s remark.

"It's the supreme test. The man who is unchivalrous to a woman--"

"Oh, stow it! Take it to the Back Kitchen. It's no more a supreme test
than anything else. The Italians never were chivalrous from the first.
If you condemn him for that, you'll condemn the whole lot."

"I condemn the whole lot."

"And the French as well?"

"And the French as well."

"Things aren't so jolly easy," said Philip, more to himself than to her.

But for Harriet things were easy, though not jolly, and she turned upon
her brother yet again. "What about the baby, pray? You've said a lot of
smart things and whittled away morality and religion and I don't know
what; but what about the baby? You think me a fool, but I've been
noticing you all today, and you haven't mentioned the baby once. You
haven't thought about it, even. You don't care. Philip! I shall not
speak to you. You are intolerable."

She kept her promise, and never opened her lips all the rest of the way.
But her eyes glowed with anger and resolution. For she was a straight,
brave woman, as well as a peevish one.

Philip acknowledged her reproof to be true. He did not care about the
baby one straw. Nevertheless, he meant to do his duty, and he was fairly
confident of success. If Gino would have sold his wife for a thousand
lire, for how much less would he not sell his child? It was just a
commercial transaction. Why should it interfere with other things? His
eyes were fixed on the towers again, just as they had been fixed when he
drove with Miss Abbott. But this time his thoughts were pleasanter, for
he had no such grave business on his mind. It was in the spirit of the
cultivated tourist that he approached his destination.

One of the towers, rough as any other, was topped by a cross--the tower
of the Collegiate Church of Santa Deodata. She was a holy maiden of the
Dark Ages, the city's patron saint, and sweetness and barbarity mingle
strangely in her story. So holy was she that all her life she lay upon
her back in the house of her mother, refusing to eat, refusing to play,
refusing to work. The devil, envious of such sanctity, tempted her in
various ways. He dangled grapes above her, he showed her fascinating
toys, he pushed soft pillows beneath her aching head. When all proved
vain he tripped up the mother and flung her downstairs before her very
eyes. But so holy was the saint that she never picked her mother up, but
lay upon her back through all, and thus ass