One evening—I believe, as I said, that it was after nearly six months' calm and temperate life that our troubles began—upon returning from my day's work, I found Virginia in a pensive mood. She accepted, but hardly returned, my salute, was very silent throughout the preparation and eating of our supper; now and then, glancing at her, I caught her gaze fixed upon me, and fancied that there was a hard light in her eyes. Our companions, Gioiachino and his wife Teresa, rallied us on what they thought to be one of those domestic differences common to the most affectionate couples. "A tiff, a tiff!" said they, nudging each other. "Virginia has caught him with the gardener's wife. We shall get no sleep to-night." This gardener's wife was an obese and asthmatic matron of some two-score years; who occupied a room in our little house, and was kinder to me than I cared for. It was not until Gioiachino and his Teresa were asleep that I could hope to discover what had affected Virginia. She then told me that, as she had been at work that afternoon, kneeling on the boards by the river with the other women, the Cavaliere Aquamorta with a party of gentlemen had come by the meadows and stopped to jest and bandy familiarities with the laundresses. Although he had pretended not to recognise her, Virginia was not deceived. Finding his opportunity, he drew near to her side, and whispered in her ear, "Can I believe my senses? You, my charming consort of a few weeks ago, in such a plight, in such a company!" Virginia had replied that the company had been of her own choosing up to this hour, and that what he complained of now could be remedied very easily, and by himself only. He said, "No, my honour will not allow it. I must needs remember what I might have made you, and what you have become. Count upon Aquamorta, who has never yet failed his friends. Count upon his memory and passionate aspirations."

"I told him," said Virginia, "that I should do nothing of the kind. I said that I was wife to a gentleman born, who also happened to be an honest man. 'If,' I said finally, 'you wish to do Virginia a real service, you will be pleased to forget that you ever saw her.' He laughed, and said that that was impossible to a man of his tumultuous passions, and went away with a profound salutation. This," said my poor Virginia, "has troubled me more than I care to own. I think we should be wise to leave Lucca until—evil wind that he is—he blows over."

Though I comforted her pretty well and bade her think no more about the man, I very soon had reason to be of her opinion. Two or three days later, as I was sawing planks in the yard, to make a trellis, that saturnine person came in, resplendently dressed, and filled the wholesome place with the reek of his essences. He saluted me with extravagant politeness, telling me that he had words for my private ear which he was sure would interest me. When I took little or no notice of him he came to closer quarters. "Hearken, Signor Manifold," says he, "my news concerns Donna Aurelia."

How he knew that sacred name I cannot conceive. It had never passed from my lips into his wicked ears. But I was unprepared for it, and started violently the moment I heard it. "Ha!" cried he, "now I have passed your guard, Don Francis, have I? Now perhaps you will do me the honour of conversing?" I blush to record that I led him within the workshop and begged him to be quick with his news.

There is no need for any reader of mine to tell me my duty. I ought not to have allowed her name to rest upon his mouth; I ought not to have allowed it to touch mine. I ought not to have remembered Aurelia, I ought not to have adored her. Was I not wedded? Was I not beloved? O God of Heaven and earth, if regrets did not avail me then, how can they avail me now? But I will no more look back than I will anticipate in this narrative. I will repeat with what face I can that I led this hardy ruffian into the workshop, cleared a bench for him to sit upon, and bade him tell his story.

Then said he, "My news would at any other time than this give you great pain, Don Francis, for it is not altogether to the credit of one to whom you have paid the most tender of your vows. But seeking, as I have always done, your honour and advantage, I feel that I shall really increase both of them by what I have to say. For if I remind you that you are a fortunate husband, it ought to enhance your consciousness of that fact when I go on to tell you that Donna Aurelia was unworthy of your attentions, since she took no pains to deserve them."

I said here that I knew beforehand his malice and the reasons for it. I said, "You have proved yourself already so unworthy of belief that I tell you now I shall not credit one word you say. How dare you speak of the unworthiness of any lady, being yourself the most worthless of men?"

He smiled, and continued, "What will you do, but thank God, my dear Don Francis, when I tell you that it was she herself who put Fra Palamone in your way? What will you say when you know that you were not intended to kill the Capuchin so that you might be chased out of Florence, as you have supposed, but instead, it was hoped that he would carry off Miss Virginia to her marchese? What will you now say to Donna Aurelia's share in that plot, when I tell you that she——"

He paused here, grinning his triumph.

"I will tell you what I have to say," I answered him, standing up with folded arms. "I say that you lie. You have never done anything but lie and cheat since the moment I saw you. You live by cheating, and will die lying. That is what I have to say. I salute you and beg you to be gone."

"The fair and cruel-kind Aurelia——" he began unconcernedly, but I struck the bench on which he sat.

"Cavaliere," I said, "if you speak one word more of that lady I shall kill you here in this place."

I had an adze in my hand, and I suppose he believed me, for he shrugged his shoulders, got up and walked out of the carpenter's shop. He had accomplished one part of his infamous design, at least. With every symptom of the most exquisite torture of mind I recalled throughout that day and night the lovely, fleeting, unattainable image of Aurelia Gualandi. She was fatally present, every bend and turn of her head, every motion of her bosom, the weaving of her hands, every flutter of her breath, every sigh, every flash of her eyes danced before me, mocking, deluding, beckoning, beguiling, enchanting me. My poor Virginia had reason to complain of my dejection, coldness, inattention, God knows! But He knows too, and will reward her for it, that the brave girl never once did complain. My torment endured atrociously all night, and all the next day; then subsided somewhat, and by the Sunday following was almost gone. On the Monday, moreover, I had something else to think of: this, namely——

On Monday evening, just as I was about to leave the yard, Virginia, with a hood over her head, came into it. This was extraordinary, and so did she appear—vividly coloured, with the eyes of one in a fever, but not alarmed; elated rather, and full of strong resolve. Before I could speak she put her finger to her lip, and said, "Hush! Come with me to the ramparts instead of going home. I have something to tell you." I followed her at once. The ramparts were very empty, as it was nearly dark. She took my arm and began to walk slowly under the trees, speaking calmly, mastering the excitement which she evidently suffered.

She said, "At noon to-day, after the dinner-hour, the padrona gave me three baskets of linen, and told me to carry them to their owners, with the bills which were pinned upon them. I put all three on my head and went away. The first errand was to the apartment of that old colonel of artillery, where I have often been before. I delivered the basket, unpacked it in his presence, received the money and my buona mano, and departed. The second took me to Don Filiberto, the parroco of Santa Lucia. As usual, he inquired after you, asked me that certain question which you know, gave me two whites, patted my cheek, and hoped for better news next week. When I came to look at my third basket, judge my dismay to find that it was addressed to the Cavaliere Aquamorta, at the Albergo del Sole. It was the largest by far—and that was why I had put it at the bottom—and had a substantial bill upon it, including the arrears of three weeks. I suppose he had planned it with the padrona, for I had never been to him before, and did not even know that we washed for him. However, there was no help for it. I must go.

"He received me with a grin, expressing surprise, which I knew he had not, and pleasure, which I fear he had. I was as unconcerned as I knew how to be, and began unpacking the linen; but he came behind me at once, and, kneeling beside me on one knee, began to be unpleasantly attentive, praising my beauty extravagantly, talking, joking, whispering—and worse—doing all he could, in fact, to make me as bad as he was. He owned that he had laid this 'little stratagem of love,' as he called it, and that the bill, far from being in arrear, had been paid, and twice paid. There, then, was the price of my betrayal. Then he spoke of you, Francis, asking whether I had discovered the cause of your recent distemperature. 'I have given him some news of his Aurelia of late,' he said, 'which may have inclined him to neglect a far more charming nymph.' I replied to that, that if he had put himself to the trouble of telling you lies of Donna Aurelia, there was no wonder that you were unhappy; for, says I, 'To have her name, which you held sacred, tripped off lips which you knew to be profane was a horrible thing.' He laughed at me, and called me his incorrigible charmer, his dearest tease, delight and provocation. He grew very attentive, and would have embraced me; whereupon, biding my time, I gave him such a slap in the left eye as he won't soon recover from. Then, while he was cursing me and calling for his servant, I made my escape."

I praised her warmly, as she deserved. She had done what became her with the only weapon she possessed. "The rest," I said, "is mine. I shall know how to maintain your honour and my own. This very night I shall send a friend to the cavaliere, and leave him the choice of weapons."

She stopped our walk, and faced me with agitation. "Dio mio, my lord, what are you saying?" I repeated my words, and she became dry, as she always did when she disapproved.

"Good, my lord," she said; "and may your handmaid know the name of the friend whom you propose to send with your cartel to the Cavaliere Aquamorta?"

I said that I should ask Gioiachino, our fellow-lodger, to oblige me.

"Excellent," said Virginia with irony, "excellent indeed! Gioiachino, a cat's-meat man, waits upon the Cavaliere Aquamorta on behalf of his friend Francesco, a journeyman carpenter!"

This made me more angry than I had any business to be, for she was perfectly right from the cavaliere's view of the thing. I said, "Virginia, my condition in this world has never been hidden from you. Apart from my birthright, which is an advantage not of my own making, I hope I have never been to you other than an honourable man. Gioiachino, who has been a good friend to you and me, certainly deserves no less credit. If a gentleman, as I claim to be, is condescending enough to send a person perfectly honest to a vulgar, libidinous, lying bully and cheat, who happens to have robbed to better purpose than I have worked— then, I say, you should agree with me that I am paying more honour to a thief than he can hope to deserve. I am sorry to have to speak so plainly to you, but it is not for you, any more than for me, to reproach Gioiachino with being an honest man."

She was silent for a few minutes, then knelt down and kissed my hand. When I raised her up and embraced her, I found tears on her cheeks. We walked home in the dark without another word said, and I prevailed upon Gioiachino to convey my challenge, though he did what he could to dissuade me. "This," he said, "is madness. Do you not know that the less your man is assured of his gentility the more exacting he will be in the profession of it? Do you know what will occur? He will call for some lacquey or another to kick me downstairs."

My answer to that was that such conduct to the bearer of a gentleman's cartel was unheard of. I added that if the cavaliere prided himself, against all evidence, upon being a gentleman, he was not at all likely to convict himself of being a ruffian. Very ruefully, in the end, the good-natured Gioiachino went out to oblige me.

It happens that I was right, or had good grounds for thinking so. The cavaliere received the poor fellow with perfect affability, and after a short colloquy with some of his companions, introduced a certain Prince Gandolfo Dolfini, with whom Gioiachino was to arrange a meeting in the fields for seven o'clock on the Wednesday morning. The cavaliere having the choice of weapons, his friend the prince decided for WHIPS.

If this was to make me feel ridiculous it failed. I was much too angry.
"Whips he shall have," said I, and went to bed.

On the morning appointed I rose at my usual hour and went to the workshop, intending to go on with my duties until the time appointed. I left Virginia in tears, and Teresa, no less wretched, clinging to her in her bed. At a quarter before seven, Gioiachino with me, armed with a stout cart-whip, I left the Porta del Vescovo and walked briskly over one or two water-meadows towards a retired grove of trees not far from the Pisa road. I flattered myself that we were first in the field; but there I was mistaken. I found a numerous company assembled—tall persons in cocked hats, coats and badges, a posse of police, and the villainous cavaliere smirking in the midst. So soon as we entered the grove he pointed to me with his cane and said in a loud voice: "There, Signor Sindaco, there is the fugitive assassin, the betrayer of an innocent girl. Speed him back to Tuscany with the added wages he has richly earned in Lucca." The police advanced, seized me, bound my wrists. An old gentleman without teeth read a long legal instrument without stops, at the end of which I was stripped to the shirt, horsed upon Gioiachino's back and vigorously whipped. I was then haled by my harsh executioners some league or more over the marshes to the confines of the Republic of Lucca and told to take myself out of sight unless I wished for more taste of the whip. Without prayers, without words, without a coat, without money, rich in nothing but innocence and despair, I reached the hillside and flung myself face downwards upon the sward. There I lay far into the night.