at day.

When her joy had a little subsided, Teresina gazed with horror at the
Twins. They were indeed a terrifying spectacle. Ragged, thin,
encrusted with dirt, with their toes sticking through their worn-out
shoes, it is no wonder that she did not at once recognise the children
of the Marchese. Grasping them by the hands as if she would never again
let them go, Teresina hurried them toward the Hotel Due Croci Bianche,
which opened upon the square, followed by crowds of interested
spectators. The landlord himself, when the news reached him, came out
to greet the wanderers and conduct them to a room.

Teresina went with them, giving orders right and left as she flew down
the long corridor.

"It is for the Marchese Grifoni!" she cried to the bewildered servants,
as she hustled the children before her to the bath. "Bring soap, bring
towels, bring food, and for the love of Saint Anthony keep the wires hot
to the villa. Never mind the cost, for the lost is found. They will
reward you well. Tell them, for the love of Heaven, to bring clothes
for the Signorina and Don Beppo, and hurry, hurry, hurry!"

Then she shut the door upon her charges, and the process of purification
began. She rang the bell furiously a few moments later, and, opening
the door a crack, handed the servant who answered it a bundle, hastily
wrapped in newspaper.

"Their clothes," she said briefly. "The Marchesa must not see them.
Burn them at once!"

For one hour or more she scrubbed and shampooed, and all but boiled the
wanderers alive in her frantic efforts to get them clean before their
mother should be able to reach them.

At last a carriage, drawn by a pair of steaming black horses, dashed up
to the hotel, and the beautiful Marchesa, pale but radiant, sprang out
and, attended by the landlord himself, hurried to the room where her
lost ones waited to embrace her! Teresina opened the door, and,
stepping into the hall, left the mother and children together with no
human eye to see that meeting! Red-eyed herself, and wiping her nose
vigorously on her apron, she went down to tell the footman all the news,
and to get the bundle of clothes for the children, which in the haste
and excitement had been left in the carriage.

An hour later, the Marchesa and two very clean and happy children came
out of the hotel, followed by Teresina. The coachman, grinning, as
Teresina said, "like a cracked melon," greeted the children as if he
were an ol