head on his forepaws.

"You see!" growled Ercole. "You cannot even tell whether it belonged to
the boy or to Corbario. An apoplexy on you! You understand nothing! Ill
befall the souls of your dead, you ignorant beast!"

Nino growled, but did not lift his head.

"You understand that," said Ercole, discontentedly. "If you were a
Christian you would stick a knife into me for insulting your dead! Yet
you cannot tell whose pocket-book this is! And if I knew, I should know
something worth knowing."

The pocket-book disappeared in the interior recesses of Ercole's
waistcoat. It was empty and bore no initial, and he could not remember
to have seen it in Corbario's or Marcello's hands, but he was quite
sure that it belonged to one of them. He was equally sure that if he
showed it to Corbario the latter would at once say that it was
Marcello's, and would take it away from him, so he said nothing about
it. He had found it in the sand, a little way up the bank, during his
first search after Marcello's disappearance.

Ercole's confidence in the good intentions of his fellow-men was not
great; he was quite lacking in the sort of charity which believeth all
things, and had a large capacity for suspicion of everybody and
everything; he held all men to be liars and most women to be something
worse.

"Men are at least Christians," he would say to Nino, "but a female is
always a female."

If he took a liking for any one, as for Marcello, he excused himself for
the weakness on the ground that he was only human after all, and in his
heart he respected his dog for snarling at everybody without
discrimination. There was no doubt, however, that he felt a sort of
attachment for the boy, and he admitted the failing while he deplored
it. Besides, he detested Corbario, and had felt that his own common
sense was insulted by the fact that Folco seemed devoted to Marcello.
The suspicion that Folco had got rid of his stepson in order to get his
fortune was therefore positively delightful, accompanied as it was by
the conviction that he should one day prove his enemy a murderer.
Perhaps if he could have known what Folco Corbario was suffering, he
might have been almost satisfied, but he had no means of guessing that.
In his opinion the man knew what had become of Marcello, and could be
made to tell if proper means were used. At night Ercole put himself to
sleep by devising the most horrible tortures for his master, such as no
fortitude cou